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constancemn's review against another edition
4.0
Actually an excellent review of this history (at least for someone educated in America, most of this material was not stuff we learned as kids).
rjvrtiska's review against another edition
3.0
England's history at a break-neck pace. Dickens has no qualms about interjecting his opinion of the character of England's major players. His voice makes a rather dry recounting a bit more palatable.
mindym99's review against another edition
4.0
Charles Dickens throwing shade at nearly every British monarch? Yes, please!
octavia_cade's review against another edition
4.0
Charles Dickens is a judgemental bitch, and I love him for it. You only have to read his novels to know that he was judgemental, and that all his contempt was reserved for those who mistreated the weak. His rants on the evils of poverty, for instance, are many and heartfelt. It is no surprise, then, that in his volume of English history, written for children, his sympathies are almost entirely for the common people, who are starved, murdered, exploited, and forced into wars in the service of rulers who are as vicious as they are cruel, and who are almost to a man utterly untrustworthy. When he actually approves of a ruler it is a notable thing.
This book is nearly 400 pages of scorn and disgust, a series of extremely unflattering portraits of rather repulsive people. I do believe my favourite description relates to Henry the Eighth, whom Dickens calls as "a most intolerable ruffian, a disgrace to human nature, and a blot of blood and grease upon the History of England." There's more than one place where he describes the inexplicable survival of one of the royal louts and their lackeys and admits it might have been better for everyone had a raging mob pulled them to bits (I rather got the sense of wistful sighs). And, you know, those near 400 pages of inflicted miseries can become a little repetitive, and the history itself is very thin and not perhaps completely accurate, but the judgemental bitching, and the general humanism behind the complaints, makes it worth the read.
This book is nearly 400 pages of scorn and disgust, a series of extremely unflattering portraits of rather repulsive people. I do believe my favourite description relates to Henry the Eighth, whom Dickens calls as "a most intolerable ruffian, a disgrace to human nature, and a blot of blood and grease upon the History of England." There's more than one place where he describes the inexplicable survival of one of the royal louts and their lackeys and admits it might have been better for everyone had a raging mob pulled them to bits (I rather got the sense of wistful sighs). And, you know, those near 400 pages of inflicted miseries can become a little repetitive, and the history itself is very thin and not perhaps completely accurate, but the judgemental bitching, and the general humanism behind the complaints, makes it worth the read.
nikkigee81's review against another edition
3.0
Very long and a bit dense, but no less readable for all that. Dickens takes one through the monarchs of England, up to Queen Victoria. Some of the reigns were quite bloody, and for a child to read, is rather shocking. Some of the kings were hard to differentiate, but I still thought it was rather good, especially with the Dickensian flair and commentary.
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