Historical romance and the mythology of Charles I in D'Israeli and Disraeli

The mythology surrounding the figure of Charles, forged during the unique events of his time, was often employed in response to sociopolitical situations and debates of the late eighteenth and then the nineteenth century. Isaac D’Israeli and Benjamin Disraeli, writing at a time when the interpretation of history was dominated by Whig historiography, sought to negate, counter or dismantle those representations of modern British history by referencing Charles and his fate. Against the Whig premise that the Glorious Revolution heralded, in fact was, the exordium to British modern history, D’Israeli saw the need to construct agonistic, Tory interpretations of the past, countering Whig interpretations of history relating to the Civil War, and to the regicide specifically, by reinventing the mythology of Charles I. Benjamin Disraeli employed the mythology of Charles I differently from its use by his father: in order comprehensively to denounce and dismantle Whig interpretations of history from medieval to then-contemporary times, and to construct an alternate, inherently Tory perspective on the social ills of his time in his fiction and non-fiction.