Professor Lawrence Goldman
I like historic and beautiful things: I want to help preserve and pass them on for others to enjoy. I taught History at Oxford University for 30 years. I was also General Editor of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and Director of the Institute of Historical Research in London. I specialise in Victorian history, including work on John Ruskin and William Morris. I’ve broadcast widely, participating a dozen times on In Our Time on Radio 4. I’ve been a member of the National Trust for more than 10 years.
Q. What Inspires you to seek election?
I wish to make the Trust’s presentation of history as accurate and balanced as possible. There should also be trust in the Trust itself, which must be transparent, democratic and accountable to its members and the public.
Q. What skills and knowledge would you bring to the Council to help the Trust be ‘for everyone, for ever’?
My career has been spent teaching, lecturing and writing accurately, objectively and from the sources about British History and I would like to share my learning and experience with those who run the Trust and visit its properties.
Q. What should be the Trust’s focus in it’s next 10-year strategy?
In Alan Bennett’s The History Boys, their teacher tells his pupils ‘Pass it on Boys, Pass it On’, and that should always be the focus of the Trust: to pass it on in the best condition possible.
Q. Anything else?
I have extensive experience lecturing to general audiences about history. I was a District President of the Workers’ Educational Association; I’m a Life Fellow of the Historical Association; and a trustee of my local museum and historical society in Southwold.