‘highly engaging and illuminating’
Observer, Book of the Week
‘written with wit and commendable succinctness’
Guardian
‘masterful and timely’
Literary Review
REVIEWS ‘An endlessly fascinating account of a truly seismic moment in British history. Peter Clark records that moment by introducing us to the first non-aristocrats to govern this country. It’s a mystery why nobody thought to tell this amazing story before but nobody could have told it better. Brilliantly conceived and beautifully expounded.’ ‘At the centenary of the first Labour government in 1924, Peter Clark fluently and lucidly illuminates British politics in the early decades of the twentieth century, giving insightful short biographies of the Labour cabinet and a sharp account of their nine months ‘in office but not in power’, and shows how the 18-year-old Labour Party was taken from the fringe of significance to being the alternative for Government.’ ‘The events of 1924 changed British political history forever. A good study of the government and its principal actors was long overdue. Now, on the centenary, we have it.’ ‘The Men of 1924 is a compelling account of the remarkable group of politicians who shaped not only a seminal moment in Labour Party history but also influenced our national story for many years afterwards.’ ‘well-written and finely observed’ ‘[An] extraordinary account’ Ramsay MacDonald’s Labour government of 1924 consisted, as governments had for generations, of twenty white, middle-aged men with a Christian background. But that is where the similarities with previous governments ended, for the election of Britain’s first Labour administration witnessed a radical departure from government by the ruling class. A majority of the new cabinet had left full time education by the time they were fifteen. Two were illegitimate, one was a foundling, three were from Irish immigrant families, another three had worked in coal mines before they were teenagers. For the first time in Britain’s political history, the government could truly be said to represent all the social classes. The Men of 1924 is a vivid portrayal of the years preceding, and the arrival of, the first Labour government and the new breed of politician it heralded – forerunners of all those who, later in the last century and in this one, overcame a system from which they had been excluded for too long. PETER CLARK is a writer and translator, and Research Associate at SOAS, University of London. He worked in the overseas service of the British Council for over thirty years, has translated novels, plays and history from Arabic, and written books on Istanbul and Marmaduke Pickthall. He is the author of Churchill’s Britain, Dickens’s London and Dickens’s Kent.
Alan Johnson
Neil Kinnock
Anthony Seldon
Nick Thomas-Symonds
House Magazine
New Horizons
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| ISBN | 9781913368814 |
| Pages | 296 |
