A. J. P. Taylor
A. J. P. Taylor | |
---|---|
Born | Alan John Percivale Taylor 25 March 1906 Southport, England |
Died | 7 September 1990 (aged 84) London, England |
Nationality | English |
Alma mater | Oriel College, Oxford |
Occupation | Historian |
Spouses |
|
Awards | Fellow of the British Academy |
Alan John Percivale Taylor (25 March 1906 – 7 September 1990) was a British historian who specialised in 19th- and 20th-century European
Life
Early life
Taylor was born in 1906 in
In the 1920s, Taylor's mother, Constance, was a member of the
Academic career
Taylor graduated from Oxford in 1927 with a
Manchester years
Taylor was a lecturer in history in the
Oxford years
He became a Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1938, a post he held until 1976. He was also a lecturer in modern history at the University of Oxford from 1938 to 1963. At Oxford he was such a popular speaker that he had to give his lectures at 8:30 a.m. to avoid the room becoming over-crowded.
In 1962, Taylor wrote in a review of The Great Hunger: Ireland 1845–1849 by Cecil Woodham-Smith that: "All Ireland was a Belsen. ... The English governing class ran true to form. They had killed two million Irish people."[11] Taylor added that if the death rate from the Great Famine was not higher it "was not for want of trying" on the part of the British government, quoting Benjamin Jowett, the Master of Balliol College: "I have always felt a certain horror of political economists since I heard one of them say that the Famine in Ireland would not kill more than a million people, and that would scarcely be enough to do much good."[11] Taylor later reprinted his book review under the stark title "Genocide" in his 1976 book Essays in English History."[11]
In 1964, whilst he retained his college fellowship, the University of Oxford declined to renew Taylor's appointment as a university lecturer in modern history. This apparently sudden decision came in the aftermath of the controversy around his book The Origins of the Second World War. Moving to London, he became a lecturer at the Institute of Historical Research at University College London and at the Polytechnic of North London.[12]
An important step in Taylor's "rehabilitation" was a festschrift organised in his honour by Martin Gilbert in 1965. He was honoured with two more festschriften, in 1976 and 1986. The festschriften were testaments to his popularity with his former students as receiving even a single festschrift is considered to be an extraordinary and rare honour.
Second World War
During the
In 1943, Taylor wrote his first pamphlet, Czechoslovakia's Place in a Free Europe, explaining his view that Czechoslovakia would after the war serve as a "bridge" between the Western world and the Soviet Union.
Resignation from British Academy
In 1979, Taylor resigned in protest from the
It's none of our business, as a group of scholars, to consider matters of this sort. The academy's only concern should be his scholarly credentials, which are unaffected by all this.
Personal life
Taylor married three times. He married his first wife Margaret Adams in 1931, they had four children together and divorced in 1951. For some time in the 1930s, he and his wife shared a house with the writer Malcolm Muggeridge and his wife Kitty. From the 1940s Margaret's infatuations with Robert Kee and Dylan Thomas pushed the couple towards separation. His second wife was Eve Crosland, the sister of Anthony Crosland MP, whom Taylor married in 1951; they had two children and divorced in 1974. His third wife was the Hungarian historian Éva Haraszti, whom he married in 1976.[20]
Work
The Italian Problem in European Diplomacy, 1847–49
Taylor's first book, published in 1934, addressed the question of Italian unification The Italian Problem in European Diplomacy, 1847–49. However, Taylor's speciality was in Central European,
The Struggle for Mastery in Europe 1848–1918
In 1954 he published his masterpiece, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe 1848–1918 and followed it up with The Trouble Makers in 1957, a critical study of British foreign policy. The Trouble Makers was a celebration of those who had criticised the government over foreign policy, a subject dear to his heart. The Trouble Makers had originally been the Ford Lectures in 1955 and was his favourite book by far. When invited to deliver the Ford Lectures, he was initially at a loss for a topic, and it was his friend Alan Bullock who suggested the topic of foreign policy dissent.[21]
Bismarck: The Man and the Statesman
The recurring theme of accidents deciding history appeared in Taylor's best-selling 1955 biography of Bismarck. Taylor controversially argued that the Iron Chancellor had unified Germany more by accident than by design; a theory that contradicted those put forward by the historians Heinrich von Sybel, Leopold von Ranke, and Heinrich von Treitschke in the latter years of the 19th century, and by other historians more recently.
