During the early 1960s, the scientist-turned-novelist C. P. Snow collided with the literary critic F. R. Leavis over the relative value of the humanities and sciences. But why did this tired subject, discussed since the Victorians, ignite such outrageous controversy at this particular moment?

The Two Cultures Controversy reveals how a cliché about disciplines became invested with rival accounts of England's past, the Cold War present, and Africa's future. Recasting the dispute as an ideological conflict, the book follows this divide through arguments over the mission of the university, the meaning of national decline, and the fate of the former British Empire.

The Two Cultures Controversy ingeniously unpacks cultural politics in Britain during what Ortolano calls the postwar “meritocratic moment,” transforming our understanding of a concept still in use today.

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Reviews

The Royal Historical Society named The Two Cultures Controversy proxime accessit for the Whitfield Prize, saluting its “thought-provoking perspective on the ways in which we imagine cultural possibilities now.”

In Twentieth Century British History, Stefan Collini judged the book “of considerable value to cultural, educational and political historians of the period, as well as of interest to a wider readership.”

For Choice, Peter Stansky wrote that “Ortolano has brought [Snow and Leavis] splendidly back to life.”

John Toye, in the Economic History Review, labeled The Two Cultures Controversy “widescreen, wrap-around cultural history of postwar Britain.”

Writing for H-Net, Peter Mandler called The Two Cultures Controversy “an exceptionally thoughtful, and thought-provoking, work from which (truly) every modern British historian will learn something fresh and useful.”

And, in the English Historical Review, William Whyte wrote that the book “announces the arrival of a very significant historian indeed.”