England Under Siege, 1588-1688

Devil-Land

*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 Times 
 
 A ground-breaking portrait of the most turbulent century in English history 
 
 Among 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 book is a big historical advance. Epic in scale, briskly paced and elegantly written ... Ours, it turns out, is a very un-insular "Island Story". And its 17th-century chapter will never look quite the same again.

The story of the rise and fall of the Stuart dynasty in England, as seen through the eyes of our often confused European neighbours ... Wonderfully clear and original.

A bracingly revisionist view of our history in the century after the Armada ... after reading Devil-Land 'this sceptered isle' and 'demi-paradise' is unlikely to look quite the same ever again.

Jackson reappraises Stuart England in two distinctive ways ... The result is a richer picture not only of England under the Stuarts and as a republic, but also of its neighbours ... The research is impressive, the writing lucid and every page thought-provoking. It is also tremendously entertaining.

Wonderful ... So vivid, plunges you into the chaos and the uncertainty, and inevitably has echoes of now. It reminds us that states are not inevitabilities, and that they're formed out of chaos and may go back to the conditions of their formation.

Extraordinary ... one of those perception-changing books of British history which only come along now and then, every few decades, and this is really one of the big ones.

A book to be savoured by students, history aficionados, and anyone who enjoys seeing a scholar at the top of her game diving into stories we think we know well, only to emerge with all manner of surprises.

Superb ... a reminder that bitter division is not a permanent condition ... Jackson chronicles events with verve and erudition.

Devil-Land eloquently retells the story of our island's most turbulent century ... England, Jackson shows, was a pariah state, feared, distrusted and ridiculed on the continent.

Clare Jackson offers some acute insights on an era of failure and ferment, weaving together an impressive narrative of a time when the English seemed suddenly to have lost their minds.

Fascinating. This Stuart-centred view from across the Channel of the years 1588-1688 offers a fresh, provocative and highly readable take on one of the most formative centuries of English history.

David Reynolds, author of Island Stories: An Unconventional History of Britain

Among 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 Star King

Charles II (Penguin Monarchs)

The acclaimed Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers - now in paperback 
 
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.

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.

Clare Jackson

A wide-ranging and insightful new biography... Jackson is an assured guide, offering both an astute psychological portrait of the king and a shrewd political history of his reigns... This judicious, perceptive and empathetic study lays down a robust challenge to biographers of rival candidates

After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else. It’s the quintessence of James; rather like his big brain, it flows everywhere and is impossible to contain. In research, analysis and imagination, it’s a masterpiece... In [Jackson's] mirror one views a life perfectly rendered — complete, complex and awe-inspiring

A terrific book... an impressive biography, which combines a variety of productive approaches to the life of James into one scintillating work

A monarch for the ages... Jackson shows her respect and affection for James in this highly readable history. A robust history of the first—and ‘by far, its most interesting’—king of Great Britain

A detailed account of our most multifarious monarch... Clare Jackson’s excellent biography of James VI and I suggests a man who was accomplished at playing a variety of different roles

It’s 400 years since James’ death. Clare Jackson’s is the third book in six months to mark the anniversary and is undoubtedly the best… She understands the importance of looking at James through his own words

Fascinating... The book never loses sight, however, of its chief reflection.... It is James as a genius, albeit a flawed one, who is reflected back in this exceptional and thought-provoking study

Jackson gives a vivid sense of how James might have looked into the future and anticipated what did indeed take place in the late 1630s... This is a historiographically convincing version of the court

This is a wonderful read, a very clever book both in structure and argument, and at last a book that recognises the last great humanist ruler with high ideals and a good deal of pragmatism... This is the biography he has long deserved

James VI and I is arguably the most intriguingly complex of British monarchs: an accomplished poet, 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. He managed to rule Scotland for nearly six decades and England and Ireland for 22 years—which alone would make him a momentous figure. But he also did more than anyone else to forge the idea of Great Britain as a political entity and to give substance to its dreams of empire, not least in America. Clare Jackson's dazzling portrait of James plunges us not only into his extraordinary political career but into his mental universe, a ferment of ambitions, obsessions and desires from which much of the English-speaking world emerged. Splendidly erudite and wonderfully vivid in its detail and insights, The Mirror of Great Britain enriches our understanding both of James's times and of our own

Fintan O'Toole, New York Times bestselling author of We Don’t Know Ourselves

In Clare Jackson’s luminous biography of James VI and I, this much misunderstood king speaks to us as the man he was rather than as the puppet of fortune. Beautifully written and supported by a treasure trove of new material, The Mirror of Great Britain is a profound meditation on the meaning of identity and the fragility of kingship

Amanda Foreman, New York Times bestselling author of The Duchess, Georgiana, and A World on Fire

A fine, humanizing portrait of Great Britain's most misunderstood and maligned monarch. In this erudite and beautifully written biography, Clare Jackson brings the man who was both James VI of Scotland and James I of England to life for a new generation of readers

Ruth Scurr, author of Napoleon: A Life Told in Gardens and Shadows

A Life of James VI & I

James 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.

Clare Jackson

Praise for The Mirror of Great Britain

A wide-ranging and insightful new biography... Jackson is an assured guide, offering both an astute psychological portrait of the king and a shrewd political history of his reigns... This judicious, perceptive and e ...

After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else. It’s the quintessence of James; rather like his big brain, it flows everywhere and is impossible to contain. In research, analysis ...

A terrific book... an impressive biography, which combines a variety of productive approaches to the life of James into one scintillating work

A wide-ranging and insightful new biography... Jackson is an assured guide, offering both an astute psychological portrait of the king and a shrewd political history of his reigns... This judicious, perceptive and e ...

After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else. It’s the quintessence of James; rather like his big brain, it flows everywhere and is impossible to contain. In research, analysis ...

A terrific book... an impressive biography, which combines a variety of productive approaches to the life of James into one scintillating work

A wide-ranging and insightful new biography... Jackson is an assured guide, offering both an astute psychological portrait of the king and a shrewd political history of his reigns... This judicious, perceptive and e ...

After finishing this beguiling book, there seems no point in reading anything else. It’s the quintessence of James; rather like his big brain, it flows everywhere and is impossible to contain. In research, analysis ...

A terrific book... an impressive biography, which combines a variety of productive approaches to the life of James into one scintillating work

Books by Clare Jackson

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