Raymond Williams was a figure of extraordinary dominance in Britain across a wide range not only in literary and cultural inquiry but of intellectual and political opposition as well. He was, with Richard Hoggart, the first, local architect of what is now the international discipline of Cultural Studies; he combined, with rare assurance, the roles of professor of literature (drama, to be precise) at Cambridge, public intellectual and ecumenical leader of radical causes, and multiple author of seven novels, a number of plays (one for television) and two dozen more-than-academic books, more like studies of a disunited kingdom's life-and-times-and-formation, including the several hundred pieces of his collected journalism stretching over th

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First published 22 November 2001

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