Alistair Horne Visiting Fellowship
The Alistair Horne Fellowship (now in its 54th year) provides limited financial assistance and membership of St Antony’s College for a candidate prepared to write a significant book of non-fiction for a general readership. First-time authors with projects which fit with the areas covered by St Antony’s Regional Study Centres and Fellows are particularly encouraged to apply.
The Fellowship carries an expenses allowance of GBP £20,000. Fellows will be senior members of St Antony’s College, entitled to the use of the College library, regional study centres, and social facilities. They will also be entitled to free common table meals and 12 High Table meals per term.
Applications for 2024/25
The Fellow for the academic year 2024/25 will be elected early in 2024. The purpose is to support the writing of a specific book. Applications should include a covering letter, a brief curriculum vitae not to exceed four pages, a description of the proposed book not to exceed 10 pages, an indication of the author’s plans for the year, and the names and contact details of two referees. Please note that doctoral students who intend to use the year to complete their theses are not eligible. Nor do we encourage applicants who merely want to prepare their completed theses for publication rather than producing a book designed to appeal to a general readership.
St Antony’s College, Oxford
St Antony’s is a postgraduate college that specialises in international studies with particular emphasis on certain regions of the world. Centres of research and study associated with St Antony’s are concerned with Europe, Russia and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Japan, South and Southeast Asia, China, and Latin America. Fellows of the College are specialists in modern history, literature, politics, economics, sociology, social anthropology, and international relations. Visiting and Research Fellows, as well as Senior Associate Members, complement the Fellowship. Students of the College are working for higher degrees at the University.
The corporate designation of the College is “The Warden and Fellows of St Antony’s College in the University of Oxford”. Its foundation was made possible by the gift of the late Antonin Besse of Aden, a leading merchant of French nationality. Provisional arrangements for the foundation of the College were made by a decree passed by Congregation on 21 September 1948. On 30 May 1950 a further decree bestowed on the College the status of a New Foundation. Its main functions were then defined: “(a) To be a centre of advanced study and research in the fields of modern international history, philosophy, economics and politics; (b) To provide an international centre within the University where graduate students from all over the world can live and work together in close contact with senior members of the University who are specialists in their field; (c) To contribute to the general teaching of the University, especially in the fields of modern history and politics”. In Michaelmas Term 1950 the College opened its doors on the Woodstock Road in a former Anglican Convent built in the 1860s. In its seventh decade of activity, the body of the College consists of the Warden, the Bursar, some forty Fellows, about 500 students and, at any time, more than 120 Senior Members.
In 1969, Alistair Horne and St Antony’s College endowed an annual Fellowship designed to encourage the completion of works in modern history and biography which combine academic scholarship and a wider public appeal. In the course of the over fifty years of its existence, the Fellowship has become a notable success. Fellows from different walks of life and parts of the world have found St Antony’s a stimulating environment in which to pursue their work. The initiators of the Fellowship were especially interested in supporting first books by authors of any age.
Alistair Horne, who died in 2017, was himself a distinguished author. Among his prize-winning books were: The Price of Glory: Verdun 1916 (1962), A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-62 (1977), The French Army and Politics 1870-1970 (1984), as well as the two volume official biography of Harold Macmillan, published in 1988-9. Sir Alistair was an Honorary Fellow of St Antony’s College.
