OFF THE SHELF: SEPTEMBER 2025

Canal Dreamers: The Epic Quest to Connect the Atlantic and Pacific in the Age of Revolutions, by Jessica M. Lepler (The University of North Carolina Press, 2025)

The author (Mansfield, 1998), now an Associate Professor of History at the University of New Hampshire, addresses ‘an alluring watery land teeming with possibility’. Unlike so many books this one has excellent maps. They convey the majesty of the chosen subject right at the start, reminding the reader that for half a century from the 1820s, there were innumerable intrigues, plans, funding quests and political sallies towards connecting the Atlantic to the Pacific, saving 4,000 nautical miles of sailing and changing the world in the process. News to most of us, I’m sure, is that there were at least three main routes in prospect, one connecting across Central America via Lake Nicaragua, another across Mexico, the third across Panama. The book title is well founded and the words begin with a snazzy blue map originally coloured in optimistically by a British agent, hoping to impress the politicians and failing, right back in the 1820s where Lepler's chosen narrative gets going. She found it in an archive and has visited dozens more to achieve such a massive overview of such a fragmented but worthwhile story. The eventual Panama Canal, subject to much recent political controversy, is a reminder that such feats of engineering are as much human and political events as they are engineering ones – and even then, as the author shows, the ability of the ‘dreamers’ to get excited over a beautiful map rather than the mosquito-infested reality was always remarkable. The broader ironies are never far away. There was a previously approved $50 billion Chinese-backed plan to dig the Nicaragua route, cancelled in 2024 due to widespread local protest. Meanwhile, the Panama Canal opened to traffic on 15 August 1914, the grand opening ceremony cancelled because of the outbreak of World War One. Such are human affairs.

Queen Elizabeth II: A Concise Biography of an Exceptional Sovereign by David Cannadine (Oxford University Press, 2025)

Out on 11 September as a hardback and an e-book, we think this lovely little volume may prove one of the hits of the year because it does so much so effortlessly, and in not too many words. It will appeal to a much broader public than more concentrated, academic books. Sir David Manning said during her life that the Queen was 'living history'. As such, the biography is a brightly lit window on almost everything: the declining British Empire; many Prime Ministers, who along with all the monarch’s Private Secretaries and Lord Chamberlains are listed in a very useful appendix; the definite transformation of Britain from one country to quite another, by the time of the Queen’s death on 8 September 2022, aged 96, having been born on 26 April 1926. Her sheer longevity is another part of the majesty, but the book is not uncritical and retains the necessary detachment of a professional historian. Still, the word ‘exceptional’ betrays the view that sovereigns are worth the candle and some more than others. In fact, explains the author, the word count for his Queen Elizabeth II entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, to be published in 2026, eclipses the word count for Queen Victoria. It places her, says Cannadine, ‘in the illustrious and varied company of William Shakespeare, her namesake Queen Elizabeth I, Margaret Thatcher, Sir Winston Churchill, and Oliver Cromwell…’ It’s perfectly possible that down the line someone will come along and pare it back a bit, but for now we all remember our Queen, and the author notes his own birth in 1950, adding that while King George VI had a year to live, in practice it has meant that for as long as he can remember it was Queen Elizabeth II, an almost institutional embodiment of human presence. The book has a delightful ‘Interlude’ halfway in, that begins on serious stuff including her mistaken indulgence of her two younger sons having been accused of emotional distance from her eldest, but continues to ‘Clothes, Horses and Dogs’. It’s terrific detail:

‘On her visit to Mexico in 1975, she wore a sunny yellow polka dot dress by Hardy Amies: yellow is a traditional colour for renewal and hope, but also symbolised maize, a vital life source in Mayan culture. But sometimes the symbols were more ambiguous. For Donald Trump’s state visit in June 2018, the Queen wore three different brooches: the first, a modest flower, was a gift from the Obamas (who did not like Trump); the second, a sapphire snowflake, was given to her by the people of Canada (a country Trump derided); and the third was a brooch habitually worn in mourning (which might have suggested she had not enjoyed his visit).’

What could be more British or subtle (or rather, quietly devastating) than that? A tremendous book in sum and one that will be widely enjoyed.

A final, Oxford-specific note, is that the book is dedicated to the late Colin Matthew, who rejuvenated the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography in the 1980s from his base in Christ Church. The author later became the editor himself. The dictionary is correctly recognised here as the essential soil from which brilliant and not-too-long biographies arise, and as such is indelibly woven into this volume, or as the quip goes somewhere else, ‘the indissoluble scheme of things’ (after Lytton Strachey).

Teachers, Schools and Views on Education by John Howson (August 2025)

The author (Worcester, 1979) began a blog in 2013, just as blogs were becoming a thing. He says that he was partly recreating the discipline of having previously written a weekly column for the Times Educational Supplement, and partly because it coincided with being elected as a county councillor for the North Oxford division St Margaret's. He adds, ‘I became the Lib Dem spokesperson on education on the county council. In 2021-22, I was made Chair of the County Council. So, politics and education have been central to my life in Oxford.’ The book was just published in August, and is available on Amazon. Howson says of the book's content, ‘[It was] written in response to a range of issues in education in England that were in the news. 2013 was the middle year of the coalition government between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. Most, but not all posts are about the school sector of education. Interspersed are some posts of a more personal nature, and others of more general interest. Important posts include my prediction about the start of the teacher supply crisis and the government's response to my concerns as well as discussions about academies and free schools. As a Liberal Democrat, the book reflects my political views at the time they were written.’

The Stained Glass & Chapels of Oxford by Dominic Price (2023)

We missed this book in 2023 when it was first published so it seemed silly not to mention it now given its rich focus on Oxford treasure. The author originally surveyed over 80 chapels in Oxford (yes, there are over 80!) and spent five years doing so, whittling his razor focus down to one stained glass window in each, taking exquisite photos and writing about what they depict, and why.

He says, ‘The result is a gazetteer that paints a picture through exquisite photography of the diverse beauty of every one of the city’s 80+ often overlooked and sometimes forgotten chapels. It includes a brief history of both stained glass and Oxford, while also providing guidance and help to those wishing to develop their photography within this field.’

Language in the Liturgy: Past, Present, Future by Barry Spurr (James Clarke & Co, 2025)

The author (St Edmund Hall, 1974) notes that ‘Many in Oxford and numerous alumni are very interested in liturgical matters,’ so if that’s you, here is a noteworthy addition that has received plenty of endorsements. Professor Spurr continues, ‘Language in the Liturgy is an historically-based, linguistically-focused account of the development of liturgical language in English in the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches over the past half-century. It analyses issues of style and expression in a wide range of texts, setting this analysis within larger contexts of ecclesiastical and societal change since the 1970s. The Book of Common Prayer is taken as the benchmark of classical liturgical composition in English, not only because it was the first liturgy to be composed in the language, but also because of the universally acknowledged beauty of it.’ Spurr argues for a restoration of an appropriate solemnity and sacredness of linguistic expression, as exemplified in the traditional Prayer Book rites. The book also includes chapters on the role of music and of silence in worship. This stimulating study will be of interest to all concerned about the future direction of liturgies in English in the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches.