A Short Narrative of the Life and Actions of His Grace John, D. of Marlborogh E-Book

Daniel Defoe

• Herausgeber: Krill Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016

Seitenzahl: 83

Beschreibung

Daniel Defoe (1660?-1731) was a prolific English writer who became one of the first Western writers to write novels and turn them into a sought after literary genre. During his life, Defoe wrote more than 500 books, pamphlets and journals on topics as wide ranging as politics, crime, religion, psychology, supernatural events, and even economics.

While those are all impressive accomplishments, Defoe’s name has lived on through Robinson Crusoe, one of the first and finest novels ever written. The book is written as a fictional autobiography of Robinson Crusoe, a castaway who spends nearly 30 years on a tropical island, where he encounters all kinds of danger and adventures. Published in the early 18th century, the novel may have been inspired by a real Scottish castaway, Alexander Selkirk, who lived for nearly 5 years on a Pacific Island. That island’s name has since been changed to Robinson Crusoe Island. Robinson Crusoe was a stark departure from the typical literature of the day, which was still based on ancient mythology, legends, and history.

Leseprobe

A SHORT NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE AND ACTIONS OF HIS GRACE JOHN, D. OF MARLBOROGH

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Daniel Defoe

DOSSIER PRESS

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

A: SHORT NARRATIVE: OF THE: Life and Actions: Of His GRACE: JOHN,: D. of Marlborough

Introduction by Paula R. Backscheider: PUBLICATION NUMBER 168 WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY University of California, Los Angeles 1974

INTRODUCTION

A Short Narrative of the Life and Actions of His Grace John, D. of Marlborogh

By

Daniel Defoe

A Short Narrative of the Life and Actions of His Grace John, D. of Marlborogh

Published by Dossier Press

New York City, NY

First published circa 1731

Copyright © Dossier Press, 2015

All rights reserved

Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

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A: SHORT NARRATIVE: OF THE: LIFE AND ACTIONS: OF HIS GRACE: JOHN,: D. OF MARLBOROUGH

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(1711)

INTRODUCTION BY PAULA R. BACKSCHEIDER: PUBLICATION NUMBER 168 WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES 1974

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GENERAL EDITORS

* William E. Conway, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

* George Robert Guffey, University of California, Los Angeles

* Maximillian E. Novak, University of California, Los Angeles

* David S. Rodes, University of California, Los Angeles

ADVISORY EDITORS

* Richard C. Boys, University of Michigan

* James L. Clifford, Columbia University

* Ralph Cohen, University of Virginia

* Vinton A. Dearing, University of California, Los Angeles

* Arthur Friedman, University of Chicago

* Louis A. Landa, Princeton University

* Earl Miner, Princeton University

* Samuel H. Monk, University of Minnesota

* Everett T. Moore, University of California, Los Angeles

* Lawrence Clark Powell, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

* James Sutherland, University College, London

* H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., University of California, Los Angeles

* Robert Vosper, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

CORRESPONDING SECRETARY

* Edna C. Davis, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

* Beverly J. Onley, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

Typography by Wm. M. Cheney

INTRODUCTION

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OPINION IS A MIGHTY MATTER in war, and I doubt but the French think it impossible to conquer an army that he leads, and our soldiers think the same; and how far even this step may encourage the French to play tricks with us, no man knows.

Swift’s Journal to Stella, 1 January 1711

… the moment he leaves the service and loses the protection of the Court, such scenes will open as no victories can varnish over.

Bolingbroke’s Letters and Correspondence,

23 January 1711

The career of John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, reflects the political battles of nearly thirty years of English politics. In an age when duplicity, intrigue, personality, and an immediate history of violence characterized politics, John Churchill was a constant, steady military success even while his political and personal fortunes alternately plunged and soared. His military ability insured his importance to the Grand Alliance and his victories brought the reverence of the European powers opposing Louis XIV as well as that of his own people, but, at the same time, his successes also assured his involvement with the fortunes of nearly every major English political figure and movement in the years 1688 to 1712.

