Damned in coruscating verse by Shelley and Byron, his coffin hissed at during his funeral, Lord Castlereagh has one of the blackest reputations in British history. But as John Bew shows, this is but a half-drawn portrait. His gripping biography reveals a shy, inarticulate but passionate man; a towering political figure of implacable principles who redrew the map of Europe, fought a duel with a cabinet colleague and would tragically take his own life amid rumours of scandal and madness.
'Wonderful ... A Life so nearly complete that it need never be written again' Ferdinand Mount, Times Literary Supplement
. 'John Bew has some heavy lifting to do in this consciously revisionist take. It is a great testament to his skills as a scholar and writer that he manages to do so with such aplomb ... stellar Tristram Hunt
. 'In a magisterial political portrait Bew brings Castlereagh and his world sharply back to life Daily Telegraph
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Author
About John Bew
John Bew is Reader in History and Foreign Policy at the War Studies Department at King's College London and Director of the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence. In 2013 he became the Henry A. Kissinger Chair in Foreign Policy and International Relations at the Library of Congress. From 2007-10, Bew was Lecturer in Modern British History, at Cambridge University, where he was also educated. He is currently writing a biography of Clement Attlee and a brief history of Realpolitik. He lives in London.
