Improvisations of Empire

Thomas Pringle in Scotland, the Cape Colony and London, 1789-1834

Improvisations of Empire
Matthew Shum
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Hardback
h229 x 153mm - 232pg
30 Apr 2020 UK
International import eta 7-19 days
9781785273780
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The first extended critical, biographical and historiographical account of Thomas Pringle' s workImprovisations of Empire offers a historical, biographical and literary study of the life and writings of Thomas Pringle (1789-1834), the son of a Lowland tenant farmer in Scotland. It examines his Scottish journalistic and literary career, his emigration to the Cape Colony as the head of a party of Scottish settlers and his subsequent relocation to London where he gained prominence as the secretary of the Anti-Slavery Society and the editor of a popular annual, Friendship' s Offering. The central concern of the book is with Pringle' s poetry and his affiliated prose, and how these writings reflect the negotiation of his deeply conflicted colonial experience from the perspectives of his Scottish background, his shifting colonial locations and his subsequent period of residence in London.
"Improvisations of Empire shows how a careful reading of a literary oeuvre can transform how we think about the legacies of the colonial era. It rescues Pringle from the realms of liberal mythmaking, casting new light on a historical period in which nation-building, class-consciousness, abolition, Christian evangelism and colonialism were deeply entangled. " -Peter D. McDonald, Professor of English and Related Literature, University of Oxford, UK "Thomas Pringle has been a long-time icon of South African liberalism. Matthew Shum' s new study presents a more complex figure caught up in the contradictions of empire by a career that comprised poetry, settler propaganda and abolitionism. Equally in command of close reading and relocations that include Scotland, Cape Colony and mid-nineteenth-century London, Improvisations of Empire is a truly eye-opening study. " -Jon Mee, Professor of Eighteenth Century Studies, University of York and British Academy/Leverhulme Senior Research Fellow "Improvisations of Empire is a remarkable achievement, which is likely to remain the definitive reading of Thomas Pringle for many years to come. " -David Attwell, Professor of Modern Literature, University of York, UK "Shum has brought to life Thomas Pringle in all his capacities: Scottish Romantic poet, South African settler and London-based advocate for abolition. A rich and important study of a complex man. " -Jason Rudy, Professor of English, University of Maryland, College Park, USA
Matthew Shum, a research associate in the English department at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa, has previously taught in the English department at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. The focus of Shum' s research is colonial writing in South Africa in the long eighteenth century.
Status: Active
ISBN-13: 9781785273780
Published: 30 Apr 2020
Published In: United Kingdom
Imprint: Anthem Press
Publisher: Anthem Press
Format: Hardback
Height: 229mm
Width: 153mm
Spine: 26mm
Weight: 454g
Pages: 232

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