Andrew Roberts
Passages to India
Conservative Politics in National and Imperial Crisis: Letters from Britain to the Viceroy of India 1926–31
By Stuart Ball (ed)
Ashgate 436pp £100
Between 1926 and 1931 Edward Wood, Lord Irwin – better known as Lord Halifax, foreign secretary at the time of the Munich Agreement of 1938 and the man who could have been prime minister instead of Winston Churchill in May 1940 – served as viceroy of India. Irwin had been a member of the Conservative Cabinet before Stanley Baldwin appointed him viceroy and was well connected outside politics too, as a friend of several members of the royal family and of such people as Geoffrey Dawson, editor of The Times. During his half-decade in New Delhi, where Sir Edwin Lutyens built a magnificent new viceregal palace for him, Irwin received a large number of letters from many of the most eminent Tory politicians of the day. The distinguished academic Stuart Ball has selected from and edited this correspondence with scholarship and skill to produce a fascinating insight into British politics at a time of acute economic and imperial crises.
The period during which these letters were written saw the General Strike, the Wall Street Crash, the start of the Great Depression, the Tory defeat in the 1929 general election and Ramsay MacDonald’s formation of the National Government and subsequent expulsion from the Labour Party. Meanwhile in New Delhi, Irwin
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
Delighted by this review from @alexander_c_lee in @Lit_Review, and his excellent insights about the challenge set by Pico's thought. Finding the right reader is a book's greatest blessing.
Out now! Literary Review's February 2025 issue, featuring
Ritchie Robertson on W G Sebald
@francisbeckett on miners
@nclarke14 on the colour pink
@TheoZenou on the Pope
Michael Burleigh on Huawei
and much, much more:
Literary Review - For People Who Devour Books
In the Current Issue: Peter Marshall on the Peasants' War * Philip Snow on Hiroshima * Jonathan Sumption on free...
literaryreview.co.uk
Two great bags for your books. Our Literary Review tote bags feature an illustration of our beloved, book-filled office on Lexington Street. Only £10 (lightweight) or £15 (sturdy) at our online shop
http://literaryreview.co.uk/shop