The Lives and Afterlives of Enoch Powell

Book excerpt: 50 years after Enoch Powell’s self-styled detonation in the form of his so-called ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech, this volume brings together contributions from international scholars in the field of history, political science and British studies, with new insights from hitherto unexplored archives. It investigates some of the key national and grassroots parameters which, from above and from below, led to Powell’s violent irruption into the immigration debate in 1968. It apprehends Powell as a political and intellectual figure firmly established in the British Tory tradition, a tradition which was to shape the 1970s debate on race and immigration, and be avidly instrumentalised by the British far-right. It also analyses Powell’s positioning vis-à-vis the Irish question, and apprehends Powell’s late-1960s moment from an international standpoint, as one of the early stages of the conservative revolution which was to culminate in 2016 with Trump’s election. Lastly, this book weaves a thread between Powell and another recent political detonation: Brexit.