The Origins of the Second World War
In 1961, he published his most controversial book, The Origins of the Second World War, which earned him a reputation as a revisionist.[22] Gordon Martel notes that "it made a profound impact. The book became a classic and a central point of reference in all discussion on the Second World War."[22]
In the book Taylor argued against the widespread belief that the outbreak of the Second World War (specifically between Germany, Poland, the United Kingdom and France, September 1939) was the result of an intentional plan on the part of Adolf Hitler. He began his book with the statement that too many people have accepted uncritically what he called the "Nuremberg Thesis", that the Second World War was the result of criminal conspiracy by a small gang comprising Hitler and his associates. He regarded the "Nuremberg Thesis" as too convenient for too many people and held that it shielded the blame for the war from the leaders of other states, let the German people avoid any responsibility for the war and created a situation where West Germany was a respectable Cold War ally against the Soviets.
Taylor's thesis was that Hitler was not the demoniacal figure of popular imagination but in foreign affairs a normal German leader. Citing Fritz Fischer, he argued that the foreign policy of Nazi Germany was the same as those of the Weimar Republic and the German Empire. Moreover, in a partial break with his view of German history advocated in The Course of German History, he argued that Hitler was not just a mainstream German leader but also a mainstream Western leader. As a normal Western leader, Hitler was no better or worse than Gustav Stresemann, Neville Chamberlain or Édouard Daladier. His argument was that Hitler wished to make Germany the strongest power in Europe but he did not want or plan war. The outbreak of war in 1939 was an unfortunate accident caused by mistakes on everyone's part and was not a part of Hitler's plan.
Taylor portrayed Hitler as a grasping opportunist with no beliefs other than the pursuit of power and
Taylor argued that the basic problem with an interwar Europe was a flawed Treaty of Versailles that was sufficiently onerous to ensure that the overwhelming majority of Germans would always hate it, but insufficiently onerous in that it failed to destroy Germany's potential to be a Great Power once more. In this way, Taylor argued that the Versailles Treaty was destabilising, for sooner or later the innate power of Germany that the Allies had declined to destroy in 1918–1919 would inevitably reassert itself against the Versailles Treaty and the international system established by Versailles that the Germans regarded as unjust and thus had no interest in preserving. Though Taylor argued that the Second World War was not inevitable and that the Versailles Treaty was nowhere near as harsh as contemporaries like John Maynard Keynes believed, what he regarded as a flawed peace settlement made the war more likely than not.
English History 1914–1945
In 1965 he rebounded from the controversy surrounding The Origins of the Second World War with the spectacular success of his book
The Reichstag Fire (introduction)
In 1964 Taylor wrote the introduction for The Reichstag Fire by the journalist Fritz Tobias. He thus became the first English-language historian and the first historian after
War by Timetable
In his 1969 book War by Timetable, Taylor examined the origins of the
Beaverbrook: A Biography
In the 1950s and 1960s, Taylor befriended Lord Beaverbrook and later wrote his biography in 1972. Beaverbrook, Canadian in origin, was a Conservative who believed strongly in the British Empire and whose entry into politics was in support of Bonar Law, a Conservative leader strongly connected with the establishment of Northern Ireland. Despite the disdain for most politicians expressed in his writings, Taylor was fascinated by politics and politicians and often cultivated relations with those who possessed power. Beside Lord Beaverbrook, whose company Taylor very much enjoyed, his favourite politician was the Labour Party leader Michael Foot, whom he often described as the greatest Prime Minister Britain never had.[citation needed]
Introductions
Taylor also wrote significant introductions to British editions of
Journalism
Starting in 1931, Taylor worked as book reviewer for the
From 1957 until 1982 he wrote for the
Broadcasting
The Second World War gave Taylor the opportunity to branch out from print journalism, initially into radio and then later television. On 17 March 1942 Taylor made the first of seven appearances on The World at War – Your Questions Answered broadcast by BBC Forces' Radio. After the war Taylor became one of the first television historians. His appearances began with his role as a panellist on the
Taylor had a famous rivalry with the historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, with whom he often debated on television. One of the more famous exchanges took place in 1961. Trevor-Roper said "I'm afraid that your book The Origins of the Second World War may damage your reputation as a historian", to which Taylor replied "Your criticism of me would damage your reputation as a historian, if you had one."
