Winston Churchill: statesman and historian

Title

Creator

Commager, Henry Steele

Language

English

Year

1968

Subject

Churchill, Winston Leonard S., 1874 – 1965.

Statesmen.

Historians.

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Abstract

Excerpts from Saturday Review, May 18, 1968.

A self-made scholar, Churchill is a distinguished political and military leader and the greatest British historian.

Fulltext

■ A self-made scholar, Churchill is a distinguished political and military leader and the greatest British historian. WINSTON CHURCHILL: STATESMAN AND HISTORIAN Winston Churchill is, be yond all doubt, that states man who became the great est historian, and that histo rian who became the geatest statesman in the long annals of England. We do not say of him, had he not chosen to be a leading public figure he would have been a lead ing historian, for he was that, by every test. It is only be cause our gaze is fastened so continuously and so in tensely on that career which has some claim to be the most splendid in two centu ries ' of English history that we do not concentrate more on that career which has some claim to be regarded as the most affluent in modern historical literature. It is the quality of Chur chill’s histories that assures them a permanent place in our literature, but the sheer bulk is no less impressive. What other major historian has written so much so well: thirty two volumes (no less) of history and biography, and another twenty volumes of speeches which add a not negligible dimension to his torical literature. If this pro digious output had been achieved at the expense of scholarly accuracy, critical acumen, or literary polish, we might dismiss it as in teresting chiefly for what it told us about Churchill him self; but the books do not shine in a borrowed light, but with their own. As with most great histo rians, Churchill was selftaught and self-trained. Cer tainly he had no formal edu cation for a career as histo rian — indeed, it is accurate to say that he had no formal education for anything ex cept soldiering — but his in formal education was prob ably as good as that which any young man enjoyed in the whole of Victorian Eng land. Born in Blenheim Pa July 1968 25 lace, connected with all the first families of politics and society, he was familiar in all the best drawing rooms, even those of royalty. As a boy he had not only read history, but seen it in the making. ‘‘I can see myself . . . sitting a little boy,” he said to the students of Harrow, “always feeling the glory of England and its history surrounding me and about me.” Perhaps he did feel something of that at Harrow, but doubt less he felt even more of it in the spacious rooms and gardens of Blenheim, at the Vice Regal Lodge in Dublin, at the house on St. James’s Place in London. But even that was only the beginning. On distant Indian frontiers he immersed him self in history and philosophy. “AH' through the long, glit tering, middle hours of the Indian day,” he remembered, “from when we quitted sta bles till when the evening shadows proclaimed the hour of Polo, I devoured Gibbon.” And not Gibbon alone, but Macaulay and Lecky and Hallam and, for good mea sure, Plato and Aristotle, too. “I approached it with an empty, hungry mind,” he added, “and with fairly strong jaws, and what I got, I bit.” Fame was the spur to this writing, as was necessity. Churchill had to make his way, he had to make his mark. The Army, for all its fascination, offered nothing permanent. Torn between journalism, history, and poli tics, Churchill therefore em braced all three, and made them one. For he was never content to sail but one sea al a time. Most nearly autobiographi cal, and prophetic, too, was the first book that Churchill wrote: the novel Savrola. The central figure, Savrola, was a soldier who aspired to be a statesman, or a states man who found that he had to be a soldier. He is in all likelihood, the greatest of military historians who wrote in English. Consider Chur chill’s claim to pre-eminence in this field. His first books were about wars-frontier skir mishes, to be sure, but that can be said of Parkman’s histories, too; his Marlbo rough can bear comparison with Freeman’s seven vol umes on Lee and his lieute nants; his magisterial histo Panorama ries of two world wars are still the most comprehensive and scholarly in our litera ture. He read history as a stu pendous moral scripture, and for him the writing was, if not divinely inspired, at least authoritative. More, it was straightforward and simple. History was a struggle be tween the forces of right and wrong, freedom and tyranny, the future and the past. By great good fortune Chur chill’s own people — “this island race,” as he called them — were on the side of right, progress, and enlight enment. For all his familiarity with the peoples of every conti nent, Churchill was the most parochial of historians. He looked out upon the whole world, but he looked through British spectacles. All his life Churchill’s eyes were dazzled by the glory of Eng land, and all his writing was suffused by a sense of that glory. He never forgot that it was the English tongue that was heard in Chicago and Vancouver, Johannes burg and Sydney, or that it was English law that was pronounced in Washington and Ottawa, Canberra and New Delhi, and English par liamentary governments that flourished in scores of nations on every continent. Finally, Churchill’s read ing of history reinforced his early education to exalt the heroic virtues. He was Ro man rather than Greek, and, as he admired the Roman accomplishments in law, gov ernment, and empire he re joiced in the Roman virtues of order, justice, resoluteness, and magnanimity. Churchill cherished as a law of history the principle that a people who respect them will pros per and survive. — By Henry Steele Commager, Excerpts from Saturday Review, May 18, 1968. July 1968 27

pages

25-27

Media