Christopher Lee

Christopher Lee was a British writer, historian and broadcaster, best-known for writing the radio documentary series This Sceptred Isle for the BBC, which recounts the history of Britain from the Romans to the death of Queen Victoria, the 20th century and the British Empire.

Lee's career began as a defence and foreign affairs correspondent for the BBC. Leaving his career in journalism for academia, Lee was the first Quatercentenary Fellow in Contemporary History and Gomes Lecturer in Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He is currently researching the history of ideas at Birkbeck College in the University of London.

His recent books include the three accompanying volumes of This Sceptred Isle. In 2003 was published 1603, the history of the death of Elizabeth I and the arrival of the Stuarts. In 2005, Nelson and Napoleon described the events that led to the Battle of Trafalgar and also in the same year he published the autobiographic Eight Bells and Top Masts and the Bath Detective thriller trilogy.

In 2006, he gave a "Platform" talk on history writing and teaching at the National Theatre as a prelude to Alan Bennett’s play The History Boys and a new stage play set in the London of 1912.

He was also the writer of more than 70 Radio 4 plays and series including, The House for Timothy West, Julian Glover and Isla Blair, Colvil & Soames for Dudley Sutton and Christopher Benjamin, Our Brave Boys for Martin Jarvis and Fiona Shaw and the Los Angeles production of his The Trial of Walter Raleigh which Rosalind Ayres produced with Michael York in the title role. A later play, A Pattern in Shrouds, broadcast on Radio 4 in the summer of 2009 which dealt with the consequences of the assassination of the Queen's uncle, Lord Mountbatten in 1979.