The origins of the dispute went back to 1957 when the
In public, Taylor declared that he would never have accepted any honour from a government that had "the blood of Suez on its hands". In private, he was furious with Trevor-Roper for holding an honour that Taylor considered rightfully his. Adding to Taylor's rancour was the fact that he had arrived at Oxford a decade before Trevor-Roper. From then on, Taylor never missed a chance to disparage Trevor-Roper's character or scholarship. The famously combative Trevor-Roper reciprocated. The feud was given much publicity by the media, not so much because of the merits of their disputes but rather because their acrimonious debates on television made for entertaining viewing. Likewise, the various articles written by Taylor and Trevor-Roper denouncing each other's scholarship, in which both men's considerable powers of invective were employed with maximum effect, made for entertaining reading. Beyond that, it was fashionable to portray the dispute between Taylor and Trevor-Roper as a battle between generations. Taylor, with his populist, irreverent style, was nearly a decade older than Trevor-Roper, but was represented by the media as a symbol of the younger generation that was coming of age in the 1950s–1960s. Trevor-Roper, who was unabashedly old-fashioned (he was one of the last Oxford dons to lecture wearing his professor's robes) and inclined to behave in a manner that the media portrayed as pompous and conceited, was seen as a symbol of the older generation. A subtle but important difference in the style between the two historians was their manner of addressing each other during their TV debates: Trevor-Roper always addressed Taylor as "Mr Taylor" or just "Taylor", while Taylor always addressed Trevor-Roper as "Hugh".[citation needed]
Another frequent sparring partner on TV for Taylor was the writer Malcolm Muggeridge. The frequent television appearances helped to make Taylor the most famous British historian of the 20th century.[citation needed] He featured in a cameo in the 1981 film Time Bandits and was satirised in an episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, in which a scantily clad woman (identified by an onscreen caption as "A. J. P. Taylor, Historian"), dubbed over with a man's voice, delivers a lecture on "Eighteenth Century Social Reform".[31] Another foray into the world of entertainment occurred in the 1960s when he served as the historical consultant for both the stage and film versions of Oh, What a Lovely War! Though he possessed great charm and charisma and a sense of humour, as he aged he presented himself as, and came to be seen as, cantankerous and irascible.[citation needed]
Opinions
Throughout his life, Taylor took public stands on the great issues of his time. In the early 1930s, he was in a
In 1938, he denounced the Munich Agreement at several rallies and may have written several leaders in the Manchester Guardian criticising it; later, he would compare the smaller number of Czechoslovak dead with the number of Polish dead. In October 1938, Taylor attracted particular controversy by a speech he gave at a dinner held every October to commemorate a protest by a group of Oxford dons against James II in 1688, an event that was an important prelude to the Glorious Revolution. He denounced the Munich Agreement and those who supported it, warning the assembled dons that if action were not taken immediately to resist Nazi Germany, then they might all soon be living under the rule of a much greater tyrant than James II. Taylor's speech was highly contentious, in part because in October 1938 the Munich Agreement was popular with the public even if subsequently it was to be reviled along with the policy of appeasement, and also because he used a non-partisan and non-political occasion to make a highly partisan, politically charged attack on government policy.[32]
Throughout his life, Taylor was sympathetic to the foreign policy of the Soviet Union, and after 1941 he was overjoyed to have the Soviet Union as Britain's ally, as this was the realisation of his desire for an Anglo-Soviet alliance. The Second World War further increased Taylor's pro-Soviet feelings, as he was always profoundly grateful for the
