Disraeli [Hardcover]

Christopher Hibbert (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 4, 2004

The masterly biography of one of the most fascinating men of the nineteenth century, Benjamin Disraeli, concentrating on his long and interesting private life: written by 'our outstanding popular historian' [A.N.Wilson]. Superb politician, orator, writer and wit, Benjamin Disraeli was -- according to Queen Victoria -- 'the kindest Minister' she had ever had, who 'reached the top of the greasy pole' [in his own words] despite considerable antisemitism. He enjoyed many scandalous affairs before marrying a widow twelve years older than himself -- an extremely eccentric woman to whom he remained deeply and touchingly devoted for the rest of his life. Disraeli had never intended to be a politician. He had begun his astonishing career by working unenthusiastically in a lawyer's office; he had tried unsuccessfully to found a newspaper; he had written a novel which lay unproductively in the publisher's office. A conspicuous dandy, sprightly, attentive and witty, he was attractive to women, enjoying many liaisons until he contracted a venereal disease in a St James's Street brothel. He married in 1839. 'Dizzy married me for my money,' Mary Anne used to say. 'But, if he had the chance again, he would marry me for love.'They lived in a large country house, Hughenden Manor, near High Wycombe, which he bought with mostly borrowed money, and soon became one of the most gifted of parliamentarians and as celebrated as any politician in England. As an antidote to his grief at his wife's death in 1872 he threw himself back into the political life, becoming Prime Minister for the second time in 1874, displacing Gladstone much to the Queen's delight.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Veteran historian Hibbert summons up the ghost of Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881), who along with Gladstone dominated English politics in the Victorian era. Hibbert finds Disraeli's character and personal history intriguing, and the reader will agree. Disraeli was the consummate outsider to the English ruling caste: he was from the wrong class, the wrong schools, the wrong ancestry (the scalding remarks of Disraeli's enemies reminded him all his life of his Jewish origins). Yet Disraeli's ambition and brilliance made him prime minister and a favorite of Queen Victoria. The author has chosen hundreds of quotations from contemporary sources; written by, to or about Disraeli, these excerpts bring the era to life. All who wrote about Disraeli's powers of oratory stressed how spellbinding he was in the House of Commons. Disraeli himself joined in this chorus, characterizing each of his oratorical triumphs as his greatest achievement to date. Hibbert (The English: A Social History) plainly appreciates Disraeli's many abilities (self-assurance, eloquence, gregariousness) as well as his deficits (cynicism, vanity). This is an adroitly written evocation of a compelling but enigmatic personality, a man whose ambition, idealism and opportunism would not seem out of place on the political scene today. (May 30)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Two-time British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli (1804-81) was a literary and political fame seeker whose story biographers have regularly visited. British historian Hibbert amplifies Disraeli's private life and drastically mutes his public career, a pattern in the veteran author's series of "personal" biographies of British figures. Thus Disraeli's sowing of wild oats, sartorial vanity, conversational wit, and voluble correspondence consume Hibbert's writing, which faithfully reflects the flamboyant Disraeli's engendering of devotion, distaste, and anti-Jewish prejudice. Born into comfortable but not extravagant circumstances, the young Disraeli eschewed the conventional occupation of political prominence, lawyer, instead attracting attention as a society novelist. Disraeli entered the House of Commons in 1837 heavily in debt. Marriage to a wealthy widow, a match, according to Hibbert, that was happy as well as convenient, permitted Disraeli to concentrate on politics and his jousts with William Gladstone over the next decades. Within its private-life framework, Hibbert's portrayal contains much to entertain. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 448 pages
• Publisher: Harper Collins (October 4, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0007147171
• ISBN-13: 978-0007147175
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.1 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 1.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,921,615 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A Great Author in his Dotage, October 5, 2006

By 

Grey Wolffe "Zeb Kantrowitz" (North Waltham, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Disraeli: The Victorian Dandy Who Became Prime Minister (Hardcover)

As those before me have said, DONT BOTHER. It's sad that so great an author as Christopher Hibbert was allowed by his publisher to put out this book which is just a rehash of a book he wrote about Disraeli 30 years ago. Except that mostly it's with a lot of additional material that is only excerpt from letters he wrote and those written to him.

Soooo much of the book is wasted on discussions of people who meant nothing to him in his later life and seem like nothing but fill. If this was a student paper it would fail.

There is a very good short bio by Edgar Feuchtwanger, and two monstrous volumes (over 700 pages) by Robert Lord Blake, and Stanley Weintraub.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars michel wugmeister, August 10, 2006

By 

Michel Wugmeister - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Disraeli: The Victorian Dandy Who Became Prime Minister (Hardcover)

An embarrasing and lazy pastiche of quotes from Disraeli's correspondence woven with an old fashioned snobbish viewpoint. There is no historical context and no discussion of what made Disraeli the importasnt figure he was. Disraeli comes off as a self-serving, superficial and useless fop, lusting after high-class recognition. This bojk should have been rejected in manuscript. Whatever reputation Mr. Hibbert may have had, it is vitiated by this piece of sophomoric drivel.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Tired, Superficial Work, Unquestioning of Its Own Premises, Poorly Edited, July 30, 2006

By 

Herman Asarnow (Portland, Oregon) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Disraeli: The Victorian Dandy Who Became Prime Minister (Hardcover)

A miserably rendered biography of one of the most complex men in British history. Hibbert writes from within his comfortable, unexamined cell of "Britishness." He superficially dismisses Disraeli's Jewish upbringing with a wave of the hand, showing not a whit of insight or interest into how it may have affected Disraeli's adult behavior--his choices of dandyism, novel writing, and even his peculiarly powerful oratory. Hibbert just neatly fits Disraeli into categories he, Hibbert, pulls out of his own experience from within what's normal and usual in British life. Moreover, the book quotes huge, unedited swaths not only of Disraeli's letters and journals (somewhat defensible) but also from other recent biographers. So it reads like the work of an undergraduate. Ultimately, Hibbert is not at all inquisitive about what led this man of many and great parts to find such a singular way to live, and to succeed in what, in the book's only success, we see was a terribly hostile social environment for a Jew(populated by powerful anti-Semites like Carlyle and Dickens, Trollope, etc.). This is poorly done work.