Clare Jackson – författare

*WINNER OF THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE 2022*A BOOK OF THE YEAR 2021, AS CHOSEN BY THE TIMES, NEW STATESMAN, TELEGRAPH AND TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT'A big historical advance. Ours, it turns out, is a very un-insular "Island Story". And its 17th-century chapter will never look quite the same again' John Adamson, Sunday TimesA ground-breaking portrait of the most turbulent century in English historyAmong foreign observers, seventeenth-century England was known as 'Devil-Land': a diabolical country of fallen angels, torn apart by seditious rebellion, religious extremism and royal collapse. Clare Jackson's dazzling, original account of English history's most turbulent and radical era tells the story of a nation in a state of near continual crisis.As an unmarried heretic with no heir, Elizabeth I was regarded with horror by Catholic Europe, while her Stuart successors, James I and Charles I, were seen as impecunious and incompetent. The traumatic civil wars, regicide and a republican Commonwealth were followed by the floundering, foreign-leaning rule of Charles II and his brother, James II, before William of Orange invaded England with a Dutch army and a new order was imposed.Devil-Land reveals England as, in many ways, a 'failed state': endemically unstable and rocked by devastating events from the Gunpowder Plot to the Great Fire of London. Catastrophe nevertheless bred creativity, and Jackson makes brilliant use of eyewitness accounts - many penned by stupefied foreigners - to dramatize her great story. Starting on the eve of the Spanish Armada in 1588 and concluding with a not-so 'Glorious Revolution' a hundred years later, Devil-Land is a spectacular reinterpretation of England's vexed and enthralling past.

The acclaimed Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers Charles II has always been one of the most instantly recognisable British kings - both in his physical appearance, disseminated through endless portraits, prints and pub signs, and in his complicated mix of lasciviousness, cynicism and luxury. His father's execution and his own many years of exile made him a guarded, curious, unusually self-conscious ruler. He lived through some of the most striking events in the national history - from the Civil Wars to the Great Plague, from the Fire of London to the wars with the Dutch.Clare Jackson's marvellous book takes full advantage of its irrepressible subject.

*WINNER OF THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE 2022*A BOOK OF THE YEAR 2021, AS CHOSEN BY THE TIMES, NEW STATESMAN, TELEGRAPH AND TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT'A big historical advance. Ours, it turns out, is a very un-insular "Island Story". And its 17th-century chapter will never look quite the same again' John Adamson, Sunday TimesA ground-breaking portrait of the most turbulent century in English historyAmong foreign observers, seventeenth-century England was known as 'Devil-Land': a diabolical country of fallen angels, torn apart by seditious rebellion, religious extremism and royal collapse. Clare Jackson's dazzling, original account of English history's most turbulent and radical era tells the story of a nation in a state of near continual crisis.As an unmarried heretic with no heir, Elizabeth I was regarded with horror by Catholic Europe, while her Stuart successors, James I and Charles I, were seen as impecunious and incompetent. The traumatic civil wars, regicide and a republican Commonwealth were followed by the floundering, foreign-leaning rule of Charles II and his brother, James II, before William of Orange invaded England with a Dutch army and a new order was imposed.Devil-Land reveals England as, in many ways, a 'failed state': endemically unstable and rocked by devastating events from the Gunpowder Plot to the Great Fire of London. Catastrophe nevertheless bred creativity, and Jackson makes brilliant use of eyewitness accounts - many penned by stupefied foreigners - to dramatize her great story. Starting on the eve of the Spanish Armada in 1588 and concluding with a not-so 'Glorious Revolution' a hundred years later, Devil-Land is a spectacular reinterpretation of England's vexed and enthralling past.

The acclaimed Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers - now in paperbackCharles II has always been one of the most instantly recognisable British kings - both in his physical appearance, disseminated through endless portraits, prints and pub signs, and in his complicated mix of lasciviousness, cynicism and luxury. His father's execution and his own many years of exile made him a guarded, curious, unusually self-conscious ruler. He lived through some of the most striking events in the national history - from the Civil Wars to the Great Plague, from the Fire of London to the wars with the Dutch.Clare Jackson's marvellous book takes full advantage of its irrepressible subject.

Winner of the 2026 Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical BiographyA Financial Times History Book of the Year 2025'After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else... In research, analysis and imagination, it’s a masterpiece' Gerard de Groot, The TimesJames VI & I, who died 400 years ago, was one of Britain’s most consequential and interesting monarchs, not least in creating the British monarchy itself by joining the English and Scottish thrones. A major intellectual, James's preoccupations ranged from witchcraft and theological controversy to hunting, diplomacy, poetry and sartorial fashion. The 'Mirror of Great Britain' was a spectacular jewel that gave symbolic endorsement to James's vision of British union, but mirrors themselves — with their limitless capacity to magnify, illuminate and distort — supplied James with one of his favourite literary metaphors.Ruler of Scotland for nearly four decades before his accession to the English throne in 1603, James was a ‘cradle king’ whose long reigns encompassed extraordinary dramas, including his abduction in the ‘Ruthven Raid’ in 1582 and his attempted assassination in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. In his lifetime, James often confounded contemporaries’ expectations while his posthumous reputation has been distorted by crude stereotypes.Closely attentive to James’s own words — in numerous publications, manuscript musings, topical verse and private correspondence — Clare Jackson's wonderful new book tells the story of this highly unusual monarch with great flair and insight.

