Acknowledgements – viIntroduction – 11. Industrialization and Urbanization – 132. Literature and the Countryside, c. 1800 to 1870 – 253. Radicalism and the Land, c. 1790 to c. 1850 – 354. Gardens, Allotments and Parks – 465. Model Villages and Garden Cities – 586. Literary Attitudes to the Countryside in the Later Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries – 677. Land Reform After 1850 – 778. Preservation, ‘Englishness’ and the Rise of Planning, c. 1880-1939 – 899. The Economic Consequences of Rural Nostalgia – 11210. Rambling – 12111. The Organic Movement Before and During the Second World War – 13112. Rural Reconstruction Between the Wars – 14113. Rural Changes and the Legislative Framework, 1939 to 2000 – 15014. Agriculture and the Environment – 16815. Recreation in the Countryside Since the Second World War – 17816. Intra-village Social Change and Attitudinal Conflict in the Twentieth Century – 18717. Town, Country and Politics at the End of the Twentieth Century – 198Notes – 209Select Bibliography – 222Index - 229

In this work Jeremy Burchardt argues that the present "town versus country" debate lies at the root of modern British history. He demonstrates the remarkable influence that attitudes to the British countryside have had on the evolution of modern British life.