Alistair Horne Visiting Fellows 1969-2023
(including titles of published and unpublished works)
- 1969 T.J. Clark Image of the People: Gustav Courbet and the 1848 Revolution (1973) and The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France 1848-51 (1973)
- 1970 Norman Davies White Eagle, Red Star: The Polish-Soviet War, 1919-20 (1972)
- John Whittam The Politics of the Italian Army (1976)
- 1971 Charles Brooks (USA) The French Film and Politics in the 1930s
- 1972-73 Robert Kee* The Laurel and the Ivy: the story of Charles Stewart Parnell and Irish Nationalism (1993)
- Roger Adelson (USA) Mark Sykes: Portrait of an Amateur (1975)
- Redmond O’Hanlon Joseph Conrad and Charles Darwin: Scientific Thought in Conrad’s Fiction (1984)
- 1974-76 Victor Bonham-Carter* Authors by Profession. Vol 1 of A History of Authorship based on the archives of the Society of Authors (1964)
- 1976-77 Timothy Hilton John Ruskin: The Early Years (1984)
- Duff Hart-Davis Monarchs of the Glen: A History of Deer Stalking in the Scottish Highlands (1978)
- 1977-78 R.A. Hyman* Charles Babbage: Pioneers of the Computer (1982)
- 1978-79 Alan Davidson* Dumas on Food (1978) (with Jane Davidson) and North Atlantic Sea Food (1979)
- 1979-80 John Grigg* Lloyd George: from peace to war, 1912-1916 (1985)
- Roy Foster Lord Randolph Churchill: A Political Life (1981)
- Anthony Mockler Haile Selassie’s War (1984)
- 1980-81 John M. Campbell F.E. Smith – The First Earl of Birkenhead (1984)
- 1982-83 Martin Meredith The First Dance of Freedom (1984)
- 1984 Steve Gallup* (USA) A History of the Salzburg Festival (1987)
- 1984-85 Axel von dem Bussche* (Germany) Memoirs
- 1985-86 Deidre McMahon Biography of De Valera
- 1986-87 Roland Huntford Nansen: The Explorer as Hero (1997)
- 1987-88 Laurent Bonnaud (France) Le tunnel sous la Manche: deux siècles de passions (1994)
- Frank McLynn Stanley: the Making of an African Explorer (1989) and Stanley: Sorcerer’s Apprentice (1990)
- 1988-89 James Clad Behind the Myth: Business, Money and Power in South East Asia (1989)
- 1990-92 Christina Hardyment History of the European Family [work in progress]
- 1991 Alex Danchev* Oliver Franks – Founding Father (1993)
- 1992-94 Michael Ignatieff Isaiah Berlin: a life (1998)
- 1995 Edward Harrison Siege of Breslau by the Red Army in 1945
- 1996 Noel Malcolm Kosovo: a short history (1998)
- 1996-97 David Gilmour The Ruling Caste: Imperial Lives in the Victorian Raj (2005)
- 1997-98 Richard Thorpe Eden: The Life and Times of Anthony Eden, First Earl of Avon 1897-1977 (2003)
- 1998-99 James Hamilton Faraday – The Life (2002)
- 1999-2000 Ian Buruma Bad Elements: Chinese Rebels from Los Angeles to Beijing (2002)
- 2000-01 Roderick Bailey The Wildest Province: SOE in the Land of the Eagle (2008)
- 2001-02 June Morris The Life & Times of Thomas Balogh: a Macaw among Mandarins (2007)
- 2002-03 Daniel Gordon Immigrants and the new Left in France (2012)
- 2003-04 Joanna Kavenna The Ice Museum: In Search of the Lost Land of Thule (2005)
- 2004-05 Victoria Schofield Witness to History – The Life of John Wheeler-Bennett (2012)
- 2005-06 Gabriel Piterberg The Returns of Zionism: Myths, Politics and Scholarship in Israel (2008)
- 2006-07 Patrick Cohrs ‘Pax Britannica’ and the Demise of European Peace [work in progress]
- 2007-08 Christopher de Bellaigue Patriot of Persia, Mohammad Mossadegh and a Very British Coup (2012)
- 2008-09 Stephanie Hare Duty, Death & the Republic, The Career of Maurice Papon from Vichy France to the Algerian War
- 2009-10 Daisy Hay The Disraelis: A Strange Romance (2015)
- 2010-11 Maurice Walsh Bitter Freedom: Ireland in a Revolutionary World 1918-23 (2015)
- 2011-12 Nicoletta Demetriou Durrell’s bitterness: Lawrence Durrell in Cyprus, 1953-56 [work in progress]
- 2012-13 David Motadel Persian Shahs in Imperial Europe [work in progress]
- 2013-14 Andrew Porwancher The Devil Himself: A Tale of Honor, Insanity, and the Birth of Modern America (2016)
- 2015-16 Sir Nicholas Stadlen Bram Fischer QC and the Unsung Heroes of the Struggle Against Apartheid 1960-1966
- 2019-20 Dr Farrah Jarral A History of the Soul
- 2020-21 Mr Tim Bouverie Allies
- 2021-22 Mr Edward Posnett Years of Lead
- 2022-2023 Alex Clapp Waste Wars
(The titles in italics are books published)
* deceased