Our First Revolution

Stephen Hoye begins this history of the 1688 ouster of King James II and the elevation of William and Mary to the throne in his usual drawling, lilting manner. While suitable for dramatic fiction, this style only makes it harder to follow the complexities of seventeenth-century English and European political history. Fortunately, Hoye reads more crisply as he goes on. He keeps the pacing good, and his timbre is pleasing. Eventually even a listener unfamiliar with the period will catch on to the various players. There is a lot to be learned here, and some interesting ideas; listeners may have a hard time initially, but it's worthwhile to persevere. W.M. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

March 26, 2007
Political journalist and historian Barone (Hard America, Soft America
) elucidates the template for America's independence movement in this well-written history of its forerunner: England's Glorious Revolution of 1688. The author describes the origins of the revolution, a mostly bloodless change of government, as a mixture of religious, political and diplomatic factors. King James II's Roman Catholicism, hostility to Parliament, and French sympathies alienated an increasing number of his powerful subjects including John Churchill, later Duke of Marlborough, who invited Dutch Stadtholder William of Orange and his wife, Mary, James's sister, to intervene. Among the revolution's consequences was a Bill of Rights that limited the monarch's powers and strengthened representative government. A Toleration Act encouraged variant forms of Protestant worship. The creation of a funded national debt and the foundation of the Bank of England laid the groundwork for financial development. Involvement in the long series of wars with France moved England from a country standing apart from Europe to one that took responsibility for maintaining a continental balance of power. It was a Glorious Revolution indeed that laid the political groundwork for the world in which we now live, and Barone's lucid work honors its heritage.