William Ewart Gladstone: The Heart and Soul of a Statesman

The leading statesman of nineteenth-century Britain, a figure who bestrode the political world like a Colossus, is ’Gladstone’ to modern biographers. In order to signal the difference between Wheeler’s approach and those of earlier biographers, the subject of this book is known as William, his baptismal name. His autobiographical fragments of 1892 included a disclaimer: ’I do not indeed intend in these notes to give a history of the inner life, which I think has with me been extraordinarily dubious, vacillating, and (above all) complex’. William Gladstone: The Heart and Soul of a Statesman is about the spiritual dimension of his complex inner life. In tracing the movements of his heart and soul, the book works from the inner to the outer aspects of a rich and varied life, from William’s daily disciplines of prayer and reflection to his earnest attempts to follow the precepts of Christianity through action in the public realm and in private philanthropy, and in the writing of numerous reviews, articles, and books. He remained an independent intellectual, eschewing party labels within the Church of England and working out his own stance in relation to specific Liberal party policies in politics. He was as much a man of letters as he was a politician. Later in his political career, ’the people’s William’ appealed to public opinion through a series of national moral campaigns. His fiercest battles, however, were spiritual, as he castigated himself for falling short of the ideals set out in Jesus’ sermon on the mount, particularly with regard to sexual desire as he sought to rescue women from a life of prostitution and became infatuated with a former courtesan. His longest crusade was against the enemy within.

Michael Wheeler, Visiting Professor of English, University of Southampton

Michael Wheeler is Visiting Professor of English at the University of Southampton; the Chairman of the Murray Bequest to Birkbeck College (history of art); and a member of the Athenæum (archive group). He was formerly Professor of English Literature and founding Director of the Ruskin Programme and Ruskin Collection Project, Lancaster (building the Ruskin Library); Co-Director, Chawton House Library and Professor of English Literature, University of Southampton; and Lay Canon of Winchester. He has been a recipient of major research grants (including Leverhulme and the British Academy), and a visiting lecturer in 18 countries overseas.