The central argument presented by this book is that representations of England and the English people have been largely absent from the canon of English Literature because that canon was constructed on behalf of the British state and its empire during the imperial period so that forms of English expression were subsumed within the wider, imperialist category of British from which they have only recently started to emerge. In order to understand this provocative argument it is necessary to contextualise Gardiner’s prior research before this publication. 

The central argument presented by this book is that representations of England and the English people have been largely absent from the canon of English Literature because that canon was constructed on behalf of the British state and its empire during the imperial period so that forms of English expression were subsumed within the wider, imperialist category of British from which they have only recently started to emerge. In order to understand this provocative argument it is necessary to contextualise Gardiner’s prior research before this publication.