Churchill's Empire The World That Made Him and the World He Made [Paperback]

This is the first book to provide a comprehensive account of Churchill's lifelong involvement with the empire, from the early stages of his childhood that shaped his imperialist outlook to his emergence as a self-made hero. Instead of locating him on a left/right spectrum, Toye presents Churchill as a human being, a man whose imperialist outlook brought both acclaim and dread. Churchill was a powerful leader who believed in the strength of his race, but not necessarily the human racehe stood alone against Hitler, but he was also an imperialist who equated Gandhi with Hitler, celebrated racism, and believed India would always remain unsuited to democracy.

Toye traces Churchill's shifts and velleities with impressive skill and erudition, using a vast range of contemporary newspapers to particularly good effect (Literary Review). Toye, named Young Academic Author of the Year byTimes Higher Educationmagazine in 2007, has synthesized the details of Churchill's life to produce a thought-provoking, sensitive account of the nerve and muscle of empire (Daily Express).

Superb, unsettling new history .... Can these clashing Churchills be reconciled? Do we live, at the same time, in the world he helped to save and the world he helped to trash? Toye, one of Britain's smartest young historians, has tried to pick through these questions dispassionately .... Of course, it's easy to dismiss any criticism of these actions as anachronistic. Didn't everybody in Britain think that way then? One of the most striking findings of Toye's research is that they really didn't: even at the time, Churchill was seen as standing at the most brutal and brutish end of the British imperialist spectrum .... Toye is no Nicholson Baker, the appalling pseudo-historian whose recent workHuman Smokepresented Churchill as no different from Hitler. Toye sees all this, clearly and emphatically .... In the end, the words of the great and glorious Churchill who reló¦