Richard DavenportHines

In Yes, Prime Minister, Sir Humphrey Appleby spells out the really important things in British life: Radio 3, the countryside, the law, and the universities – both of them. It is an amusing reminder that writing on higher education in the United Kingdom focuses on just a handful of institutions. In History in the House, Richard Davenport-Hines takes this approach much further – to just one discipline in a single Oxford college, Christ Church, known as ‘the House’.

When the Society for Anglo-Chinese Understanding (SACU) invited Hugh Trevor-Roper, Regius Professor of History at the University of Oxford, to visit China in 1965, he jumped at the chance. It was a decision that all parties concerned came to regret. The eminent historian had a terrible time in China, ‘that land of bigots and parrots’. He didn’t meet the right people. He found no intellectual equals. The interpreters and guides assigned to the group weren’t up to the job. He nicknamed them Cement-head, Duckbottom, Smooth-face, and the Presbyterian.