Norman Davies

Norman Davies is author, teacher, historian, broadcaster, and commentator. Born in Bolton in 1939, he was educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, and the universities of Grenoble, Sussex and Krakow. His academic career started with OUP’s God’s Playground: a history of Poland (1981), before moving on to write the Oxford History of Europe, published as Europe: a history (1996), and to cover a wide range of topics from The Isles: a history (1999), an iconoclastic account of Britain’s past, and Europe at War: no simple victory (2006), which contests western perspectives of 1939-45, to, most recently, To and From (2010) on postal history, Vanished Kingdoms (2013) on Europe’s lost realms, Beneath Another Sky (2017) on global history, and Trail of Hope (2018) on the amazing odyssey of the Anders Army in 1941-46. He is a Fellow of the British Academy, and has been awarded the CMG by Queen Elizabeth II and the Order of the White Eagle by the President of Poland. He has two sons, Daniel and Christian, and lives in Summertown, Oxford, with his wife, Maria.