This Sceptred Isle: The Dynasties: Dynasties - Britain's Most Powerful Families (BBC Radio Collection)

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Christopher Lee

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Pages: 288 (Hardcover)

ISBN: 0563537485

Pub: BBC Books

Pub date: 2002-02-07

Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 438242

Editorial Review:

This Sceptred Isle: The Dynasties is Christopher Lee's third book on British history taken from BBC Radio 4 series. The first was a bracing gallop through the centuries from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria, the second a more leisurely chronicle of the country in the 20th century. Both were solidly traditional in their commitment to narrative and to the decisive impact of great men (and, occasionally, great women) on events. This third book on the country's most powerful families necessarily makes even clearer Lee's belief that the story of the nation is to be found in the actions of great individuals. From the Godwines of late Anglo-Saxon England through the Mortimers of medieval warfare and the Cecils of Tudor politicking to the Churchills and Russells of more modern times, he traces the stories of 15 power-broking families in a series of self-contained chapters. The book has its faults. Because many of the families coincided in the times of their greatness, the reader gets some of the same stories (from the Glorious Revolution, for example) told again and again beyond the point where repetition seems valuable. There are too many paragraphs outlining aristocratic genealogy in the sort of detail that only those who read Burke's Peerage for pleasure will find enjoyable. But Lee's narrative skill, his sense of character and gift for choosing the stories to best illustrate it, all combine to produce a book that conveys vividly, and often brilliantly, the power that a handful of families have wielded in British history. --Nick Rennison

Reader Reviews:

Almost unlistenable (4/4 people found this helpful)

There's a reason why the BBC withdrew the entire 'Dynasties' audiobook range from sale: it simply doesn't work, on any level. If you're a specialist in Anglo-Saxon history, then this coverage will be far too shallow for you. If, on the other hand, you last learnt about the Anglo-Saxons at school, and your memory is little more than a list of words such as Harold, Hastings, thegn, Ethelred, Offa, Canute etc, then you will very quickly be overwhelmed by the explosion of new names that Anna Massey throws at you right from the start. It may, just possibly, work on the printed page, but in audiobook form it is hopeless. You very quickly lose track of who did what to whom, and you give up caring.

History as a football commentary (12/15 people found this helpful)

Imagine you're watching a football game on television and the tube goes. This book is like that, you're told who's passing to whom, but not why, or how gracefully they did it. I can't comment on the factual accuracy of this book - perhaps that's where its strengths lie. (Something must have persuaded the BBC to put it on!) The prose is dire, the editing poor - attitudes and attributes are assigned to characters on one page and the opposite the next - its all a turbulent mess.

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