Introduction

Abstract

This chapter introduces the concepts of celebrity and the hero as frameworks of analysis for understanding the role of popular politicians in nineteenth-century Britain and Ireland. It argues that the emergence of the popular politician was a product of changed social and political circumstances brought about by the French Revolution and subsequent wars, together with developments in technology and the expansion of the press. It also introduces the main cast of characters who populate the book and will be its main case studies, particularly Henry Hunt, George Thompson, Richard Cobden, Daniel O’Connell, Feargus O’Connor, William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglass and Harriet Beecher Stowe. It outlines the approaches and structure of the book, and identifies the importance of material and visual culture as well as more traditional sources such as private correspondence and coverage in the newspapers and periodical press.