That Sweet Enemy: The British and the French from the Sun King to the Present [Hardcover]

This tome of nearly 700 pages of text about the relations between Britain and 'that sweet enemy, France' (a phrase from a sonnet by Sir Philip Sidney) is like a huge pudding stuffed with goodies: I have rarely read a history book whose brilliance is sustained over such an immense time-range - from the reign of Louis XIV to that of Jacques Chirac. The authors - the husband an Englishman, his wife born in France - handle the story with skill, and efficiency, and they frequently employ a joyous felicity of phrase to point up differences and similarities between England and France. There are neat descriptions of personalities - the authors are always forthright in their judgments - and spirited accounts of campaigns. Even someone who, like myself, considered himself quite familiar with the political narrative will come across sections which throw a new light upon it. I learnt much, for example, from the Tombs' description of France's involvement in the American War of Independence, and from their interesting reflections on how the loss of the American colonies, even in the short term, turned out to be a blessing in disguise for Britain. And the wider narrative is frequently interrupted by vignettes of little-known episodes, set in a different type, which further illuminate the themes under discussion.

There is a particularly striking chapter about the differences between the British and French navies during the Second Hundred Years' War: here, as throughout the book, the authors fully acknowledge and make excellent use of the secondary literature they have consulted. (Their list of secondary authorities runs to 28 pages.)

After the Napoleonic Wars Britain and France were never again at war with each other, and since the Entente Cordiale of 1904 they have technically been allies. But that does not mean that there have not been tensions and suspicions between the two countries throughout all these years, even during the First and Second World Wars, and of course during the inter-war period also. The authors are interesting on Appeasement. Most historians say that the French could not stop Hitler marching into the Rhineland or the Sudetenland because the British would not have supported them. The authors say that for various reasons the French governments, like the British, would not have wanted to risk a conflict anyway and were glad later to blame their non-intervention on the lack of British support.

After the Second World War Britain and France took such different attitudes towards 'ever closer union' in Europe that there really has been very little cordiality between them. The parts of the book dealing with the issue of Europe bring out very well the very different visions of the two countries in an account that shows clearly how British policy handed the leadership of Western Europe to France for more than half a century, but which has broken down in today's enlarged European Union. Besides, the book argues, that leadership was exercised in a way which, after early economic successes, eventually brought stagnation to France.

The political chapters are interspersed with sparkling chapters on culture and society: how each nation saw and often stereotyped the other; how each alternatively (or simultaneously) mocked and copied, despised and envied, hated and admired the other, but could never be indifferent. Travel, manners in general and table manners in particular, sport, fashions in clothes, attitudes to the theatre, the views the two countries had about each other's women, philosophical traditions - these are some of the subjects that are treated with wit and learning.

Not the least among the charms of this book are the debates between husband and wife which end each of the four parts into which the volume is divided. It is perhaps a bit of a knockabout, in which both rally fairly uncompromisingly to the defence of their native countries; but the summing up of the 'British' and 'French' points of view is very well done and thought-provoking.

This must already be the most authoritative and enjoyable treatment of the period under review; but I hope that the success of this book will encourage the authors to produce a prequel, from the Norman Conquest to the 17th century, or at least from the 16th to the 17th century: the Tudor-Valois period is, in my opinion, the defining period during which the most essential differences between England and France took shape, and I would love to see the authors tackle it with the same verve which has made this book such a remarkable achievement.

There seems to me to be two sorts of history books -those written by academics and intended to be read by other academics and then those produced by "television historians" [memorably attacked in Alan Bennett's play "The History Boys"] aiming at a mass market. This book is in neither category. It is exhaustively researched {30 page bibliography] but is elegantly written with frequent excursions into lives which were affected by Anglo-French relations - Captain Asgill, Paul de Rapin, Abbe Jean-Bernard le Blanc, Charles Frederick Worth, Emma Crouch and many others. If, like me, you have never heard of these people, buy the book and find out. The book also explores associated themes - the French and Shakespeare, cooking ["le bifteck" was imported into France by Wellington's army], and the French adoption of English team sports. I particularly enjoyed the authors' hypothesis for the failure of cricket to take hold in France - France invented the Tour de France instead which provides similar rewards - "a summer sport that is prolonged, tactical, unendurable to outsiders and an excuse for sunbathing". The historical narrrative is particularly good on Pitt the Younger, Choiseul, Bonoparte and de Gaulle [at the abortive negotiations for Britain's entry into the EEC in the 1960s the French foreign minister "ostentatiously occupied himself by reading, entering into the discussion only to refuse every British amendment"] and the current Anglo-French situation, which is neatly summarised in the authors' "Conclusions and Disagreements".

The best book of 2006 for me. Bought it as a birthday present for my partner but it lives on my side of the bed and her attempts at sleep are constantly interrupted by 'did you know.. eg that the last British/ French battle was at Bayonne?'. It is a very good story and I enjoyed the vigorous asides from the two authors - husband and wife, English and French - that punctuate the narrative. The history bits - dates, battles, people in charge - are put in a context that helps readers understand the reasons that drive the suspicions, the rows and so on. A book to be dipped into and every time a plum. "Did you know that......?" This is one soap that can never be dropped from the schedules.

It is interesting that Amazon France lists it only in English. No French publisher brave enough?