Doctor, diplomat, spy, philosopher

One of the best lectures I ever heard was given by Hugh Trevor-Roper nearly 50 years ago, and its merit was not in its delivery. He stood at a lectern in a ragged gown reading from a script with small gestures which hardly emphasised points but seemed necessary to keep the words coming, although they were already there in front of him. At times he paused and looked up, but not at us, as if something had occurred to him which he was trying to remember and use later, in less depressing circumstances. It ought to have been depressing for the audience, too; but it wasn’t. The words were so well chosen and artfully combined that they have not faded from memory yet. Major-General Harrison, one of Oliver’s barmy army, lives on, as painted in Hugh’s fanciful colours, a portrait presumably intended to appear in the big book on the Civil War which he was never to publish.

Why not? There was the technical difficulty of combining narrative and social history, of pulling off Macaulay’s stunt 100 years too late. There was his much greater facility with essays, reviews and selections, which left more time for correspondence and for political and academic intrigue. It was rumoured that he had actually written the big book, but had left it in a train or taxi or waiting-room, beyond hope of recovery. Such accidents have happened, but in any case he was happier compressing great subjects into small boxes. He also dealt with a small one at great length: The Hidden Life of the fake mandarin Sir Edmund Backhouse took up 391 pages, although he was a much less important figure than he liked to pretend. Now we have 438 on a physician very famous in his own time, and certainly more important: the healer, friend and confidant of the powerful, the learned and the wise for over 50 years before he died in 1655; a work written over 30 years and published posthumously with the utmost care by Blair Worden.