Lloyd George

by Chris Wrigley

Professor Wrigley assesses the main features of Lloyd George's career from his early days as a fiery Welsh radical through the pre-First World War Liberal social reforms to his premiership (1916-1922) and after. He concludes with an assessment of the place of Lloyd George in British political history and a survey of the biographical material available.

180 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1992

About the author

Chris Wrigley is Emeritus Professor of History at Nottingham University, UK. Previously, he taught at Queen's University, Belfast, and Loughborough University. He was on the Economic History Society Council from 1983 for nearly 30 years, and President of the Historical Association from 1996 until 1999.

Reviews

[Bill38silver · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a short book of 155 pages in which a great deal of material is drawn from archive collections and many previous works on one of the key figures of 20th century history. Lloyd George fascinates and frustrates in equal measure, being charismatic and complex. And not without scandal and dubious dollops of self-serving.
This is one of the Historical Association Studies. Wrigley tries to balance the differing views of other writers and commentators. He crams a lot in a short space, but in my view he has downplayed the critical influence in World War 1 of Lloyd George. It would have been helpful if more was said on several matters including Lloyd George's involvement in the Marconi Scandal.
Overall, a worthy effort at a balanced assessment of Lloyd George.