Writing
History, ideas and public life
Essays and accessible introductions to political thought, religion, intellectual history and the ideas that continue to shape the present.
START HERE · A GUIDE TO THE FIELD
Intellectual History: A Guide to Ideas in Context
What is intellectual history, and how do historians study ideas? Explore Annales, Lovejoy, the Cambridge historians and LaCapra, with examples from across the site and a scholarly reading list.
Ideas have histories
This is where I write beyond the confines of the thesis. Some articles introduce major thinkers and debates; others connect historical arguments to contemporary political and cultural questions. The aim throughout is serious history in clear, inviting prose.
Choose a reading route
Start with a question rather than a name. Open a route below for selected essays, then use the subject archives for further reading. These selections bring older writing into conversation with the latest articles.
Historical method and public argument
Justice, faith and political obligation
Enlightenment, rights and reform
Knowledge, institutions and political identity
Science, nature and society
Opposition, authority and the uses of the past
Browse by subject
Explore the articles through six themes spanning political thought, religion, science, empire and the practice of intellectual history.
Political Thought
Essays on political ideas, institutions, ideologies and thinkers from antiquity to the modern world.
Enlightenment & Modernity
Essays on natural law, reform, reason and the emergence of modern political and intellectual life.
Historiography & Method
Essays on how intellectual history is researched, interpreted and written.
Religion & Authority
Essays on faith, reform, political theology and the relationship between religious and temporal power.
Science & Society
Essays on natural history, evolution, statistics and the political contexts of scientific knowledge.
Empire & Global History
Essays on empire, nationalism, decolonisation and intellectual exchange across borders.
Latest articles
Browse the newest essays and introductions below.
FEATURED GUIDE · 8 OCTOBER 2026
Intellectual History: A Guide to Ideas in Context
Explore the field’s development, from Annales and Lovejoy to the Cambridge historians and LaCapra, with examples and further reading.
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Can We Tell the Truth About Ourselves? Rousseau and the Confessions
Rousseau’s Confessions makes sincerity a problem of memory, self-justification and the reader’s judgement.
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Who Gets to Call Whom Barbarous? Montaigne on Custom and Cruelty
Montaigne on custom, cruelty and cultural judgement: Samuel Woodall and Jack Thomson ask who gets to call another society barbarous.
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What Does an Intellectual Historian Actually Study? Methodology, Context, and Intentionality
What intellectual historians study, how contextualism works, and why texts are best understood as actions within historical debates.
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How Should We Learn to Live and Die? Montaigne on Philosophy and Experience
Explore Montaigne on death, education and everyday experience with Samuel Woodall and Jack Thomson in the second Beyond the Text conversation.
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Why Did Montaigne Make Himself His Subject?
Why did Montaigne write about himself? Explore his Essays, changing identity and self-knowledge with Samuel Woodall and Jack Thomson.
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When Does Disagreement Become Faction? Hobbes on Political Division
The final episode in our Hobbes trilogy examines disagreement, faction and the forces Hobbes believed could dissolve a commonwealth.
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Introducing 25 Political Thinkers: A Beginner’s Guide
A free, illustrated 54-page guide to 25 political thinkers, with quotations, reading suggestions and questions to explore.
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Why Should We Obey the State? Hobbes on Political Obligation
The second episode in our Hobbes trilogy examines covenant, authorisation, sovereignty and the reasons citizens owe obedience to the state.
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Who Was Thomas Hobbes and What Was He Afraid Of?
The first episode in our Hobbes trilogy explores the life, civil-war context and political fear behind Leviathan.
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Browse monthly editions bringing together new essays, research updates, recent presentations and selected work from across intellectual history.