‘I have written so much to day that I am almost blind & can’t guide my pen any more’ (5065), Disraeli told Lord Stanley on 21 August 1868. Indeed, Disraeli’s surviving correspondence in 1868 is so copious that, for the first time, ourBenjamin Disraeli Lettersseries devotes an entire book to that year alone, one that proved to be anannus mirabilis: on 27 February, Disraeli, Jewish by birth but a baptized Anglican – yet perennially vilified by anti-Semites – became England’s fortieth prime minister. Within a few days of taking office, he is reported to have said, ‘Yes! I...