George Farrar was a human dynamo. From what we know there were few uneventful or restful days in his life. Salesman, athlete, entrepreneur, father of six daughters, mining magnate, politician, town planner, farmer and soldier; he was tried for high treason, condemned to death by hanging, knighted and made a baronet. He became a household name on the Rand and in the 1968 South African Dictionary of Biography has four columns to himself.

Part political biography and part study of imperialism, The Strange Death of the Liberal Empire is an examination of Lord Selborne's career as high commissioner for South Africa from 1905 to 1910.