As a socialist, Taylor saw the capitalist system as wrong on practical and moral grounds, although he rejected the Marxist view that capitalism was responsible for wars and conflicts. He felt that the status quo in the West was highly unstable and prone to accidents, and prevented a just and moral international system from coming into being. Moreover, Taylor was enraged by the decision of the Western powers, which he blamed on the US, to re-build and establish the West German state in the late 1940s, which Taylor saw as laying the foundations for a Fourth Reich that would one day plunge the world back into war.[citation needed]
He also blamed the United States for the
In 1950, he was again temporarily banned by the
Taylor was also opposed to the British Empire and against Britain's participation in the European Economic Community and NATO.[33]
In an interview with Irish State radio in April 1976, Taylor argued that the British presence in Northern Ireland was perpetuating the conflict there. Taylor claimed the best solution would be for an "armed push" by the Irish nationalists to drive out the one million Ulster Protestants from Ireland. He cited as a successful precedent the expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia after the Second World War. On the question of whether there would be a civil war should Britain quit Northern Ireland, Taylor answered: "What we have, after all, is an incipient civil war. To put it brutally, if there were a civil war in Northern Ireland, and I am not convinced that there would be, quite a lot of people would be killed and the war would be decided within a few months. Spread over the years, probably more people have been killed".[34]
Taylor was fearless in espousing unpopular people and causes. In 1980, he resigned from the
Germanophobia
Taylor held fierce
For Taylor, Nazi racial imperialism was a continuation of policies pursued by every German ruler. The Course of German History was a best-seller in both the United Kingdom and the United States; it was the success of this book that made Taylor's reputation in the United States. Its success also marked the beginning of the breach between Taylor and his mentor Namier, who wanted to write a similar book. By the 1950s, relations between Taylor and Namier had noticeably cooled and in his 1983 autobiography, A Personal History, Taylor, though acknowledging a huge intellectual debt to Namier, portrayed him as a pompous bore.
Populism
Taylor's approach to history was a populist one. He felt that history should be open to all and enjoyed being called the "People's Historian" and the "Everyman's Historian". He usually favoured an anti-great man theory, history being made for the most part by towering figures of stupidity rather than of genius. In his view, leaders did not make history; instead they reacted to events – what happened in the past was due to sequences of blunders and errors that were largely outside anyone's control. To the extent that anyone made anything happen in history, it was only through their mistakes.[35]
Though Taylor normally preferred to portray leaders as fools blundering their way forward, he did think that individuals sometimes could play a positive role in history; his heroes were Vladimir Lenin and David Lloyd George.[36] But for Taylor, people like Lloyd George and Lenin were the exceptions. Despite Taylor's increasing ambivalence toward appeasement from the late 1950s, which became explicitly evident in his 1961 book Origins of the Second World War, Winston Churchill remained another of his heroes. In English History 1914–1945 (1965), he famously concluded his biographical footnote of Churchill with the phrase "the saviour of his country".[37] Another person Taylor admired was the historian E. H. Carr, who was his favourite historian and a good friend.
Irony and humour
His narratives used irony and humour to entertain as well as inform. He examined history from odd angles, exposing what he considered to be the pomposities of various historical characters. He was famed for "Taylorisms": witty, epigrammatic, and sometimes cryptic remarks that were meant to expose what he considered to be the absurdities and paradoxes of modern
"The Establishment"
Taylor has been credited with coining the term "the Establishment" in a 1953 book review, but this is disputed.[by whom?] On 29 August 1953, in reviewing a biography of William Cobbett in New Statesman, Taylor wrote "The Establishment draws in recruits from outside as soon as they are ready to conform to its standards and become respectable. There is nothing more agreeable in life than to make peace with the Establishment – and nothing more corrupting."
