The Decline, Revival and Fall of the British Empire

Many notable books have arisen from those who have delivered the Ford Lectures at Oxford subsequently revising their material for publication. The fame of other series of Ford Lectures, which their authors for one reason or another chose to leave unpublished, has depended on the impact which they made on the audience at the time. Until the appearance of this book, the lectures which the late John Gallagher delivered in 1974 fell into that category. Those, like the present reviewer, who were not fortunate enough to hear them have often been told how much they missed. Now Gallagher's lectures join those of Namier and McFarlane in being published posthumously some years after they were delivered. As the centrepiece of this book in memory of Gallagher, who died in 1980 at the distressingly early age for a historian of 61, Dr Anil Seal prints a version of the lectures, apparently derived from the speaker's notes.