The diaries of the last British Governor of Hong Kong, published on the 25th anniversary of the handoverIn June 1992 Chris Patten went to Hong Kong as the last British governor, to try to prepare it not (as other British colonies over the decades) for independence, but for handing back in 1997 to the Chinese, from whom most of its territory had been leased 99 years previously.
RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK Economic thinking - about globalisation, climate change, immigration, austerity, automation and much more - in its most digestible formFor decades, a single free market philosophy has dominated global economics.
THE INSPIRATION FOR THE MAJOR NEW NETFLIX SERIES, HOW TO CHANGE YOUR MIND'It's a trip - engrossing, eye-opening, mind altering' New Statesman 'Fascinating.
'A landmark piece of non-fiction' Janet Maslin, The New York TimesFrom the winner of the Pulitzer Prize, this is one of the great untold stories of American history: the migration of black citizens who fled the south and went north in search of a better life From 1915 to 1970, an exodus of almost six million people would change the face of America.
One of our most celebrated historians shows how we can use the lessons of the past to build a new post-covid society in BritainThe 'duty of care' which the state owes to its citizens is a phrase much used, but what has it actually meant in Britain historically?
'The most honest attempt yet to tell how the Battle of Britain really was' Andrew Wilson, ObserverHistory is swamped by patriotic myths about the aerial combat fought between the RAF and the Luftwaffe over the summer of 1940.
**As featured on Barack Obama's Summer 2022 Reading List**Winner of the Gordon Burn PrizeWinner of the 2022 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in NonfictionFinalist for the National Book Critics Circle AwardFinalist for the Pen/Diamonstein-Spievogel Award for the Art of the EssayShortlisted for the National Book Award'Gorgeous' - Brit Bennett'Pure genius' - Jacqueline Woodson'One of the most dynamic books I have ever read' - Clint SmithAt the March on Washington, Josephine Baker reflected on her life and her legacy.
A SUNDAY TELEGRAPH AND GUARDIAN BOOK OF THE YEARWINNER OF SWEDEN'S AUGUST PRIZEWINNER OF THE WARWICK PRIZE FOR WOMEN IN TRANSLATIONSHORTLISTED FOR THE BRITISH ACADEMY BOOK PRIZE'Osebol is a magnificent success; it is hard to imagine it better .
'Bristles with provocative insights into the tangled liaisons of sex and self' Times Higher EducationIn the third volume of his acclaimed examination of sexuality in modern Western society, Foucault investigates the Golden Age of Rome to reveal a decisive break from the classical Greek version of sexual pleasure.
'No brief survey can do justice to the richness, complexity and detail of Foucault's discussion' New York Review of BooksThe second volume of Michel Foucault's pioneering analysis of the changing nature of desire explores how sexuality was perceived in classical Greek culture.
'A brilliant display of fireworks, attacking the widespread and banal notion that "e;in the beginning"e; sexual activity was guilt-free and delicious, being repressed and blighted only by the gloom of Victorianism' Spectator We talk about sex more and more, but are we more liberated?
The acclaimed account of the English people, now updated with two new chapters'Masterful, an enormously readable narrative of the English people from the Anglo-Saxons to the present' Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times, Books of the YearIn The English and their History, the first full-length account to appear in one volume for many decades, Robert Tombs gives us the history of the English people, and of how the stories they have told about themselves have shaped them, from the prehistoric 'dreamtime' through to the present day.
A FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020How did we end up in a world where humans coexist with technologies we can no longer fully control or understand?
'Offers so much pleasure and insight' Guardian'Entertaining, convincing and timely' The TimesA vivid, seminal portrait of the early 1980s: a period that changed Britain foreverThe early 1980s in Britain were a time of hope, and of dread: of Cold War tension and imminent conflict, when crowds in the street could mean an ecstatic national celebration or an inner-city riot.
This book takes a dramatically original approach to the history of humanity, using objects which previous civilisations have left behind them, often accidentally, as prisms through which we can explore past worlds and the lives of the men and women who lived in them.
The Agricola is both a portrait of Julius Agricola - the most famous governor of Roman Britain and Tacitus' well-loved and respected father-in-law - and the first detailed account of Britain that has come down to us.
The incredible story of the fight for female education in BritainIn 1869, when five women enrolled at university for the first time in British history, the average female brain was thought to be 150 grams lighter than a man's.
A Sunday Telegraph and Times Higher Education 'Book of the Week', Deborah Cohen's Family Secrets is a gripping book about what families - Victorian and modern - try to hide, and why.
The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884), was a provocative and profoundly influential critique of the Victorian nuclear family.
A natural history of the supernatural from Roger Clarke, lifelong investigator into England's creepiest real-life ghost stories'Is there anybody out there?
Two centuries ago, the Russians pushed out of the cold north towards the Caucasus Mountains, the range that blocked their access to Georgia, Turkey, Persia and India.
Richard Sennett's The Fall of Public Man examines the growing imbalance between private and public experience, and asks what can bring us to reconnect with our communities.
Step into the everyday lives of East End Londoners during the Second World War 'I wanted to write about a time and a place when living in such a street - or rather a community - would have been part of so-called ordinary working people's everyday experience, but when the circumstances couldn't exactly be described as normal.
From the Wolfson Prize-winning author of God's Architect: Pugin and the Building of Romantic BritainBetween the fall of the Bastille in 1789 and the opening of the Great Exhibition in 1851, history changed.
'We shall live at last as free men on our own soil, and die peacefully in our own homes'Theodor Herzl's passionate advocacy of the founding of a Jewish state grew out of his conviction that Jews would never be assimilated into the populations in which they lived.
The late nineteenth century and Edwardian era, suggests Jose Harris in this book, represent a sharp break with the early years of Queen Victoria's reign.
Mrs Jordan's Profession is the acclaimed biography of Dora Jordan by bestselling author Claire Tomalin'Intelligent, finely made and wonderfully readable.