Speed limits
In 1967, Taylor wrote an article for the Sunday Express in which he argued that speed limits had made absolutely no positive difference to road safety and that "on the contrary, [speed limits] tend to increase the risks and dangers". Taylor went on to claim "I have been driving a car for 45 years. I have consistently ignored all the various speed limits. Never once have I encountered the slightest risk as a result." The article caused a member of the public to lodge a complaint with the Press Council, on the grounds that Taylor's remarks "amount[ed] to an indirect incitement to drivers to break the law". The Council eventually rejected the complaint and ruled that "while Mr Taylor's views are controversial, he has an unchallengeable right to express them".[39][40]
Criticisms
The Origins of the Second World War
The Origins of the Second World War was received negatively in some quarters when it was published in 1961. The book set off a huge storm of controversy and debate that lasted for years. At least part of the vehement criticism was due to the confusion in the public's mind between Taylor's book and another book published in 1961, Der Erzwungene Krieg (The Forced War) by the American historian
Other historians who criticised The Origins of the Second World War included:
The issue of misinterpretation is also addressed in Gordon A. Craig's book Germany: 1866–1945, where it is argued that Taylor dismissed Hitler's foreign policy, as presented in Mein Kampf, and in particular, the remilitarisation of the Rhineland, as a jumble of idle thoughts written down under the impact of the French occupation of the Ruhr.
As angry as the reaction in Britain was to The Origins of the Second World War, it was greater when the book was published in January 1962 in the United States. With the exception of
Despite the criticism, The Origins of the Second World War is regarded as a watershed in the historiography of the origins of the Second World War. In general, historians have praised Taylor for the following:
- In focussing on the improvised character of German and Italian foreign policy, he helped to create a debate over the degree to which fascist states were fulfilling a programme versus taking advantage of events.
- In highlighting certain continuities in German foreign policy between 1871 and 1939, he helped to place Nazi foreign policy in a wider perspective, although the degree of continuity is still subject to considerable debate.
- As the first English-language historian to bring attention to the work of the French economist and historian Étienne Mantoux, especially his 1946 book The Carthaginian Peace: or The Economic Consequences of Mr Keynes, he was able to show that Germany was capable of paying reparations to France after the First World War; the only problem was that the Germans were unwilling. In this way, he started an important debate over who was really responsible for the hyperinflation that destroyed the German economy in 1923.
- In showing that appeasement was a popular policy and that there was continuity in British foreign policy after 1933, he shattered the common view of the appeasers as a small, degenerate clique that had mysteriously hijacked the British government sometime in the 1930s and who had carried out their policies in the face of massive public resistance.
- In showing that the Anschluss was enormously popular in Austria, he helped to discredit the notion of Austria as a victim of Nazi aggression brought unwillingly into the Reich.
- In portraying the leaders of the 1930s as real people attempting to deal with real problems, he made the first strides towards attempting an explanation of the actions of the appeasers rather than merely condemning them.
- He was one of the first historians to present Hitler as an ordinary human being rather than as a "madman", albeit one who held morally repellent beliefs, thus offering possibilities to explain his actions.
- In showing that Hitler just as often reacted as acted, he offered a balance to previous accounts in which Hitler was portrayed as the sole agent and the leaders of Britain and France as entirely reactive.
In response to Taylor's argument that Hitler had no programme because his foreign policy seemed to operate in a haphazard and slapdash way, Taylor's critics such as Trevor-Roper construed a theorem in which Hitler held "consistent aims" but sought to achieve them via "flexible methods".
Portrayal of Mussolini
Taylor drew a picture of
The French Third Republic
Taylor has been criticised[by whom?] for promoting the La décadence view of the French Third Republic. This historical concept portrays the Third Republic as a decadent state, forever on the verge of collapse. In particular, advocates of the La décadence concept have asserted that inter-war France was riven by political instability; possessed a leadership that was deeply divided, corrupt, incompetent and pusillanimous, which ruled over a nation rent by mass unemployment, strikes, a sense of despair over the future, riots and a state of near-civil war between the Left and the Right. Of all the French governments of the interwar era, only the Popular Front government of Léon Blum was presented sympathetically by Taylor, which he praised for carrying out what he regarded as long overdue social reforms. Many experts in French history have admitted that there is a kernel of truth to Taylor's picture of France but have complained that Taylor presented French politics and society in such a manner as to border on caricature.[citation needed]
Retirement
Taylor was badly injured in 1984 when he was run over by a car while crossing Old Compton Street in London. The effect of the accident led to his retirement in 1985. In his last years, he endured Parkinson's disease, which left him incapable of writing. His last public appearance was at his 80th birthday, in 1986, when a group of his former students, including Sir Martin Gilbert, Alan Sked, Norman Davies and Paul Kennedy, organised a public reception in his honour. He had, with considerable difficulty, memorised a short speech, which he delivered in a manner that managed to hide the fact that his memory and mind had been permanently damaged by Parkinson's disease.
