Antony Beevor

Born in Kensington,[2] Beevor was educated at two independent schools; Abberley Hall School in Worcestershire, followed by Winchester College in Hampshire. He then went to the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, where he studied under the military historian John Keegan before receiving a commission in the 11th Hussars on 28 July 1967.[3] Beevor served in England and Germany and was promoted to lieutenant on 28 January 1969 before resigning his commission on 5 August 1970.[4][5]

Beevor has been a visiting professor at the School of History, Classics and Archaeology at Birkbeck, University of London, and at the University of Kent.[6] He was the 2002-2003 Lees-Knowles Lecturer at Cambridge University.

His best-known works, the best-selling Stalingrad (1998) and Berlin: The Downfall 1945 (2002), recount the World War II battles between the Soviet Union and Germany. They have been praised for their vivid, compelling style, their treatment of the ordinary lives of combatants and civilians, and the use of newly disclosed documents from Soviet archives.[7][8][9]

His The Spanish Civil War (1982) was later re-written as The Battle for Spain (2006), keeping the structure and some content from the earlier work, but using the updated narrative style of his Stalingrad book and also adding characters and new archival research from German and Russian sources.[10]

Beevor's book The Second World War (2012) is notable for its focus on the conditions and grief faced by women and civilians and for its coverage of the war in East Asia, which has been called "masterful".[11][12] Beevor's expertise has been the subject of some commentary; his publications have been praised as revitalizing interest in World War II topics[13] and have allowed readers to reevaluate events such as D-Day from a new perspective.[14] He has also appeared as an expert in television documentaries related to World War II.[15][16]

Overall, his works have been translated into 35 languages with more than 8.5 million copies sold.[17]

In August 2015, Russia's Yekaterinburg region considered banning Beevor's books, accusing him of Nazi sympathies, citing his lack of Russian sources when writing about Russia, and claiming he had promoted false stereotypes introduced by Nazi Germany during World War II.[18][19][20] Beevor responded by calling the banning "a government trying to impose its own version of history", comparing it to other "attempts to dictate a truth", such as denial of the Holocaust and the Armenian genocide.

In January 2018, Beevor's book about the Battle of Stalingrad was attacked in Ukraine because of a single mistranslation in the Russian edition. Beevor told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: "I must say, this sounds absolutely astonishing. There's certainly nothing inherently anti-Ukrainian in the book at all."[21]

Beevor is descended from a long line of writers, starting with the legal philosopher John Austin and his wife Sarah, their daughter Lucie, Lady Duff Gordon (Letters from Egypt), his grandmother Lina Waterfield, (Observer correspondent and Castle in Italy), and his mother Kinta Beevor (A Tuscan Childhood). Antony Beevor is married to biographer The Honourable Artemis Cooper; they have two children, Nella and Adam.[22]

Beevor was appointed a Knight Bachelor in the 2017 New Year Honours for "services in support of Armed Forces Professional Development".[23]

He is a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres,[24] a member of Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana[25] and a commander of the Belgian Order of the Crown.[6]

Beevor was awarded an Honorary D.Litt. from the University of Kent in 2004,[26] from the University of Bath in 2010,[27] the University of East Anglia in 2014[28] and the University of York in 2015.[29] He was elected an honorary Fellow of King's College London in July 2016.[30]

Beevor, a former chair and member of the Council of the Society of Authors,[31] resigned with Sir Philip Pullman in 2022[32] in protest over the actions of the CEO and the leadership of the management committee.

• Crete: The Battle and the Resistance won the Runciman Prize, administered by the Anglo-Hellenic League for stimulating interest in Greek history and culture.[33]
• Stalingrad
  • The first Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction[34]
  • Wolfson History Prize[35]
  • Hawthornden Prize for Literature[36]
• Berlin: The Downfall 1945
  • Longman-History Today Trustees' Award
• The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936–1939 (Spanish Edition)
  • La Vanguardia Prize for Non-Fiction

Beevor was recognised with the 2014 Pritzker Military Museum & Library's Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing.[37] Tim O'Brien, the 2013 recipient, made the announcement on behalf of the selection committee.[22][38][39] The award carried a purse of US$100,000.[40]

In July 2016, Beevor was awarded the Medlicott Medal for services to history by the UK-based Historical Association.[41]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Antony Beevor.

• Official website
• Antony Beevor Stalingrad Berlin - The Downfall 1945
• Antony Beevor discusses his book on the Spanish Civil War
• Antony Beevor at IMDb
• Appearances on C-SPAN
• Interview on The Second World War at the Pritzker Military Museum & Library on 21 June 2012
• Sir Antony Beevor on Desert Island Discs, BBC Radio 4, 19 February 2017