David Starkey OBE is a famed British historian, a bestselling writer, a television and radio presenter, and a world-renowned expert on the Tudor period.
Biography
David Robert Starkey was born on the 3rd January 1945 to a relatively poor working class family in Kendal, Cumbria. His father, Robert Starkey, was a factory foreman and a quiet, passive man. His mother Elsie Lyon, on the other hand, was a strong personality and was a powerful influence on Starkey during his formative years. Elsie was an intelligent woman but frustrated in her own intelligence, she pushed Starkey hard to achieve what she had not.
Starkey was a gifted student and, after excelling at Kendal Grammar School, won a scholarship to read history at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.
After gaining his doctorate, Starkey taught history at the London School of Economics from 1972 to 1998. During this period he began a parallel career as a television and radio presenter. Starkey’s series Henry VIII and his Queens, Elizabeth I and the lesser known Tudor monarchs made him a familiar face on British television. In 2004 Starkey began an incredibly popular multi-series documentary on the British monarchy from the Middle Ages to the present day.
Starkey soon gained a reputation for not suffering fools gladly. He could be abrasive, blunt to the point of rudeness and a ruthless interrogator of guests who appeared on his programmes and talk shows. Perhaps most famously, Starkey’s criticism of Elizabeth II achieved notoriety. Starkey compared the Queen unfavourably to her predecessors, calling her an uneducated housewife and likening her attitude to culture to that of Josef Goebbels. In recent years Starkey has seemed to mellow or, at least, express his views differently.
Starkey has also made a great success of his writing career with his books being respected by historians and loved by the public. Starkey is a renowned expert on the Tudor period and so his books are always supremely well researched and full of historical detail. He is also gifted with an excellent and approachable writing style. Starkey’s most recent book, Henry: Virtuous Prince, was an instant bestseller.
Bibliography
- This Land of England (1985) (with David Souden)
- The Reign of Henry VIII: Personalities and Politics (1986)
- The English Court from the Wars of the Roses to the Civil War (1987)
- Rivals in Power: the Lives and Letters of the Great Tudor Dynasties (1990)
- Henry VIII: A European Court in England (1991)
- Elizabeth (2000)
- Elizabeth I: The Exhibition Catalogue (2003)
- Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII (2004)
- The Monarchy of England: The Beginnings (2004)
- Monarchy: From the Middle Ages to Modernity (2006)
- Henry: Virtuous Prince (2008)
Television Work
- Henry VIII (1997)
- Elizabeth (2000)
- The Six Wives of Henry VIII (2001)
- Edward and Mary: The Unknown Tudors (2002)
- Monarchy with David Starkey (2004 – 2007)
Forthcoming Book
Henry: Model of a Tyrant, the concluding part of Starkey’s excellent biography of Henry VIII, is due to be published by HarperPress on the 6th April 2009, neatly timed to coincide with the 500th anniversary of Henry’s accession to the throne.
References:
David Starkey: The History Man, The Independent, 9 December 2006
The Lure of David Starkey, The Times, 20 September 2007
The Queen and I, The Guardian, 22 December 2007
 |
