A. C. Benson (1862-1925), novelist, poet (he wrote Land of Hope and Glory), educationalist and Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge, kept a voluminous diary for most of his life. Considered too controversial at the time, it was sealed up after his death. Only now, with the publication of this extensive selection, can his witty and acute judgements on people, institutions and issues – including Henry James, Thomas Hardy, Queen Victoria, Dean Inge, Balfour, Asquith, Eton and Cambridge – be fully appreciated. He paints an endlessly fascinating and often very funny picture of a public life at the heart of the Edwardian literary, educational, church and political establishments; but also of a private life riven by the pressures of unconsummated romantic attachments to young men, and by attacks of appalling depression, an illness then barely understood.

Historians Eamon Duffy and Ronald Hyam made this 300,000-word selection, adding a substantial introduction, footnotes, chronology, index and photographs. It is presented as two hardbacks in a slipcase.