Welcome to Helen McCarthy, historian of working motherhood and the role of women in international diplomacy
Professor Helen McCarthy, historian of modern Britain and Professor of Modern and Contemporary British History at the University of Cambridge, will join the judging panel for the Wolfson History Prize in 2026.
Professor McCarthy was previously shortlisted for the Wolfson History Prize in 2021 for Double Lives: A History of Working Motherhood. An expert on women’s work and professional identities, the social and political history of the interwar period, and the social and cultural history of diplomacy, her other books include Women of the World: The Rise of the Female Diplomat (2014), which won Best Book on International Affairs at the Political Book Awards.
Helen is currently writing a social history of retirement entitled Living the Dream: The Rise and Fall of Retirement, to be published by Allen Lane in 2028 and supported by a Major Research Fellowship from the Leverhulme Trust.
“History helps us to think differently about the world we live in”
Helen McCarthy said: “Joining the panel of judges for the Wolfson History Prize is a thrill and an honour. In these fraught and complicated times, we need history books which can inform, enthral and help us to think differently about the world we live in. The Prize is both a powerful reminder of why the past matters and a celebration of the brilliant historical writing which brings it to life on the page.”
Paul Ramsbottom, Chief Executive of the Wolfson Foundation, said: “We are thrilled that Professor Helen McCarthy has joined the Wolfson History Prize judging panel. She is a remarkable historian, who has made a significant contribution to the social history of modern Britain on subjects as varied as working motherhood, liberal internationalism and the evolving patterns of retirement.”
Helen McCarthy will join the Wolfson History Prize judging panel for 2026 alongside chair of the judges David Cannadine, Sudhir Hazareesingh, Helen King, and Diarmaid MacCulloch.
About the judges
David Cannadine (Chair of the judges) is widely regarded as one of the most influential British historians of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. His work spans the evolution of Britain’s social, political, and cultural life, with a particular focus on how memory, ceremony, class, and empire shape national identity.
Sudhir Hazareesingh joined the judging panel in 2022, having been awarded the Wolfson History Prize the year before for Black Spartacus: The Epic life of Toussaint Louverture, the extraordinary, gripping story of a former slave’s rise to become leader of the world’s first independent black state. His latest book is Daring to be Free: Rebellion and Resistance of the Enslaved in the Atlantic World (October 2025).
Helen King is a historian of medicine and the body, specialising in the history of obstetrics and gynaecology. Her recent book Immaculate Forms: Uncovering the History of Women’s Bodies (2024) explores how medicine and religion have shaped perceptions of women’s bodies, from ancient Greece to the modern day. Professor King is also an elected member of the General Synod and is involved in campaigns addressing discrimination on the grounds of gender and sexuality.
Helen McCarthy is an historian of everyday worlds of work, family and politics in modern Britain from the late nineteenth century to the present. She is author of Double Lives: A History of Working Motherhood (2020), which was shortlisted for the Wolfson History Prize in 2021, and is currently writing a social history of retirement for Allen Lane.
Diarmaid MacCulloch, an internationally recognised scholar of Christianity, is an ordained deacon in the Church of England and was knighted in 2012 for services to scholarship. A Wolfson History Prize judge since 2016, he won the prize in 2004 for Reformation: Europe’s House Divided 1490-1700. His latest book is Lower than the Angels: A History of Sex and Christianity (2024).
For detailed biographies of the five judges, please visit Judges of the Wolfson History Prize.
This year’s shortlist of six books will be announced on Thursday 17 September 2026, and the winner revealed on Tuesday 1 December 2026.
