Aside from contemporary England/Britain, much of my exposure to English/British history from textbooks, articles, etc. has always portrayed it as a country one would not want to live in.
Much of the history is filled with rebellions, civil wars, dodgy politics, and rather dangerous, rapid, social changes.
Does English/British history naturally consist of hardship, or is it just the level of documentation that takes all of these events into great detail?
My follow up question is whether or not Britain's history was better or worse than any other similar country (for the sake of condensing the scope, we'll say Western Europe).
My main field of study is Spain, but I know that France and Germany/Holy Roman Empire had its fair share of upheavals. Back to Spain, it's history has been far from stable. I strongly urge you to listen to Teofilo Ruiz's audio lecture called "The Other 1492," in which he paints a less romantic view of Spanish history. Even the often romanticized Al-Andalus had its fair share of upheavals, such as the Islamic fundamentalist Almoravid dynasty and the political intrigues which aided the Christians in the Reconquista. Then there was the 200 year period of civil wars in Spain from which emerged the Catholic Monarchs which used tools such as the Inquisition to maintain an autocratic rule. This is incredibly brief and undetailed, but I think that Teofilo Ruiz does a great job explaining how 1492 adversely affected pretty much everyone. More recently, let's not forget the Spanish Civil War and subsequent dictatorship of which probably would be more talked about if it wasn't overshadowed by WWII and the fact that Franco's regime helped the West with virulent anti-Communist policies during the Cold War.