In Balfour's World, Aristocracy and Political Culture at the Fin de Siècle, Nancy Ellenberger examines the social world and interactions of a group of upper-class men and women in late-nineteenth century Britain. The principal characters are Arthur Balfour, George Pembroke, George Wyndham, Laura and Margot Tenant, and Mary Elcho, though many other figures also receive some attention. Most of them were members of the informal group known as the Souls because of their penchant for discussing their personal and emotional views with each other in a nonpartisan way. The opening section of the book dwells particularly on gendered identities, whereas the focus of the later chapters moves from metropolitan drawing rooms to country house parties and from political activities to the role of the press in revealing Society scandals. The text draws on an extensive cache of primary sources, principally letters and diaries, and a wide range of secondary sources. Ellenberger's command of the factual detail, both social and political, is generally assured, and she includes many interesting vignettes that illuminate the social mores of the era. One example, out of many possibilities, is the passage on the opportunities presented by hunting for unsupervised gender relations. The book is nicely produced, appropriately illustrated, and reasonably priced. In all those respects, the study has much to commend it.

On the other hand, the arrangement of the book, which Ellenberger describes as “a braided narrative” (11), is somewhat confusing. Her frequent switching from one character to another aids comparison but also impedes a clear narrative. Furthermore, the cast of characters is rather too wide and the incidents sometimes too minor or obscure to always arouse interest. Her tendency to speculate about the personal feelings of the various characters is unhistorical, and Ellenberger occasionally employs overblown language. Her claim, for example, that George Wyndham described his ability to sway a mass audience “in terms that implied the self-annihilation of the sexual act” (287) is pure psychobabble. The description of Lord Salisbury as presiding over the Indian famine gives an unjustified impression of his responsibility for that tragedy.

Balfour is the central figure, and Ellenberger presents a balanced account of his complex and enigmatic character. She also draws attention to his dependence on George Wyndham for political information and assistance in the later 1880s. On the other hand, Balfour's relations with his uncle Lord Salisbury, the prime minister, and with the younger members of the Cecil clan are neglected. That omission accords with Ellenberger's terms of reference but it gives a one-sided view of Balfour's world. Ellenberger ends her account in 1895, seven years before Balfour became prime minister. A comparison of his social life before and after he became premier would have been illuminating. The young Balfour played a crucial role in introducing and promoting golf to Britain's governing class, but his passion for the game gets only a passing mention. Balfour's Scottish identity is also neglected although it was an important component of his personality. He was only one of a number of Anglicized Scots who became prominent in Britain's governing elite around the turn of the century.

Ellenberger's focus on the aristocratic character of political culture is somewhat misplaced. As she admits, the number of aristocrats who were active politicians declined rapidly in the late Victorian era due in part to the expansion of the electorate and in part to a decline in their willingness to engage in public service. Consequently, elite political society was no longer mainly the preserve of the aristocracy. That change was illustrated by Margot Tennant's marriage, not to an aristocrat, but to the middle-class lawyer and Liberal minister H. H. Asquith. Ellenberger's use of the phrase fin de siècle is also questionable. That term originally referred to the decadent movement in French literature and art and was absent from contemporary British political society and discourse.

Ellenberger ends the book with a brief epilogue that stresses the change in “emotional expression” (301) that characterized Balfour's generation and the blurring of lines between the social classes. Nevertheless, Ellenberger notes that endogamy and friendship within the group remained strong even in the next generation, which undermines the significance of the previous point. Balfour's World is a work of considerable scholarship that illuminates many particular issues, but it offers no clearly demonstrated general conclusions.