Restoration Politics, Religion, and Culture: Britain and Ireland, 1660-1714 (2009)

Description:

This indispensable introductory guide offers students a number of highly focused chapters on key themes in Restoration history. Each addresses a core question relating to the period 1660-1714, and uses artistic and literary sources - as well as more traditional texts of political history - to illustrate and illuminate arguments. George Southcombe and Grant Tapsell provide clear analyses of different aspects of the era whilst maintaining an overall coherence based on three central propositions:
- 1660-1714 represents a political world fundamentally influenced by the civil wars and interregnum
- The period can best be understood by linking together types of evidence too often separated in conventional accounts
- The high politics of kings and their courts should be examined within broader social and geographical contexts

Featuring chapters on the exclusion crisis, Charles II and James VII/II, as well as the British dimension, restoration culture, and politics out-of-doors, this is essential reading for anyone studying this fascinating period in British history.

Brief description: GEORGE SOUTHCOMBE is British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow, Faculty of History and Somerville College, Oxford, UK.

Review Quotes:
"An impressive text - extremely well organized and highly readable." - Professor Melinda Zook, Purdue University
"This book is without doubt the most student-friendly of recent accounts of the Restoration period. It is well written, with a light and engaging style, and deftly argued." - Dr David Scott, History of Parliament Trust, UK
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