Dr David Starkey

Henry VIII is the only king whose shape you remember. He bestrides our history like a colossus and the decisions he took still reverberate today. The Reformation is the first Brexit; his ministers devised the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty and his tumultuous personal life pitted religion against politics as brutally as in our own age of Isis. In this lecture David Starkey draws on his unique knowledge of Henry’s reign on the one hand, and his insights as a leading commentator on modern politics on the other, to illuminate both the Tudor age and our own.