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The Works of Max Beerbohm · Theme
Historical Revisionism and Style
How The Works of Max Beerbohm develops Historical Revisionism and Style.
Beerbohm deliberately challenges established historical judgments (e.g., Thackeray's condemnation of George IV), using elegant, ironic prose to rehabilitate figures and argue that style and aesthetic merit should outweigh conventional moral or factual assessments.
Where it surfaces
- King George the Fourth
The chapter explicitly revises Thackeray's moralistic history, arguing that style and aesthetic unity should inform our judgment of historical figures.
- Poor Romeo!
The narrator weighs traditional accounts against Mr. Pryse Gordon's memoir, ultimately favoring tradition as a guide to truth, while using a discovered print and newspaper archives to reconstruct the real story.