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Andrew Roberts
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Salisbury: Victorian Titan Hardcover – January 1, 2000

by Andrew Roberts (Author)
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Writing with complete access to Salisbury's archive at Hatfield House, as well as using the papers of more than 140 of Salisbury's contemporaries, Andrew Roberts explores every aspect of the man: his marriage for love, his caustic journalism, his distinctive philosophy of Toryism and his depression, ironic humour and dazzling intellect.
Salisbury's was a turbulent fifty-year career, during which he won over Disraeli, destroyed Lord Randolph Churchill, brought Edward VII to heel, wrecked Gladstone's hopes for Irish Home Rule, offered secret deals to Tsar Nicholas II, saw off Otto von Bismarck and saw through Kaiser Wilhelm II.
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  1. Print length
    938 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd
  4. Publication date
    January 1, 2000
  5. Dimensions
    6.75 x 2 x 9.5 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0297817132
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0297817130
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Andrew Roberts took a first in Modern History at Cambridge. He has been a professional historian since the publication of his life of Lord Halifax , The Holy Fox, in 1991. He contributes regularly to the Sunday Telegraph. Lives in Knightsbridge, London, and has two children. His Salisbury won the Wolfson History Prize in 2000. He published Napoleon and Wellington in 2001.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd; First Edition (January 1, 2000)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 938 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0297817132
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0297817130
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.22 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.75 x 2 x 9.5 inches
  • Customer Reviews:

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Andrew Roberts

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Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
53 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

James E. Mckinney
5.0 out of 5 stars A REMARKABLE BIOGRAPHY OF A REMARKALBE MAN
Reviewed in the United States on March 22, 2015
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Robert Arthur,Talbot Gascoyne Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury was very likely England's greatest 19th Century Prime Minister particularly in foreign affairs. I rank him above other 19th century greats, Melbourne, Palmerston, Disraeli and Gladstone.He was a direct descendant of the two Cecils who so ably served Queen Elizabeth I and served as PM longer than any of his predecessors.

He was an extraordinary man completely at home in the highest ranks of the English nobility caring nothing about other's opinion of him. He was completely disdainful of all honors refusing twice two offers of Dukedoms by his Queen, Victoria and accepting only the Garter and the Chancellorship of Oxford. He dressed so badly that upon occasion he was not recognized as the PM.

It was he, not Disraeli, who managed the Congress of Berlin. Salisbury also foretold the massacre of General Gordon and his troops at Khartoum.

Salisbury was a very secretive man preferring to handle diplomatic matters by private rather than public correspondence. Like Mrs.Clinton he kept foreign correspondence at his 65 bedroom home, Hatfield, rather than at the Foreign Office, the Secretary of which he often served while holding the office PM.

A master of the English language and possessed of a mordant wit. Commenting on the endless controversies over fishing rights to the
Newfoundland Banks, he observed that "it was a pity that the fish lacked the good taste to live in warmer waters." After the Italians'defeat at battle of Adowa he bemoaned the Italians talent for losing.

During his many years as PM he dealt with the problems of Irish Home rule, the Fashoda crisis and the Boer War. He was also PM on both Victoria's Golden and Diamond Jubilees. His relations with that queen grew warmer as the years rolled by and matured to mutual respect and friendship.

This a very long book, 850 pages of text, 30 pages of chapter notes and a 23 page bibliography. The photographs of the leading personages of the day are wonderful and there are excellent maps and a family tree.

This is a very log book, however, not to be read casual readers. For me its principal interest was in Salisbury himself rather than on the lengthy descriptions of the political problems of the day. '.Hats off to the author, Andrew Roberts, all of whose books are superb.
15 people found this helpful
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A Florida Reader
5.0 out of 5 stars Very Challenging to Read, but Very Much Worth the Effort
Reviewed in the United States on January 22, 2017
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Written in that very British style of lots of commas, convoluted sentence structure and many very big words on those 850 pages of the main body that sent me scurrying to the Internet, it was very the less an extraordinarily good book. Very challenging even if you have a decent grounding in British governmental history of the 19th Century, but well worth the effort.
5 people found this helpful
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ppasmy
5.0 out of 5 stars Salisbury "Brilliant Bluffer"
Reviewed in the United States on October 7, 2015
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An excellent and informative review of a remarkable British Prime Minister. Not necessarily easy reading for an Irishman but demonstrates the brilliance of the empire builders and the Bluff, which in Salisbury's own words was used to maintain their conquests.
2 people found this helpful
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PJ
5.0 out of 5 stars You gotta love Victorian political history but if you do this magnificent ...
Reviewed in the United States on May 4, 2016
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You gotta love Victorian political history but if you do this magnificent biography covers it all. He was actually the TRUE king of England for much of the time Queen Victoria ruled.
2 people found this helpful
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Andrew Roberts
5.0 out of 5 stars Bigraphy at its best!
Reviewed in the United States on November 25, 2014
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A work of genius, but then I did write it so that's not entirely objective!
13 people found this helpful
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Samuel Romilly
3.0 out of 5 stars Important but pedestrian
Reviewed in the United States on January 28, 2017
This is an undoubtedly an important book as it provides virtually the only biography of an important but largely forgotten politician and prime minister. The research has been prodigious, and the sources are mined to effect. It is a titan of a book whether or not the subject was a titan also.

