Little Englanders: Britain in the Edwardian Era – Alwyn Turner

When Queen Victoria died in 1901 it was the end of an era.  In this illustrated talk, Alwyn Turner reconsiders the Edwardian era as a time of profound social change with the rise of women’s suffrage and the labour movement, unrest in Ireland and the Boer republics, scandals in parliament and culture wars at home. He tells the story of the Edwardians through music halls and male beauty contests, the real Peaky Blinders and the 1908 Summer Olympics.  This colourful, detailed entertaining social history shows that, though the golden Victorian age was in the past, the birth of modern Britain was only just beginning.

“Britain’s most electrifying contemporary social historian conjures the forgotten country of more than a century ago … fiercely recommended” – Alan Moore

“The Edwardians have long been the lost decade of British history, yet they are that history at its climax. Alwyn Turner sets the record straight, bringing its characters, strains and stresses brilliantly to life” – Simon Jenkins