TRADITIONS AND MEN

New Zealand Listener, Volume 37, Issue 940, 16 August 1957, Page 17

TRADITIONS AND MEN

ENGLAND'S PRECEDENCE, by William McElwee; Hodder, and Stoughton, English price 21/-. \WILLIAM McELWEE is an historian with a good professional record, and he knows his way around effectively among the sources of 17th century British history. This book, however, is professedly based on other men’s research, and aims to tell coherently of a crucial period which.is now so set about with excellent books that the shape of the whole has become obscured. The subject matter is "the most important achievement in all English history," namely, "the establishment of a workable system of representative government, and of the essential political freedoms." The narrative is basically personal, and deals with men, not with trends. It presents a lively pageant of understandable individuals whose calculations, good sense, passions and mistakes are set forth in deft and vigorous strokes. Traditions and men _ are _ shrewdly re-assessed, and there are clues to deeper interpretations. If there is a criticism, it is that Mr McElwee has not dug sufficiently into the gaps left by his great predecessors, nor, perhaps, fully incorporated the results of some recent research into social and economic trends. One looks in vain for a firm explanation of why the fenland should suddenly sprout invincible soldiers, and of how it was that King Pym could suddenly arouse the frightening Frankenstein of a London mob howling for blood at the word of command. Nor are the foundations explored of that solid social structure that could endure a century of civil strife and yet remain stable through the storms of 18th century controversy. Yet what remains is a brave and important story, well worth a fresh and forthright re-

telling.

F. L. W.

Wood