Yes, Hugh Trevor-Roper was a Robot and Worse

This year saw the release of Earnshaw Books’ edited version of Edmund Backhouse’s Decadence Mandchoue in both an English and Chinese version, all edited by Derek Sandhaus. A fascinating book. And, as many of you will know, the old Hermit of Peking was royally trashed by that old fuddy duddy Hugh Trevor-Roper in his bitter and rather nasty biography of Backhouse. Well, Adam Sisman’s biography of Trevor-Roper (or Baron Dacre of Glanton) has just been published in the USA (it’s been out in the UK for a few months already) and, while I wouldn’t read a whole book on Trevor-Roper personally, it is apparently contentious to anyone not inclined to dislike the man.

According to the Ephraim Castle column in the Daily Mail last week Sisman quotes Trevor-Roper’s his Oxford Colleague (and China-born son of a Imperial Maritime Customs official) Maurice Bowra as ‘a robot, without human experience, with no girls, no real friends, no capacity for intimacy and no desire to like or be liked.’ Sisman believes that despite being married Trevor-Roper, who was spiteful towards Backhouse for his references to homosexuality, was probably gay himself. Much more in the bio apparently but also suggests that those of us who feel that Backhouse deserves a new and better, more balanced biography have always been right!