A.L. Rowse And Cornwall : Paradoxical Patriot

Even those with an interest in history who know little or nothing about Cornwall will be aware of Rowse.

Philip Payton's latest book offers a revisionist view of the complex and enigmatic Cornishman.

It promises to be a radically different appraisal from the general view that Rowse's complexity was essentially about class and 'provincialism'-Rowse was born into a working-class family and spent his working life aspiring to be something 'better'.

Drawing on the Rowse archive-some of it previously unavailable-held of Exeter University, Payton's study moves beyond the rigours of a Cornish childhood, the struggle to get to Oxford, the penetration of the English establishment and the sentimental construction of his 'Little Land of Cornwall' to ask deeper questions about Rowse's life as Cornishman, politician, historian, anglophile and 'man of letters'.

In particular, it illuminates Rowse's role in the development of the 'new British historiography' and the placement within it of Cornish history.