Historical Biographies
Last updated: June 22, 2025
The best books on The French Resistance, recommended by Jonathan Fenby
The historian and author chooses five books on de Gaulle and the Resistance. He says the British tried to veto de Gaulle’s famous 1940 speech from London calling on the French to stand up to German occupation
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1
Elizabeth I
by David Starkey and Susan Doran -
2
The Faerie Queene
by edited by Thomas P Roche Jr and C Patrick O’Donnell Jr & Edmund Spenser -
3
Translations by Elizabeth I, 1592-98
by Janel Mueller and Joshua Scodel -
4
Rewriting the Renaissance
by Margaret W Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan and Nancy Vickers -
5
Representing Elizabeth in Stuart England
by John A Watkins
The best books on Elizabeth I, recommended by Helen Hackett
The best books on Elizabeth I, recommended by Helen Hackett
University College London professor Helen Hackett selects five books on the Virgin Queen, including one by the monarch herself. “You get a sense of her independence of mind. She does her own thing”
The best books on Samuel Johnson, recommended by Peter Lilley
Samuel Johnson, author of the 1755 A Dictionary of the English Language, was not a hard-hearted Tory caricature, but a champion of the poor and enslaved, according to Margaret Thatcher’s Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, Peter Lilley.