Marlborough’s military career spanned two periods. Aware of the danger of the “exorbitant power of France” and the corresponding danger to the Protestant religion, disgusted with James’s actions at the Gloucester shipwreck and in dealing with Scottish Protestants, Marlborough had joined the bloodless shift to William of Orange. For William, he led the English forces in Flanders in 1689 and in Ireland in 1690; in 1691 he was in charge of the British forces in Europe with the rank of lieutenant-general. In January, 1692, however, Marlborough was dismissed from all of his offices for a combination of reasons, each insufficient in itself but all too typical for him—open opposition to William’s Dutch dominated army, rumors that he and Sarah, his ambitious and sometimes presumptuous wife, were plotting Anne’s usurpation of the throne, and dissension aroused between Anne and her sister Queen Mary by the quixotic Sarah. When rumors of a Jacobite uprising began, Marlborough spent six weeks in the Tower.

Although Marlborough was restored to political favor in 1698 partly as a placatory gesture to Anne, it was 1701 before he resumed his military career, this time as William’s Commander-in-Chief and Ambassador Extraordinary to the United Provinces. In this second phase of his military career, he won every battle, took every fort that he besieged, held the Grand Alliance together, broke the threatening supremacy of France, and established England as a major power. Yet, during these ten years, Queen Anne’s ministry and Parliament underwent several major upheavals: the resulting shifts in policy and personalities alternately inconvenienced and vexed Marlborough. The year 1711 marked the culmination of warring factions and clandestine arrangement, and Daniel Defoe’s A Short Narrative of the Life and Actions of his grace, John, Duke of Marlborough, published 20 February 1711, originated in this battle. (For discussion of authorship, please see Appendix.)

Much that happened in these years can be unraveled back to Harley, Earl of Oxford. His influences and circuitous dealing emerge wherever a close examination of politics is made.[1] Hiding his activities from even his closest associates, employing spies and journalists whose purposes seem contradictory, manipulating the House of Commons’ radical October Club while preaching a “broad bottomed” moderate government, and buzzing in the Queen’s ear in a variety of ways, Harley was ready for any exigency. England had wanted peace since 1709 when their insistence on “no peace without Spain” and on the XXXVII Article asking for guarantees of three Spanish towns had rallied the French behind the war;[2] Marlborough’s pleas that peace be made and Spain be dealt with later were ignored. Although Parliament voted Malplaquet a triumph, Marlborough’s power and prestige were systematically shorn away, and embarrassing decisions contrived to force his resignation were effected.[3] Should Marlborough resign, a scapegoat for defeat or an unfavorable peace would be assured. By 1710, foreign policy had changed—a growing interest in trade and colonization urged Parliament to end a costly and now unnecessary war and had united the Tories, Jacobites, the Church party, as well as such diverse men as the Dukes of Argyll, Somerset, Newcastle, and Shrewsbury, a Whig. With the election of the radical Tory majority (240 new members were seated) to the Commons in 1710 and the creation of twelve new peers,[4] Harley’s job of using diverse elements to form a moderate government became more complex. He found it expedient to establish and maintain influence with groups ranging from the radical Tory October Club to Swift’s country squire and clergy Examiner readers to moderate Whigs such as Shrewsbury. Moreover, Defoe had impressed upon him the importance of assuring the nation that moderate and sensible men were at the bottom of all of the political changes.[5] Harley, therefore, prepared for at least three apparently exclusive possibilities—prosecuting the war for several more years, negotiating a peace with the Allies, or making a separate peace with France without the Allies. To keep all these possibilities alive, Harley had to remain in harmony with Marlborough. The general’s popularity with the soldiers and the European powers and France’s awe of his military prowess necessitated the appearance that Marlborough’s command was secure. While the Examiner, with its Tory audience and its emphasis on pressure for peace, was essential to Harley, so were Swift’s and Defoe’s appeals for moderation at a time when sympathy for Marlborough was rampant and the call “no peace without Spain” was still defended even by the October Club; for the same reasons he was glad to have Bolingbroke openly associated with the Examiner.

January of 1711 brought the decisive defeat at Brihuega which effectively took the issue of Spanish succession away; in the ensuing witch hunt, Almanza and the peace talks of 1709 were revived to distract the people. While these inquiries proceeded, England received word that France was ready to discuss terms. The delay between this (8 February) and France’s formal proposal (2 May) was an anxious time for Harley and his schemers. Defoe was busy setting the stage for the outcome.

While Swift, the high Tory, could easily set about discrediting Marlborough, the hero and standard bearer, and, by so doing, weaken the Whig’s position, Defoe’s readers required different handling. His most effective writing at this time was in pamphlets which reached a wider audience and which were not bound by the consistency of the Review. Defoe and Swift, primed with the Minister’s inside knowledge, set about to discredit the Whig ministry in basically the same way. In the 15 February Examiner, Swift wrote,