In this brilliant work of biography, Michael Braddick charts the life of Christopher Hill, one of the leading historians of his generation. From his abandonment of the respectable, provincial Methodism of his youth, through his embrace of Marxism, to his membership and eventual break with the Communist Party, as well as his celebrated intellectual career, Hill was an enigmatic figure. Across more than fifteen books and dozens of articles fundamentally rewrote the way we understand the English Revolution and the development of the modern British state. While his career brought many of the trappings of establishment respectability — he was both a Fellow of the British Academy and the Master of Balliol College, Oxford — he was also seen as a threat to that very same establishment. Under surveillance by the security services for decades, in the 1980s Hill was publicly accused of having been a Soviet agent during the war.

Braddick’s judicious biography not only situates Hill’s life and work in their historical context but seeks to rescue Hill for a new generation of readers.