Emily Robinson is an Advance Research Fellow in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Nottingham.

Although it is quite wide-ranging in terms of source material, the focus of this interesting, readable, and thought-provoking book is most concerned with the historically inflected rhetoric by senior members of political parties than on the historical political imagination per se. The focus is frequently on the aesthetic and emotional ends that the rhetoric is put to—with the book drawing on various literary writings for approaches and to appropriate critical distinctions. Particularly good are arguments about the importance of the decline—across the board—of political pessimism, and its replacement by a deadening optimism that is both born of an extremely limited world view but which nevertheless projects an unlimited vista forwards., SCOTT ANTHONY, University of Cambridge, Twentieth Century British History, 5 September 2013|"this is a fascinating and thought-provoking book, which is well worth reading."(Political Studies Review Volume 12, Issue 3, September 2014), Simon Griffiths, Goldsmiths, University of London, Political Studies Review Volume 12, Issue 3,, 1 September 2014

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction 1 Ideology and temporality2 Structures of memory: Parties and their pasts3 Against the tide of history: Conservatism in the 1980s and 1990s 4 Negotiations with Labour’s past: The SDP and New Labour5 New times, new politics: The collapse of the CPGB’s historical narrativeConclusions NotesBibliography

Emily Robinson is an Advance Research Fellow in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Nottingham.

Although it is quite wide-ranging in terms of source material, the focus of this interesting, readable, and thought-provoking book is most concerned with the historically inflected rhetoric by senior members of political parties than on the historical political imagination per se. The focus is frequently on the aesthetic and emotional ends that the rhetoric is put to—with the book drawing on various literary writings for approaches and to appropriate critical distinctions. Particularly good are arguments about the importance of the decline—across the board—of political pessimism, and its replacement by a deadening optimism that is both born of an extremely limited world view but which nevertheless projects an unlimited vista forwards., SCOTT ANTHONY, University of Cambridge, Twentieth Century British History, 5 September 2013|"this is a fascinating and thought-provoking book, which is well worth reading."(Political Studies Review Volume 12, Issue 3, September 2014), Simon Griffiths, Goldsmiths, University of London, Political Studies Review Volume 12, Issue 3,, 1 September 2014

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction 1 Ideology and temporality2 Structures of memory: Parties and their pasts3 Against the tide of history: Conservatism in the 1980s and 1990s 4 Negotiations with Labour’s past: The SDP and New Labour5 New times, new politics: The collapse of the CPGB’s historical narrativeConclusions NotesBibliography

Emily Robinson is an Advance Research Fellow in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Nottingham.

Although it is quite wide-ranging in terms of source material, the focus of this interesting, readable, and thought-provoking book is most concerned with the historically inflected rhetoric by senior members of political parties than on the historical political imagination per se. The focus is frequently on the aesthetic and emotional ends that the rhetoric is put to—with the book drawing on various literary writings for approaches and to appropriate critical distinctions. Particularly good are arguments about the importance of the decline—across the board—of political pessimism, and its replacement by a deadening optimism that is both born of an extremely limited world view but which nevertheless projects an unlimited vista forwards., SCOTT ANTHONY, University of Cambridge, Twentieth Century British History, 5 September 2013|"this is a fascinating and thought-provoking book, which is well worth reading."(Political Studies Review Volume 12, Issue 3, September 2014), Simon Griffiths, Goldsmiths, University of London, Political Studies Review Volume 12, Issue 3,, 1 September 2014

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction 1 Ideology and temporality2 Structures of memory: Parties and their pasts3 Against the tide of history: Conservatism in the 1980s and 1990s 4 Negotiations with Labour’s past: The SDP and New Labour5 New times, new politics: The collapse of the CPGB’s historical narrativeConclusions NotesBibliography