In 1987, he entered a nursing home in Barnet, London, where he died on 7 September 1990 aged 84. He was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium.[3]
Works
- The Italian Problem in European Diplomacy, 1847–1849, 1934.
- (editor) The Struggle for Supremacy in Germany, 1859–1866 by Heinrich Friedjung, 1935.
- Germany's First Bid for Colonies 1884–1885: a Move in Bismarck's European Policy, 1938.
- The Habsburg Monarchy 1809–1918, 1941, revised edition 1948, reissued in 1966 OCLC 4311308.
- OCLC 33368634
- Trieste, (London: Yugoslav Information Office, 1945). 32 pages.
- Co-edited with R. Reynolds British Pamphleteers, 1948.
- Co-edited with Alan Bullock A Select List of Books on European History, 1949.
- From Napoleon to Stalin, 1950.
- Rumours of Wars, 1952.
- The Struggle for Mastery in Europe 1848–1918 (Oxford History of Modern Europe), 1954.
- Bismarck: the Man and Statesman, 1955. Reissued by Vintage Books in 1967 OCLC 351039.
- Englishmen and Others, 1956.
- co-edited with Sir Richard Pares Essays Presented to Sir Lewis Namier, 1956.
- The Trouble Makers: Dissent over Foreign Policy, 1792–1939, 1957.
- Lloyd George, 1961.
- The Origins of the Second World War, 1961. Reissued by Fawcett Books in 1969 OCLC 263622959.
- The First World War: an Illustrated History, 1963. OCLC 253080
- Politics in Wartime, 1964.
- English History 1914–1945 (Volume XV of the Oxford History of England), 1965. OCLC 36661639
- From Sarajevo to Potsdam, 1966. 1st American edition, 1967. OCLC 1499372
- From Napoleon to Lenin, 1966.
- The Abdication of King Edward VIII by Lord Beaverbrook, (editor) 1966.
- Europe: Grandeur and Decline, 1967.
- Introduction to 1848: The Opening of an Era by F. Fejto, 1967.
- War by Timetable, 1969. ISBN 0-356-02818-6
- Churchill Revised: A Critical Assessment, 1969. OCLC 4194
- (editor) Lloyd George: Twelve Essays, 1971.
- (editor) ISBN 0091072700
- Beaverbrook, 1972. ISBN 0-671-21376-8
- (editor) Off the Record: Political Interviews, 1933–43 by W. P. Corzier, 1973.
- A History of World War Two: 1974.
- "Fritz Fischer and His School," The Journal of Modern History Vol. 47, No. 1, March 1975
- The Second World War: an Illustrated History, 1975.
- (editor) My Darling Pussy: The Letters of Lloyd George and Frances Stevenson, 1975. ISBN 0-297-77017-9
- The Last of Old Europe: a Grand Tour, 1976. Reissued in 1984. OCLC 80148134
- Essays in English History, 1976. ISBN 0-14-021862-9
- "Accident Prone, or What Happened Next," The Journal of Modern History Vol. 49, No. 1, March 1977
- The War Lords, 1977.
- The Russian War, 1978.
- How Wars Begin, 1979. OCLC 5536093
- Politicians, Socialism, and Historians, 1980.
- Revolutions and Revolutionaries, 1980.
- A Personal History, 1983.
- An Old Man's Diary, 1984.
- How Wars End, 1985.
- Letters to Eva: 1969–1983, edited by Eva Haraszti Taylor, 1991.
- From Napoleon to the Second International: Essays on Nineteenth-century Europe. Ed. 1993.
- From the Boer War to the Cold War: Essays on Twentieth-century Europe. Ed. 1995. ISBN 0-241-13445-5
- Struggles for Supremacy: Diplomatic Essays by A.J.P. Taylor. Edited by Chris Wigley. Ashgate, 2000. OCLC 42289691
See also
References
Notes
- ^ Overy, Richard (30 January 1994). "Riddle Radical Ridicule". The Observer.
- ^ "Top Historians: The Results". History Today. 16 November 2011. Retrieved 6 November 2020.
- ^ doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/39823. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ OCLC 10162255.
- ^ Wrigley 2006
- ^ Staff (2011). Bootham School Register. York, England: Bootham Old Scholars Association (BOSA).
- ^ a b Burk 2002, p.41
- ISBN 9780241112472.
- ^ "Our History" Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine University of Manchester website
- ^ Burk 2002[page needed]
- ^ a b c Donnelly, James (Autumn 1993). "The Great Famine and its interpreters, old and new". History Ireland. Retrieved 29 May 2008.
- ^ a b Bernstein, Richard (8 September 1990) "A.J.P. Taylor, British Historian, Dies" Archived 9 August 2017 at the Wayback Machine in The New York Times
- ^ a b c d e Burk 2000
- ^ Kathleen Burk (2000). Troublemaker The Life and History of A.J.P. Taylor. Yale University Press New Haven and London. p. 236.
- ^ Kathleen Burk (2000). Troublemaker The Life and History of A.J.P. Taylor. Yale University Press New Haven and London. p. 236.
- ^ Kathleen Burk (2000). Troublemaker The Life and History of A.J.P. Taylor. Yale University Press New Haven and London. p. 236.
- ^ Kathleen Burk (2000). Troublemaker The Life and History of A.J.P. Taylor. Yale University Press New Haven and London. p. 236.
- ^ Kathleen Burk (2000). Troublemaker The Life and History of A.J.P. Taylor. Yale University Press New Haven and London. p. 236.
- ^ Lukes, Igor (1996). Czechoslovakia Between Stalin and Hitler: The Diplomacy of Edvard Benes in the 1930s. Oxford University Press. p. 159.
- ^ Taylor, A. J. P. (1983) A Personal History. London: Hamish Hamilton. p.267
- ISBN 0-7126-5922-6
- ^ a b Martel 1999, p.1
- Sunday Pictorial.
- Sunday Express.
- Sunday Express.
- Sunday Express.
- Sunday Express.
- Sunday Express.
- Sunday Express.
- ^ Wrigley 2006, p.320
- ^ "Eighteenth Century Social Legislation/The Battle of Trafalgar". MontyPython.net. Retrieved 28 June 2018.
- ^ Burk, 147.
- ^ Himmelfarb, 1994.
- ^ Walker, Christopher (12 April 1976) "Protestant expulsion from Ulster by Irish nationalists would be the best solution, Mr A J P Taylor says", The Times p.2
- ^ Himmelfarb, 1994.
- ^ Himmelfarb, 1994.
- ^ Taylor, A. J. P. (1965). English History 1914–1945. Oxford: Clarendon Press. p. 29.
- ^ Burk 2002, p. 302.
- ^ The Press and the People. London: The Press Council. 1968. pp. 45–46.
- ^ "Press Writer's Freedom is Defended". Birmingham Daily Post. 11 December 1967. p. 31.
- ^ Burk 2002, p. 292
- ^ Rothbard, Murray N. (13 March 2017) [first published 18 April 1962]. "Review of The Origins of the Second World War". Rothbard Archives. Mises Institute. Retrieved 7 July 2020.
Bibliography
- Burk, Kathleen (2002). Troublemaker: The Life and History of A. J. P. Taylor. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
- Martel, Gordon (editor) (1986, rev. 1999) The Origins of the Second World War Reconsidered: A. J. P. Taylor and the Historians London; New York: Routledge.
- Wrigley, Chris J. (2006) A. J. P. Taylor: Radical Historian of Europe. London: I. B. Tauris. (hardcover, OCLC 71295901.
Further reading
- Bosworth, Robert Explaining Auschwitz and Hiroshima: History Writing and the Second World War, 1945–90, London: Routledge, 1993.
- Boyer, John "A. J. P. Taylor and the Art of Modern History" pages 40–72 from Journal of Modern History, Volume 49, Issue 1, March 1977.
- Cole, Robert A. J. P. Taylor: The Traitor Within The Gates London: Macmillan, 1993.
