The English and Their History

By: Robert Tombs

Narrated by: Stephen Thorne

In 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.

If a nation is a group of people with a sense of kinship, a political identity and representative institutions, then the English have a claim to be the oldest nation in the world. They first came into existence as an idea, before they had a common ruler and before the country they lived in even had a name. They have lasted as a recognisable entity ever since, and their defining national institutions can be traced back to the earliest years of their history. The English have come a long way from those precarious days of invasion and conquest, with many spectacular changes of fortune.

Their political, economic and cultural contacts have left traces for good and ill across the world. This book describes their history and its meanings from their beginnings in the monasteries of Northumbria and the wetlands of Wessex to the cosmopolitan energy of today's England.

Robert Tombs draws out important threads running through the story, including participatory government, language, law, religion, the land and the sea, and the ever-changing relations with other peoples. Not the least of these connections are the ways the English have understood their own history, have argued about it, forgotten it, and yet been shaped by it. These diverse and sometimes conflicting understandings are an inherent part of their identity.

Rather to their surprise, as ties within the United Kingdom loosen, the English are suddenly beginning a new period in their long history. Especially at times of change, history can help us to think about the sort of people we are and wish to be.

This audiobook, the first single-volume work on this scale for more than half a century, and which incorporates a wealth of recent scholarship, presents a challenging modern account of this immense and continuing story, bringing out the strength and resilience of English government, the deep patterns of division, yet also the persistent capacity to come together in the face of danger.

©2015 Robert Tombs (P)2016 Audible, Ltd

Critic reviews

"A work of supreme intelligence.... No history published this year has been of such resounding importance to contemporary debates. Tombs, who is both fearless and non-partisan, deserves to be rewarded with a life peerage for this book." (Richard Davenport-Hines, Observer)
"Learned, pithy and punchy, with a laudable sense of narrative sweep and a bracing willingness to offer bold judgments, [Tombs's] survey is a tremendous achievement, and deserves to become the standard history for years to come." (Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times)
"Packed with telling detail and told with gentle, sardonic wit...[a] vast and delightful book." (Ben Macintyre, The Times)

Superb, educational, captivating.

Brilliantly written and narrated. Highly recommend this book. if you know nothing about the english then read this and you will know all about the english

Excellent, with surprising details, super narrator

Mr Tombs has done a fine job of compressing the complex story of the English into a one-volume book. The great sweep may be known to many, but he teases out the social factors that make history come alive, and delivers the death blow to many misconceptions along the way. Thoroughly recommended.

Excellent, but a touch brexity

Was given this by my other half. I don’t know much about history before 1850 so it was a real eye opener. It’s really well written and engaging and i just loved listening to it. As the author approaches the modern day his standpoint becomes clearer and it is further to the right than my own. Not to the point of tub thumping bombast, as he clearly is striving for balance, but he does come across as an apologist for empire at points. We were violent, we oversaw some horrendous acts this all gets dealt with breezily in a ‘mistakes were made, lessons were learned’ kind of way which, having done a phd in colonialism in Zambia, i found unconvincing and trite. Part of this is that he’s a trying to argue against what he calls ‘declinism’, and he’s got a point. The English have achieved so much yet do themselves down an awful lot. We’re wealthy, safe, democratic, and pretty peaceful. There’s a lot to be proud of. So, I’d really recommend this book for anyone wanting a deep dive on the last 1000 years of English history, but know that the later chapters are more clearly coloured by a specific political viewpoint on the right of British politics. That said, 45 hours! I don’t regret it but feel i deserve some sort of badge after all that.

Dry, uninteresting, and overall boring

The only reason I gave the narrator 2 stars is because he is a perfect fit for this novel; dry, uninteresting, and overall boring. I was interested in this book as a overall narrative of the Engilsh people and the fact it was 47 hours. The author spends the first 7 hours (in audio time) discussing 1500 years of history. That leaves 40 hours to cover everything that has occured in England since. You would think that would give the novel some depth but sadly no, it becomes a political history. Seriously it should have been titled a ¨History of English politics¨. The author glosses over imperialism in India and the rest of Asia, barely mentions the invasion of Ireland until it relates to 19th centruy politics, and only brings up anything to do with Scotland if it involves a Stewart. To me this reads as a ¨historian¨ who does not know, and did not care to research, anything prior to 1800. I made it to the last 10 hours and have just given up seeing how I zoned out during the previous 15. I cant stress enough how the ony 2 subjects discussed are religion and politics. I am highly dissapointed and do not reccomend you waste your money.