For over thirty years, historian and broadcaster Michael Wood has brought history alive for viewers and readers in Britain and further afield.   Michael has written many books and made many films either about British history or about other major civilisations. He has well over a hundred documentary films to his name, among them In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great and The Story of India, which the Wall Street Journal described as ‘still the gold standard’ of documentary history making.  

He is also the author of several highly praised books on English history including In Search of the Dark Ages, Domesday, and In Search of England,   Michael was born in Manchester, and educated at Manchester Grammar School and Oriel College Oxford, where he did post-graduate research in Anglo-Saxon history, on which he has written many academic articles.

He is currently Professor of Public History at the University of Manchester, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, the Royal Society of Arts and the Society of Antiquaries, and a governor of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. He was recently awarded the Historical Association’s Medlicott Medal for ’outstanding services and current contributions to history’.

Michael's BBC2 series The Story of China was first transmitted in 2016 and after further updates is the subject of a major book.