- Published: 12 March 2015
- ISBN: 9781448185788
- Imprint: Cornerstone Digital
- Format: EBook
- Pages: 400
King John
Treachery, Tyranny and the Road to Magna Carta
- Published: 12 March 2015
- ISBN: 9781448185788
- Imprint: Cornerstone Digital
- Format: EBook
- Pages: 400
A riveting and timely portrait of an execrable king
Jessie Childs, author of God's Traitors
Fine, timely... jaunty, authoritative... Morris has already proven himself as a 13th-century royal biographer - his study of Edward I is a modern classic. He is on form here, too. His split-chronology approach to John’s life before and after the loss of Normandy highlights just how disastrous it was for the king’s reign and reputation.
DAN JONES, Sunday Times
The John that emerges... is still a tyrant, but a more complex figure in a complex time. His importance for us, concludes the historian and broadcaster Marc Morris, is that "his oppressions led to the creation of a document that ensured they would not be repeated".
Sunday Telegraph
A compelling portrait of a king whose 17-year reign witnessed mass oppression on a huge scale... injected with a lively fluency... A fine reminder of the huge influence of Magna Carta that continues to form the basis of our freedoms even today.
Express
An excellent and sardonic new biography of King John. It will delight all who enjoyed his books on 1066 and Edward I.
TOM HOLLAND
A narrative history of the reign in muscular prose, full of anecdote and with a strong sense of period. He reconstructs with much skill some of the critical events of the reign, such as the murder of Arthur and John’s brutal feud with William de Briouze and his family.
Literary Review
A lively overview, which eschews a linear narrative in favour of flashbacks to John's earlier life and which offers a damning indictment of the king in the conclusion.
History Today
A masterpiece of historical writing… Morris is a wonderful storyteller
TLS
[A] magisterial biography ... Will surely become the book of choice on this fated reign for years to come.
BBC History Magazine
Outstanding ... This is by far the best book on the monarch’s reign since W L Warren’s trail-blazing biography, King John, written in 1961 – with the literary bravura of which Morris’ book may not unfavourably be compared.
BBC History Magazine
Morris is more than the master of his sources: he engages with them and brings his sharp critical intelligence to bear on them. His writing is clear, incisive and spiced time and again by a bon mot. This is by far the best book on the monarch's reign since W L Warren's trail-blazing biography, King John, written in 1961 - with the literary bravura of which Morris' book may not unfavourably be compared.
BBC History Magazine
[A] magisterial biography ... Will surely become the book of choice on this fated reign for years to come.
BBC History Magazine