Jonathan McGovern

My thanks to the brilliant @drwillgreen.bsky.social for having me form part of his exciting special issue on Shakespeare and Middleton, and for his superb editorial work.

New Insight on the Rape Accusation Against Thomas Culpeper, Gentleman of the Privy Chamber On 10 May 1542, an evangelical exile in Strasbourg named Richard Hilles wrote a letter to Henry Bullinger, in which he reported on the Catherine Howard aff

Just published in Notes & Queries: new evidence concerning the famous rape accusation against Thomas Culpeper. academic.oup.com/nq/advance-a...

The Historical Writers' Association has just announced the shortlist for the 2025 HWA Non-fiction Crown - I was one of the judges. So many great books here! 📚

Herbert Butterfield’s The Whig Interpretation of History (1931) is universally received as sceptical of ‘whig’ teleology in historical accounts and, therefore, of politically charged narratives of history. This view stands in need of a basic correction. Butterfield’s work targets teleological accounts which involve a determinate conception of progress such as would arm a partisan politics. He calls this the politics of the ‘general proposition’. Nevertheless, he does defend a conception of progress involving an indeterminate concept. The historian finds, intimated in the detail of the past, that progress is the fruit of interactions between opposing parties. The imperative for the statesman in the present, then, is to facilitate such interactions. In short, The Whig Interpretation of History is a positive work of political thought. Looked at this way, Butterfield’s later, controversial work, The Englishman & His History, does not appear to be in contradiction with the earlier book so much as a polemical expression of it. The two books together present what may be called Butterfield’s politics of historiography. Histories which present progress as a straight line, to be co-opted by one party, encourage precisely the political action which impedes progress. Butterfield, in short, is still a kind of ‘whig’.

📣Out now on #firstview!

Jack Haughton (@camhistory.bsky.social) on 'Dispelling ‘das Herbert Butterfieldproblem’: A Rereading of The Whig Interpretation of History'

#IntellectualHistory #Progress #Positive 20thc 🗃️

👉Read online here: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Very exciting to see THE COLLECTED WORKS OF THOMAS KYD: VOLUME 2, for which I am the Associate Editor, now listed on the Boydell & Brewer website.

The Collected Works of Thomas Kyd - Boydell and Brewer share.google/Lg1i9VkrMyzD...

Ah, Oxford, how I miss you.

Exciting times as we await imminent proofs for 'The Collected Works of Thomas Kyd: Volume 2'.

Seven years in the making, I can't wait to see the full edition out in the world.

Been there. It's the hardest time to see any merit in one's own work. I wonder how many books are lost at this stage because the author loses courage at the last minute?

Cover proofs for new book, coming out in December!

And an excellent job you did too!

I've just completed the index for @jonathanmcgovern.bsky.social's book 'The Early Parliaments of Henry VIII - an important and very comprehensive work of parliamentary history, coming soon from @boydellandbrewer.bsky.social boydellandbrewer.com/book/the-ear...

Looks excellent, despite the relatively low salary for London. Would be an ideal job for me actually, if I wasn't already spoken for. Good luck with the search!

Closing date for this Early Modern Parliamentary Records Specialist role at The National Archives is this Sunday (31 August). Details via the link in the original post.

The poverty of scholars, as described in Tang Xianzu's Peony Pavilion (1598), sometimes described as the Chinese Romeo and Juliet.

YouTube video by Institute of Historical Research INTERVIEWS WITH HISTORIANS - GEOFFREY ELTON

I've never seen a video fo Geoffrey Elton before. Amazing that this footage survives and has been made available.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ayeg...

A pen on top of a proofing manuscript.

Proofs!

A passage from Ortho-epia Gallica (1593).

An Elizabethan French lesson. "Sblood! Swoundes! Yeeld thy purse: quicke, quicke, dispatch, yeeld, alight, or I will shoote this bullet into thy belly."

Yes, great to reconnect. I wondered where everyone had gone. Now I know!