And yet, and yet. There is a major problem with it. It lacks interest. I struggled with it. I also struggle with why I struggled. What is its defect? It was not just the length, nor the compass. I was reading in tandem Norman Gash's magisterial biography of that largely forgotten and even more important titan, Robert Peel. Gash's two volumes are even longer that Roberts's one, but they never flag. Maybe Peel is intrinsically more interesting as a man and as a politician, but it is more than that. Gash has sparkle as well as scholarship. Roberts has only the latter. The style is competent but without verve. I do not like saying it, but it is pedestrian. He plods through Salisbury's worthy life. Perhaps less detail, perhaps a shorter book, perhaps a sketch would have been more effective. I know! It reminds me of those titanic Victorian bibliographies that lie heavy on library shelves gathering dust, worthy like their subjects, but dull ( a little like The Guardian - although that is not a comparison of which Roberts would approve)

I have laid this book aside at page 233 and am unlikely ever to read the remaining 619 pages (not including the almost hundred pages of notes and bibliography and index). The only book that has had a similar dulling effect on me was many years ago when I failed to finish the massive tomb of another Victorian Titan, Karl Marx. I am afraid to compare anything with Das Kapital is damming with feint praise.
3 people found this helpful
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Emilio J Morales
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on August 22, 2014
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Excellent book written by Roberts about this great Victorian statesman; a great read
2 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

Guy N Stevenson
4.0 out of 5 stars Lively and detailed account of this Victorian Giant
Reviewed in Canada on December 2, 2020
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I loved this book. I’m a big fan of Andrew Roberts from his previous works. Wonderfully detailed account of the life of Salisbury, an overlooked PM of Britain, despite the fact he was Prime Minister for 13 years between 1895 and 1902, often thought of as Pax Britannica. This is one of Robert’s earlier works from 1999. He ages like a fine bottle of wine, nevertheless his earlier works are very well written and extremely well researched. One walks away feeling you actually knew Salisbury.
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HBH
5.0 out of 5 stars Very Good
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 16, 2008
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Salisbury by Andrew Roberts is a masterful work on a giant of the Victorian political scene. It is an in-depth, but not intimidating work which is easy to read and has good pace. It deals with one of the longest serving British Prime Ministers who won three large election victories, introduced a number of reforms and extended the British Empire but always looked on the negative side of events and believed that change was to be avoided at all costs until absolutely necessary. This biography tries to explain how Salisbury dealt with being a politician with this inherrent negativity at a time of great social and political change. All in all a very good book which is not as politically biased as some of Anderew Roberts' other works.
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful book on a magnificent subject
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 11, 2022
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This is an excellent biography on a much neglected figure. It was notable that it was quite hard to find this on an Amazon search compared with Roberts' biographies of Churchill and George III who are more "famous". From the perspective of 20th and 21st century welfare state liberal politics, the big figure in late Victorian English politics is of course Gladstone. He was the "progressive" before the word had been coined and introduced (almost) everything the Labour party later took up and expanded. Salisbury was the man who saw the negative direction that this would later take the country at a time when few did. The fact that he has largely been forgotten demonstrates how his genuine conservative approach (meaning conserving what is worth conserving and not ripping everything up because it is traditional) no longer has any supporters at all. Including, conspicuously, in the party that currently goes by the name of being Conservative. And for those who believe that Disraeli was Victoria's favourite Prime Minister, please have a read and discover that in fact it was Salisbury.
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars A magnum opus
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 14, 2022
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Andrew Roberts is incredibly gifted in his depth of research and gripping style of writing. The best biography of one of the greatest P.M.s of all time.
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J Price
3.0 out of 5 stars A Titan of a book in more ways than one!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 12, 2013
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I am glad I bought the KIndle version; someone gave me the paperback but it is far too heavy to read in bed and too big in the suitcase for holiday reading (you'd need to be away for a month, anyway). It is very heavy going to boot!
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