- Cook, Chris and Sked, Alan (editors) Crisis and Controversy: Essays in Honour of A. J. P. Taylor, London: Macmillan Press, 1976
- Dray, William, Concepts of Causation in A. J. P. Taylor's Account of the Origins of the Second World War pages 149–172 from History and Theory, Volume 17, Issue #1, 1978.
- Gilbert, Martin (editor) A Century of Conflict, 1850–1950; Essays for A. J. P. Taylor, London, H. Hamilton 1966.
- Hauser, Oswald "A. J. P. Taylor" pages 34–39 from Journal of Modern History, Volume 49, Issue #1, March 1977.
- Hett, Benjamin C. "Goak Here: A. J. P. Taylor and the Origins of the Second World War" pages 257–280 from Canadian Journal of History, Volume 32, Issue #2, 1996.
- Himmelfarb, Gertrude. "Taylor-Made History," National Interest (June 1994), Issue 36, pp32-43.
- Johnson, Paul "A. J. P. Taylor: A Saturnine Star Who Had Intellectuals Rolling in the Aisles" page 31 from The Spectator, Volume 300, Issue # 9266, 11 March 2006.
- Johnson, R. W., Look Back in Laughter: Oxford's Golden Postwar Age, Threshold Press, 2015.
- Kennedy, Paul "A. J. P. Taylor 'Profound Forces' in History" pages 9–13 from History Today, Volume 33, Issue #3, March 1986.
- Kennedy, Paul "The Nonconformist" pages 109–114 from The Atlantic, Volume 287, Issue #4, April 2001.
- Louis, William (editor) The Origins of the Second World War: A. J. P. Taylor And His Critics, New York: Wiley & Sons, 1972.
- Mehta, Ved Fly and Fly Bottle: Encounters with British Intellectuals, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1962.
- Pepper, F. S., Handbook of 20th century Quotations, Sphere Study Aids, 1984, passim.
- Robertson, Esmonde (editor) The Origins of the Second World War: Historical Interpretations, London: Macmillan, 1971.
- Sisman, Adam A. J. P. Taylor: A Biography London: Sinclair-Stevenson, 1994.
- Smallwood, J. "A Historical Debate of the 1960s: World War II Historiography—The Origins of the Second World War, A. J. P. Taylor and his Critics" pages 403–410 from Australian Journal of Politics and History, Volume 26, Issue #3, 1980.
- Watt, D.C. "Some Aspects of AJP Taylor's Work as Diplomatic Historian" pages 19–33 from Journal of Modern History, Volume 49, Issue #1, March 1977.
- Williams, H. Russell "A. J. P. Taylor" from Historians of Modern Europe edited by Hans Schmitt, Baton Rouge: Louisiana State Press, 1971.
- Wrigley, Chris (editor) A. J. P. Taylor: A Complete Bibliography and Guide to his Historical and Other Writings, Brighton: Harvester, 1982.
- Wrigley, Chris (editor) Warfare, Diplomacy and Politics: Essays in Honour of A. J. P. Taylor, London: Hamilton, 1986.
- Wrighley, Chris 'A. J. P. Taylor: a Nonconforming Radical Historian of Europe" pages 74–75 from Contemporary European History, Volume 3, 1994.
- "Taylor, A(lan) J(ohn) P(ercivale)" pages 389–392 from Current Biography 1983 edited by Charles Moritz, H.W. Wilson Company, New York, US, 1983, 1984.
- "A. J. P. Taylor" pages 564–570 from The Annual Obituary 1990 edited by Deborah Andrews, St. James Press, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America, 1991.
External links
- A. J. P. Taylor at the BFI's Screenonline
- Economic Imperialism by A. J. P. Taylor
- AJP Taylor's Railroad Timetable Theory
- The Taylor Thesis
- Hitler, Stresemann and the Discontinuity of German Foreign Policy
- The Origins of the Second World War Reflections on Three Approaches to the Problem
- Review of AJP Taylor: Radical Historian of Europe by Tristram Hunt in The Guardian
- Taylor author page and archive at The London Review of Books
- Parliamentary Archives, Papers of A. J. P. Taylor (1906-1990) Archived 23 September 2021 at the Wayback Machine