The English Association has been one of those bodies I have been aware of but never really known much about: my first awareness came during study for English A level at school, and as someone who has retained an interest in English literature ever since it has cropped up on different occasions and at various times subsequently. So, one of the bonuses of reading and reviewing this history is to learn more about the Association. With a primarily educational focus, it clearly influenced strongly if indirectly my school studies. Through its publications and activities it has focused influentially on the teaching of English at various levels, advice and approaches that would have been passed on by my teachers.
Any association that thrives for a hundred years deserves a centenary history and the English Association very much so. Anyone who has read William Baker's reviews for this journal, or his earlier historical papers in its companion Library Review, will know what to expect and will not be disappointed in their expectations. His jointly‐authored account is meticulous (the only slight error I have noticed is to call the Scottish poet Sydney Goodsir Smith “Sydney Goodson Smith”), closely referenced to its sources, yet judicious in its selection of material, arrangement and presentation. While an initial sub‐chapter is headed The Context in relation to the foundation of the Association, the subsequent history is itself contextualised within contemporary educational, critical or intellectual movements. This is not a dry‐as‐dust chronicle of officers, meetings and publications, but a history of a significant body in relation to its changing times.
Within a chronological arrangement there are sections obviously on activities and personalities. In the period between the two world wars the Newbolt Report on the teaching of English (1921) features prominently among the developing activities and influence of the association. The pattern continues after the second world war in ever changing circumstances: one of the achievements of the association has been to react to and in many instances stand in the forefront of changing intellectual or educational contexts in its subject.
Two major chapters cover the important topic of the association's publications. The first deals with its annuals (Essays and Studies. The Year's Work in English Studies and The Year's Work in Critical and Cultural Theory) and the second with its journals (primarily but not exclusively The Bulletin which became simply English). A final chapter deals with the provincial (and overseas) branches of the association: one of the most active branches was its Scottish one, and there is also the irony that the very establishment of the association itself derived from an initiative by a Scot, Easton Smith Valentine the head of English at Dundee High School. There is an adequate index, and a bibliography that relates only to the text of this book. The association's website carries a little more detail on the publications, although perhaps a comprehensive bibliography of the association's publications and their contents would be a useful project.
The English Association merits its history being recorded for posterity, and this account makes a very good job of it. It is concise and readable, yet with adequate detail throughout. The content is well selected and sources used judiciously and never voluminously, although all meticulously referenced. The result is a fitting tribute to a significant association that offers an informed history of the association itself and of the times and contexts within which it has flourished.
