Blood, Class, and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Ironies [Hardcover]

Christopher Hitchens (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 11, 1990

America's "special relationship" with Britain goes largely unexamined. The author shows that the "special" ingredient in the relationship is a compound of empire, transmitted from an ancient regime that has tried to preserve and renew itself thereby.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Author and journalist Hitchens, Washington editor for Harper's and a columnist for The Nation, sees empire as a binding theme of the "special relationship" between Britain and the United States, and Britain's canny attempt to "play Greece to America's Rome" as a controlling factor in the relationship. Hitchens examines critical points in American history and politics since 1898 to demonstrate his points. America's love of royalty and long love affair with Churchillian rhetoric have created popular support of what Hitchens sees as very much an alliance of aristocracies, with class a key element. The book is somewhat disorganized and often pointlessly sarcastic, but on balance it is a thought-provoking overview of an interesting and significant topic. For consideration by medium-sized and large libraries.
- Nancy C. Cridland, Indiana Univ. Libs., Bloomington
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 1st edition (June 11, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374114439
• ISBN-13: 978-0374114435
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.4 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #941,811 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Christopher Hitchens (1949-2011) was the author of Letters to a Young Contrarian, and the bestseller No One Left to Lie To: The Values of the Worst Family. A regular contributor to Vanity Fair, The Atlantic Monthly and Slate, Hitchens also wrote for The Weekly Standard, The National Review, and The Independent, and appeared on The Daily Show, Charlie Rose, The Chris Matthew's Show, Real Time with Bill Maher, and C-Span's Washington Journal. He was named one of the world's "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" by Foreign Policy and Britain's Prospect.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Informative and revealing. Churchill sank the "Lusitania"!, January 31, 2002

By 

David H. Myers (Fremont, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Blood, Class, and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Ironies (Hardcover)

This is an explication of a notion most citizens think they already know and believe they understand intuitively. This was my feeling as, in the course of browsing I examined the only book by Christopher Hitchens on my local library shelf. I was frankly disappointed, looking to this author for controversy and insight. Or should I say outrageousness? As in the case of his well reasoned but totally pointless indictment of Henry Kissinger for war crimes. Anyway, finding the topic uninspiring and disinclined to go to the bother to check it out, but having the time, I read the first 2 chapters and was genuinely astonished to find the book truly engaging! Now that I've finished it, and although I'm unsure if I agree with the author that the direction of the circumstances of the relationship between the 2 countries were NOT inevitable, I think knowing the subject in detail is most worthwhile. The author thinks there were occasions when we were free of the Old World notions of class and the imperial style of politics they engender, and in the position to resist these notions. And that we'd be better for it if we had. It seems to me conventional thinking labels this attitude isolationism and inevitably resists it as parochial. But the idea that we should be (or should have been) strict in defining Americanism ourselves, and resist Old World insinuations as to the course it should follow is, indeed, insightful. And the historic detail is truly enlightening. Altogether this IS a very interesting, if not startling, book.

5 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thanks again, Hitchens., July 6, 2000

By 

Timmy Church - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blood, Class, and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Ironies (Hardcover)

"Boom! Pow! That's the way it all goes down when C.H. comes to town!" "That's an odd thing for Charlie Rose to say," I remarked to my wife, Sunderquist, the other day. Well, my apologies Mr Rose, you were right on. Right on the money! Hitchens, the leading attack dog of the sensible left, fixes his eye on Brittania and plucks big. Where else were we to learn that Evelyn Waugh thought Buck Henry was "kind of queer"? Not from Highlights, I'll tell you that, Sunderquist. Gracefully turned on high quality pulp and written in English this book sure beats Cleopatra's Needle, with a stick. A big metal stick that really cuttingly insults what it's about to smash. Yeah.

6 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not too bad, considering it is Hitchens, May 12, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Blood, Class, and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Ironies (Hardcover)

Recently, we have had some insight into the personality of Mr. Hitchens, including an account in the New Yorker of what it is like to attend a meeting with him. Unfortunately, he has proven to Katha Pollitt that he is anti-women (and thus anti-minorities), and so we must regard Hitchens as an enemy to progressive politics. However, he has a great deal of interest to say about his birth nation, and I find it curious that his own brother is a conservative journalist. There are many revelations in this book, and I can recommend it to anyone interested in the man behind the torrent of journalism (some of it published in conservative publications) that continues week after week.