It may seem unfashionable to say so, but historians should seize the imagination as well as the intellect. History is, in a sense, a story, a narrative of adventure and of vision, of character and of incident. It is also a portrait of the great general drama of the human spirit.
London has always provided the landscape for my imagination. It becomes a character - a living being - within each of my books.
There are so many characters whizzing around inside my head, it's like Looney Tunes. But as soon as I've finished writing about them, I completely forget who they are.
The English have always been greedy for news of times past, with that mixture of fatalism and melancholy which is part of the national character.
