Background
ROBERTS, Michael was born on May 21, 1908 in Nelson, Lancashire. Son of Arthur Roberts and Hannah Elizabeth Landless.
( British Diplomacy and Swedish Politics, 1758–1773 was f...)
British Diplomacy and Swedish Politics, 1758–1773 was first published in 1980. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. This book has three objectives; to shed light on the central issue in British foreign policy during a period inadequately explored by historians; to present, for the first time in English, an account of the dramatic last decade of Swedish "liberty" and its final overthrow by Gustavus III; and finally, to direct the attention of historians to the career of Sir John Goodricke—a diplomat whom Lor Rochford called "the best man we have abroad; you can trust him with anything—except money." These themes are in fact inextricably linked. For Great Britain, emerging from the Seven Years War victorious but isolated, needed to safeguard her trade with Russia and British statesmen felt that an Anglo-Russian alliance could best be achieved by first concluding a treaty with Sweden to which Russia would adhere. To achieve this aim, it was essential to break French influence in Stockholm, to oust the francophile Hats from power, and to install their anglophile rivals the Caps. Thus Swedish party politics, and the Swedish constitutions, unexpectedly became matters of great consequence in Whitehall. To win the necessary victory in Stockholm Britain needed a minister of peculiar talents and no little ability. Sir John Goodricke was such a minister. And the record of his exertions, and of his eventual failure, is necessary to any proper understanding of British policy in the postwar decade. This book is an important contribution to both British and Scandinavian history and, since it also illuminates the subject of European political relations in the eighteenth century, it will be welcomed by diplomatic historians and specialists in eighteenth-century studies as well. Michael Roberts tells his story with customary verve and grace, and effectively refutes any idea that diplomatic history need be dull.
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(In his Wiles Lectures for 1977 Professor Roberts examines...)
In his Wiles Lectures for 1977 Professor Roberts examines some of the problems raised by Sweden's brief career as a great power, and seeks to answer some of the questions that flow from them. Were the underlying considerations which prompted the unexpected development geopolitical, or social, or economic? How was it possible to produce the financial resources and the manpower which the enterprise demanded? How far was seventeenth-century Sweden a militarized society? What importance had official propaganda and national myths? Did the consititutional situation help to make an expansionist foreign policy easier? The structure of the empire is next examined: its administration, the ties that held it together, the differing interests of the provinces, the varying responses of the metropolitan power was there, in fact, anything deserving the name of an imperial policy? How did the provinces view the Swedish connexion? In a final chapter the author tries to answer the question why, if Sweden could acquire an empire without undue strain, she could not retain it; why the collapse was so rapid and so total; and whether her career as a great power had real relevance to the country's subsequent history. On almost all these topics little information is available in English, and no comparable treatment of them on this scale exists in any language.
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ROBERTS, Michael was born on May 21, 1908 in Nelson, Lancashire. Son of Arthur Roberts and Hannah Elizabeth Landless.
Brighton College, Worcester College, Oxford.
He was particularly known for his studies of Swedish history. He taught at Rhodes University College in Grahamstown, South Africa from 1935, served in the army in East Africa during World World War II, and headed the British Council in Stockholm 1944-1946. From 1954 until his retirement in 1973, he was professor of modern history at the Queen"s University of Belfast.
He also held guest professorships in United States. universities.
Roberts is chiefly known as the originator of the theory of a "Revolution in Military Affairs" or Royal Military Academy, which he first presented in a paper entitled "The Military Revolution: 1560-1660" in a lecture at the Queen"s university of Belfast in 1955. This theory holds that certain changes in military tactics and technology led to a revolutionary new method of waging war that made combat more decisive.
Although originally working in the area of British history, Roberts soon gained an interest in the history of Sweden and learnt Swedish prior to 1940. He made his most significant contributions on the period from the late 16th to the early 18th century when Sweden was a major player on the European political and military scene, but published several studies on later periods in both Swedish and British history.
Some of his works on Swedish history are used as textbooks in Swedish universities and several have also been translated into Swedish.
In addition, he proposed the concept of a "military revolution" in the early modern Europe - an idea that, with modification, is still used by historians. Roberts also wrote translations of the poet Birger Sjöberg and Sweden"s bard Carl Michael Bellman into English, which he published himself. These works are on file at the National Library of Sweden.
In 2008 the Birger Sjöberg Society published Frida"s New Clothes, a collection of the poet"s lyrics in translation.
Fourteen of the translations were by Roberts. Jeremy Black, writing in History Today, comments that "Few subjects are identified so closely with one man as English-language scholarship on early-modern Sweden and Michael Roberts." Glansholms bookshop and antiquariat (in Sweden) comment that Roberts gives a fascinating picture of Sweden in the Age of Liberty in his book, and that "he is a good storyteller in his anglo-saxon tradition, succeeding in telling Swedish history with clarity and humour.".
(In his Wiles Lectures for 1977 Professor Roberts examines...)
( British Diplomacy and Swedish Politics, 1758–1773 was f...)
(First Published in 1965. Routledge is an imprint of Taylo...)
(Book by Michael Roberts)
(foldout map)
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences]
He was a member of the British Academy and the Royal Irish Academy. Michael Roberts had several Swedish honours bestowed upon him. Among other things he received an honorary doctorate from Stockholm University, and was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities.
Married Ann McKinnon Morton in 1941.