VICEROYS: THE CREATION OF THE BRITISH

Book ID/图书代码： 07980017C00013

English Summary/英文概要： Viceroys is the story of the British aristocracy sent to govern India during the reigns of five British monarchs. It is also the story of how the modern British identity was established. British history from the Hundred Years War onwards gives an impression of how the British were seen. It is a misconception or more kindly, a British view. Until the nineteenth century the British did not have an identity readily recognized throughout the world. Even the Elizabethans were never established other than as great individuals.

From 1815, an image of Britain as the first superpower was built that would make do until even the twenty first century. Direct rule in the name of a long-lived queen and the consequential superlatives of style and theatre of conquest had the whole world believing that it knew the secret of that British identity. To be white and British even at the lowest social level was enough to command and to be white, British and aristocratic was enough to rule.

By the end of Victoria’s reign a quarter of the world saluted the authority of the British identity. It took until the second half of the twentieth century for even the Americans to question that authority. The token in that identity, the plumed viceroy whose quarterings linked everyone who held that office to the aristocracy that was the guardian of that image, is not just an illusion.

Viceroys is not a chronological biography of each viceroy from Canning to Mountbatten. It is instead, the story of the viceregal caste. It is the supreme view of the British in India, describing the sort of people who went out and the sort of people they were on their return. It is the story of utter power and what men did with it.

Viceroys will come to a conclusion as to what created the international identity of the British that was cherished well into the twentieth century. It was and is an identity that has coloured in the worst pictures of the British character and ambition as seen by modern radicalized people and loyalties around the globe. Ironically, it is in part the answer to how was it that such a small offshore European island people believed themselves to have the right to sit at the highest institutional tables and judge what is right and what is unacceptable in other nations and institutions.

Chinese Summary/中文概要： 《总督》讲述了五位英国君主统治期间，被派去统治印度的英国贵族的故事，同时也讲述了现代英国形象建立的过程。从百年战争开始的英国历史给人留下了如何看待英国人的印象，而这是一种误解，或者说，是英国人的观点。直到十九世纪，英国人还没有一个在世界上被公认的身份。

从1815年起，英国作为第一个超级大国的形象逐步树立，一直维持到二十一世纪。以长寿女王的名义进行直接统治，以及由此产生的等级制度，令全世界都相信其知道英国身份的秘密。身为白人和英国人，即便是最低的社会阶层，也足以指挥他人，而身为白人、英国人兼贵族，便足以统治国家。

到维多利亚时期末，世界上四分之一的国家拜倒于英国的权威。世人（就连美国人）也是直到20世纪下半叶才开始质疑英国的权威……

《总督》并不是一部记录了历任总督的编年史传记，相反，这是英国人在印度的最高观点，描述了那些外出的人和回国的人，这是一个关于绝对权力的故事，并且讲述了人类是如何运用这些权利的。

《总督》就“什么创造了英国人的国际身份”这一问题得出结论。这一身份过去和现在都是英国性格和野心最糟糕的形象……具有讽刺意味的是，这在一定程度上回答了“为何这样一个离岸欧洲小岛的人民认为自己有权高高在上、判断其他国家的是与非、对与错”。（LYR）

Awards/获奖情况：

About the Author/作者介绍： Christopher Lee 是剑桥艾曼纽学院第一位400周年纪念研究员兼惠特克研究员，并在伦敦大学伯克贝克学院研究思想史。他曾荣获过多项荣誉和奖项，其中包括由他主持的BBC广播4“英国历史—从罗马到维多利亚之死”，“战略岛屿及其历史”，以及“大英帝国”。

Christopher Lee was the first Quatercentenary Fellow and Whittaker Fellow in Contemporary History at Emmanuel College Cambridge and researched the history of ideas at Birkbeck College, University of London, with reference to pamphleteering in the reforming period from the Slave Act 1807 to the Great Reform Act 1832. His BBC Radio 4 history of Britain from Romans to death of Victoria, This Sceptred Isle and his history, The British Empire were both multi-award winning series.

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