The first modern account of the advancement of political and religious ideas in Scotland in the years between the Restoration of Charles II and the collapse of royal authority under James VII and II.In the twilight years of Scottish independence, the Restoration period witnessed both the triumph of Stuart absolutism and the radical Covenanting resistance of the "Killing Times" immortalised in presbyterian memory. This is thefirst account of this fascinating and dramatic period in Scottish history. It begins with the widespread popular royalism that acclaimed Charles II's return to power in 1660 and concludes by examining the collapse of royal authority that occurred under his brother, James VII & II, and the events of the Williamite Revolution of 1688-90. In reconstructing the world of late-seventeenth century Scotland, this book draws on an extensive range of printed and manuscript sources, the majority of which have never been used by historians before. Amidst current interest in Scottish political and parliamentary history before 1707, this book emphasises the dynamic and characteristic cosmopolitanism of Restoration intellectual culture as revealed from a range of national, British and Continental perspectives. In doing so, it challenges numerous historiographical orthodoxies, and modifies conventional understanding of pre-Enlightenment Scotland. CLARE JACKSON lectures in the history of political thought at the University of Cambridge.

History has not been kind to King James. A cradle king who was crowned in Scotland in 1567 and England and Ireland in 1603, James VI and I has long been eclipsed in fame and reputation by his predecessor and cousin, Elizabeth I, and his mother, Mary, Queen of Scots.Yet James, if often overlooked or, more often, cruelly stereotyped, presents an equally fascinating figure: a diplomat whose long reigns encompassed extraordinary dramas, “a passionate Protestant with a profound interest in witches and demons, a lover of young men, and the patron of both Shakespeare and the great version of the Bible that still bears his name” (Fintan O’Toole). James identified himself with the “Mirror of Great Britain,” a spectacular jewel commissioned upon his accession to the English throne, which not only furnished him with one of his favorite metaphors—that of the mirror, with its limitless capacity to magnify, illuminate, and distort—but gave symbolic endorsement to his vision of British union.Now, four hundred years after his death, Wolfson History Prize–winning historian Clare Jackson finally reappraises the life and legacy of the “first king of Great Britain.” Beginning with the surprise assassination of his father, Lord Darnley, and the subsequent beheading of his mother, Jackson contextualizes James’s troubled childhood as well as the many attempts on his life, from his teenage detention by the Ruthven Raiders to the infamous Gunpowder Plot of 1605. She reflects on the renewed creativity of the Jacobean era, culminating in the King James Bible, Macbeth, and King Lear, and demonstrates how the king’s keen interest in joining worlds old and new—establishing colonies overseas and, closer to home, uniting Scotland, England, and Ireland—set the geopolitical stage for centuries to come. In so doing, Jackson reveals King James as perhaps the most consequential monarch of the early modern era, whose impact, for better and for worse, still reverberates today.Closely attentive to James’s own words in numerous publications, manuscript musings, verse, and private correspondence, The Mirror of Great Britain tells the story of this highly unusual, significant monarch with flair, insight, and empathy for the man who bore the crown.

WINNER OF THE 2026 ELIZABETH LONGFORD PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL BIOGRAPHYA BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR: FINANCIAL TIMES, THE TIMES, HISTORY TODAY AND THE ROYAL ACADEMY MAGAZINE 'After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else... In research, analysis and imagination, it’s a masterpiece' Gerard de Groot, The TimesJames VI & I, who died 400 years ago, was one of Britain’s most consequential and interesting monarchs, not least in creating the British monarchy itself by joining the English and Scottish thrones. A major intellectual, James's preoccupations ranged from witchcraft and theological controversy to hunting, diplomacy, poetry and sartorial fashion. The 'Mirror of Great Britain' was a spectacular jewel that gave symbolic endorsement to James's vision of British union, but mirrors themselves – with their limitless capacity to magnify, illuminate and distort – supplied James with one of his favourite literary metaphors.Ruler of Scotland for nearly four decades before his accession to the English throne in 1603, James was a ‘cradle king’ whose long reigns encompassed extraordinary dramas, including his abduction in the ‘Ruthven Raid’ in 1582 and his attempted assassination in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. In his lifetime, James often confounded contemporaries’ expectations while his posthumous reputation has been distorted by crude stereotypes.Closely attentive to James’s own words – in numerous publications, manuscript musings, topical verse and private correspondence – Clare Jackson's wonderful new book tells the story of this highly unusual monarch with great flair and insight.

WINNER OF THE 2026 ELIZABETH LONGFORD PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL BIOGRAPHYA BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR: FINANCIAL TIMES, THE TIMES, HISTORY TODAY AND THE ROYAL ACADEMY MAGAZINE 'After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else... In research, analysis and imagination, it’s a masterpiece' Gerard de Groot, The TimesJames VI & I, who died 400 years ago, was one of Britain’s most consequential and interesting monarchs, not least in creating the British monarchy itself by joining the English and Scottish thrones. A major intellectual, James's preoccupations ranged from witchcraft and theological controversy to hunting, diplomacy, poetry and sartorial fashion. The 'Mirror of Great Britain' was a spectacular jewel that gave symbolic endorsement to James's vision of British union, but mirrors themselves – with their limitless capacity to magnify, illuminate and distort – supplied James with one of his favourite literary metaphors.Ruler of Scotland for nearly four decades before his accession to the English throne in 1603, James was a ‘cradle king’ whose long reigns encompassed extraordinary dramas, including his abduction in the ‘Ruthven Raid’ in 1582 and his attempted assassination in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. In his lifetime, James often confounded contemporaries’ expectations while his posthumous reputation has been distorted by crude stereotypes.Closely attentive to James’s own words – in numerous publications, manuscript musings, topical verse and private correspondence – Clare Jackson's wonderful new book tells the story of this highly unusual monarch with great flair and insight.