A weekly review of politics, literature, theology, and art.

Celebrities, heroes and champions explores the role of the popular politician in British and Irish society from the Napoleonic Wars to the Second Reform Act of 1867. Covering movements for parliamentary reform up to and including Chartism, Catholic Emancipation, transatlantic Anti-Slavery and the Anti-Corn Law League, as well as the receptions of international celebrities such as Lajos Kossuth and Giuseppe Garibaldi, it offers a unique perspective on the connections between politics and historical cultures of fame and celebrity. This book will interest students and scholars of Britain, Ireland, continental Europe and North America in the nineteenth century, as well as general readers with an interest in the history of popular politics. Its exploration of the relationship between politics and celebrity, and the methods through which public reputations have been promoted and manipulated for political ends, have clear contemporary relevance.

"This 'instant life' of Daniel O'Connell, written within weeks of his death, synthesises personal observation and contemporary literature to describe the Liberator's career from a liberal Irish Protestant perspective. Taylor shows personal sympathy for O'Connell as leader of a downtrodden people, but sees his talents as distorted by oppression and by a conservative upbringing and concludes that his abusive and truculent oratory did as much to retard Catholic Emancipation as his tactical leadership did to advance it. Taylor's critique, and its limitations, provide valuable insights on the ambivalent and mistrustful alliance between O'Connell and the Whig Party." "This edition also includes Taylor's Atheaeum article on 'Repeal Songs of Munster', a wry look at O'Connellite street ballads and Young Ireland patriotic verse from a Whig-Unionist perspective, and a controversial review of Carleton's Famine novel, The Black Prophet, in which Taylor defends the Whig free-market approach to Famine relief."--BOOK JACKET.