Charles Dickens is perhaps the most beloved figure of British literary heritage. His writing has become a revered aspect of Great Britain’s national identity, one entrenched with the warm Victorian traditions of family, hearth and home. Michael Slater, in his new biography, The Great Charles Dickens Scandal connects Dickens’ celebrity with
It is 1919, the First World War has just ended, and people are at a genuine loss— but in Bedford, a group of middle-class English women have a solution: they form a new religion. They choose Mabel Barltrop, a widow recently released from the asylum, as their leader. They name
This morning The Wall Street Journal ran a very positive review of Joel Mokyr’s “The Enlightened Economy”, a wedding of economics and intellectual history that examines the “Industrial Enlightenment” of 17th century Britain. Reviewer Trevor Butterworth applauds Mokyr’s book for its “densely packed but gratifyingly lucid prose” in explaining Britain’s