Jonathan Sumption

'Sumption is that rare and precious thing: a serious, decent, honest thinker . . . and one of our finest historians.' Dan Jones, Sunday Times 'Gripping and eminently readable . . . a compelling justification for the enduring value of historical narrative.' The Times 'Unsurpassed, and probably unsurpassable.' Daily Telegraph In this final volume of his epic history of the...

In the past few decades, legislatures throughout the world have suffered from gridlock. In democracies, laws and policies are just as soon unpicked as made. It seems that Congress and Parliaments cannot forge progress or consensus. Moreover, courts often overturn decisions made by elected representatives. In the absence of effective politicians, many turn to the courts to solve political and...

Cursed Kings tells the story of the destruction of France by the madness of its king and the greed and violence of his family. In the early fifteenth century, France had gone from being the strongest and most populous nation state of medieval Europe to suffering a complete internal collapse and a partial conquest by a foreign power. It had...

Across the globe, democracy is in crisis – in the UK alone, it has been rocked by Brexit, the pandemic and successive attempts by governments to bypass legal norms. But how did this happen, and where might we go from here? The Challenges of Democracy by Jonathan Sumption cuts through the political noise with acute analysis of the state of...

Divided Houses is a tale of contrasting fortunes. In the last decade of his reign, Edward III, a senile, pathetic symbol of England's past conquests, was condemned to see them overrun by the armies of his enemies. When he died in 1377, he was succeeded by a vulnerable child, who was destined to grow into a neurotic and unstable adult...