Pelican S. Series

This text looks at the people, ideas and events between the Great Exhibition of 1851 and the Second Reform Act of 1867. From "John Arthur Roebuck and the Crimean War," and "Samuel Smiles and the Gospel of Work" to "Thomas Hughes and the Public Schools" and "Benjanmin Disraeli and the Leap in the Dark," Asa Briggs provides an assessment of Victorian achievements; and in doing so conjures up an enviable picture of the progress and independence of the last century.
"For expounding this theme, this interaction of event and personality, Mr. Briggs is abundantly and happily endowed. He is always readable, often amusing, never facetious. He is widely read and widely interested. He has a sound historic judgment, and an unfailing sense for what is significant in the historic sequence and what is merely topical. . . . Above all, he is in sympathy with the age of which he is writing." "Times Literary Supplement""

A Social History of England

by Asa Briggs

Published 15 September 1983

Ranging widely over time and place, Asa Briggs highlights continuities and changes in society in England from prehistory to the present day. Literature, art and politics are investigated as aspects and gauges of human experience; research in related disciplines is discussed and changes in historical interpretations explained. The author also offers his own, personal, view of social history.

Victorian Cities

by Asa Briggs

Published May 1968

In 1837, in England and Wales, there were only five provincial cities of more than 100,000 inhabitants. By 1891 there were twenty-three. Over the same period London's population more than doubled.

In this companion volume to Victorian People and Victorian Things, Lord Briggs focuses on the cities of Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, Middlesbrough, Melbourne (an example of a Victorian community overseas) and London, comparing and contrasting their social, political and topographical development. Full of illuminating detail, Victorian Cities presents a unique social, political and economic bird's-eye view of the past.