ABSTRACT
Historians have used a variety of arguments to assert that the first Opium War was an inevitable consequence of Anglo-Chinese commercial contact. Historians have also used the British-run government in India's opium monopoly as evidence to argue for the inevitability of the Opium War. The British press's reaction to the Opium War has also received little attention from historians. Umberto Eco's novel, Foucault's Pendulum, helps to explain the recurring deficiencies in the secondary sources that focus on the Opium War. Shifting the focus from public events in Canton to the private decision-making process in London challenges long-held assumptions about the reasons for the first Opium War. The overwhelming concentration on British imperialism has also hurt the interpretation of the Opium War by neglecting the Chinese side of the story. As Martin Lynn has cautioned, the historian's focus on imperialism has exaggerated the importance of the Western presence overseas.
