Listen free for 30 days
-
The Politics of Pain
- Postwar England and the Rise of Nationalism
- Narrated by: Bruce Mann
- Length: 8 hrs and 5 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wish list failed.
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
The Politics of Pain
Buy Now for $22.26
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Publisher's Summary
From one of the most perceptive observers of the English today comes a brilliantly insightful, mordantly funny account of their seemingly irrational embrace of nationalism.
England's recent lurch to the right appears to be but one example of the nationalist wave sweeping across the world, yet as acclaimed Irish critic Fintan O'Toole suggests in The Politics of Pain, it is, in reality, a phenomenon rooted in World War II. We must look not to the vagaries of the European Union but, instead, far back to the end of the British empire, if we hope to understand our most fraternal ally - and the royal mess in which the British now find themselves. O'Toole depicts a roiling nation that almost ludicrously dreams of a German invasion, if only to get the blood going, and that erupts in faux outrage over regulations on "prawn-flavored crisps." A sympathetic yet unsparing observer, O'Toole asks: How did a great nation bring itself to the point of such willful self-harm? His answer represents one of the most profound portraits of the English since Sarah Lyall's New York Times best seller The Anglo Files.