History Today

Why did the Industrial Revolution begin in Britain when it did? How quickly and decisively did it transform industrial technology, class relations and living standards? 

Although there has always been a public eager to read or hear the narration of past events, the 'History Men' - scholars writing professional history based on original sources - are a relatively new breed.

‘Kill not Moth nor Butterfly, For the Last Judgement draweth nigh’ wrote William Blake in Auguries of Innocence, reflecting the changing perception of man’s relation to the natural world.

Donald Watt cautions against a history which abandons the study of historical realities in favour of intellectual abstractions.

Peter Clarke presents a review of the historiography on the topic.

Edward Countryman explores the relationship between cinematic images and the American history.

Christopher Hill continues the forum on words historians use by arguing that things exist before words describe them.

Gillian Williams on the promise of watercolourist and engraver, Wenceslaus Hollar, when he petitioned Charles II to allow him to accompany the British Ambassador on an expedition to Morocco, that he 'would examine all and take designs, and give his Majesty much better satisfaction'.

Films interest the modern historian for they reflect the preoccupations and conventions of an age. In this article, Jeffrey Richards shows how the British cinema-goer in the 1930s saw the world according to the British Board of Censors.