Reviewing The English World¹ in the Times Literary Supplement, the historian Theodore Zeldin wrote that it confirmed his view that “a national perspective cannot be sustained in historical study much longer,” that nations are not, and never were, “distinct entities.” “All our instincts tell us that there is something different between a German and an Italian, but then all our instincts tell us that the earth is flat.” If that analogy were correct, we should all be flat-earthers now. For it is not our instincts alone but history itself that tells us there is indeed “something different” between a German and an Italian—and something different between both of them and an Englishman.

Were it not for the tendency among some historians to belittle and even deny the idea of nationality, the present book—folio-sized, beautifully printed, and lavishly illustrated—might simply take its place among the more worthy coffee-table books of the season. As it is, it assumes a larger significance. The truisms of one time become the bold affirmations of another. The very title, The English World: History, Character, and People, is a challenge to the “new historian,” for whom the idea of an “English world” is as outmoded as the idea of “character.” And the brief introduction by the editor, Robert Blake, is a wanton provocation, starting with a quotation from Churchill to Ribbentrop, the German ambassador on the eve of the war, “England is a curious country and few foreigners can understand her mind,”