The Impossible Office?

Sir Anthony Seldon is the acknowledged national authority on all matters to do with Number 10 and Prime Ministers. His first book on a Prime Minister, Churchill's Indian Summer (1981) was published forty years ago, and since then he has written or edited many books, including the definitive insider accounts of the last five Prime Ministers. He is the honorary historian at Number 10 Downing Street, chair of the National Archive Trust, and has interviewed virtually all those who have worked in Number 10 in the last 50 years. Jonathan Meakin was educated at Royal Holloway, University of London and at the University of St Andrews. He has had a lifelong interest in history. He has worked on many publications with Anthony Seldon, including Cameron at 10 and The Cabinet Office, 1916–2016. Illias Thoms has worked with Anthony Seldon for over ten years and this is their fourth book together, including Cameron at 10 and Brown at 10. He graduated from Balliol College, Oxford with a degree in history and politics in 2014 and works as an assistant director in the UK film and television industries.

• Preface; 1. The Bookend Prime Ministers: Walpole and Johnson; 2. A Country Transformed, 1721–2021; 3. The Liminal Premiership: From the Saxons to 1806; 4. The Transformational Prime Ministers, 1806–2021; 5. The Powers of the Prime Minister, 1721–2021; 6. The Constraints on the Prime Minister, 1721–2021; 7. The Falling Power of the Monarchy, 1660–2021; 8. The Rise and Fall of the Foreign Secretary, 1782–2021; 9. The Rise, and Rise of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, 1660–2021; 10. The Impossible Office: The Prime Minister by 2021.

'A tremendous, magisterial book, informed and underpinned by brilliant historical and political insight. A triumph.' William Boyd, author of Trio, Restless and Any Human Heart