Thomas Holland FRSL (born 5 January 1968) is an English author and popular historian who has published best-selling books on topics including classical and medieval history, and the origins of Islam.
In Attis (1996), he took historical figures from the ancient Roman Republic like Pompey and the poet Catullus and put them in a modern setting among a string of brutal murders.
1999's Sleeper in the Sands is set in Egypt, starting with the discovery of the Tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922 and travelling backward in time as a deadly secret is unveiled.
While doing research for The Bone Hunter, Holland read From Alexander to Actium by historian Peter Green and his childhood passion for ancient history and civilisations was reignited.
It was called "gripping and hugely entertaining" by The Sunday Times,[12] "informative, balanced and accessible" by BookPage,[13] and "a model of exactly how a popular history of the classical world should be written" by The Guardian.
His account focuses on politics over social and economic trends, and his consideration of the vast amounts of scholarship about the period is limited to a very narrow selection of work.
It was reviewed positively by Paul Cartledge, a professor of Greek history at Cambridge University, for The Independent: "If Persian Fire does not win the Samuel Johnson Prize, there is no justice in this world.
Noel Malcolm reviewed it for The Daily Telegraph and called it "a tremendously good read", but criticised the lack of detail about historical evidence and Holland's "elevated" style of prose.
[20] Christina Hardyment, reviewing it for The Independent, praised Holland's writing style, saying he "excels at narration, never jogging when he can gallop ... His highly individual road map to the hitherto 'dark ages' is written with forceful – and convincing – panache.
[23] But it was criticised by historian Glen Bowersock in The Guardian as being written in "a swashbuckling style that aims more to unsettle his readers than to instruct them ... irresponsible and unreliable".
Professor of Classics at the University of Pennsylvania Emily Wilson, reviewing it for The Guardian, was critical of the "overblown style" and narrative's lurid details, saying, "this is ancient Rome for the age of Donald Trump".
[25] But in his review for The Observer, Nick Cohen wrote "Among the many virtues of Tom Holland's terrific history is that he does not shrink from seeing the Roman emperors for what they were: 'the west's primal examples of tyranny'.
[33] Although Holland had studied Latin at school, his Greek is completely self-taught, and he set himself the task of translating one paragraph of the over-800-page Histories every day until he finished.
"[34] Classics scholar Edith Hall reviewed it for The Times Literary Supplement and said it was "unquestionably the best English translation of Herodotus to have appeared in the past half-century, and there have been quite a few ...
Holland has written dozens of articles for newspapers, journals and websites on varied topics including wildlife conservation,[35] sports,[36][37] politics[38] and history.
[45] Holland adapted the writings of classical Greek and Roman authors Herodotus, Homer, Thucydides, and Virgil for a series of broadcasts on BBC Radio 4.
[46] In 2001, Radio Four also broadcast a dramatic play he wrote based on Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War, titled Our Man in Athens.
[49] In August 2012, Holland produced and presented a documentary for Channel 4 television titled Islam: The Untold Story,[50] which questioned Islamic doctrine that maintains Muhammad founded the religion in Mecca in the 7th century, and that the Quran was transmitted, in full, directly to Muhammad by Allah (God) via the angel Gabriel, rather than being written by a person or persons.
He concluded that it is much more likely that Islamic theology developed gradually over several centuries as the Arab Empire expanded, and that descriptions of Muhammad's home more closely resemble what is now southern Israel than Mecca.
[55] A planned screening of Islam: The Untold Story before an audience of historians was cancelled, due to security concerns over threats received by Holland as a result of the documentary.
[57] In the film, Holland visited the site of the 2015 Bataclan theatre massacre in Paris, interviewed a Salafi jihadist leader in Jordan, and then went to the Iraqi city of Sinjar, which had historically been largely populated by the Yazidi minority.
At one point, Holland was shown approaching a pit filled with the remains of Yazidi women whom Isis considered too old to be used as sex slaves, and then had to vomit off-camera.
"[59] Although some Muslim groups once again registered their disapproval of the programme's content and of Channel 4 for airing it, Holland stated their reaction this time was much less severe than with Islam: The Untold Story.
"[68] In 2017, Holland joined Scottish businessman/blogger Kevin Hague and history professor Ali Ansari to create a new think tank which they named "These Islands".
[69][70] In 2019, Holland was a signatory on a public letter to The Guardian denouncing Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour Party and candidate for Prime Minister, for antisemitism.
In a camp I visited, a woman who had been raped for an entire year, then shot in the head when her owner grew tired of her, then finally sold back to her husband, lay curled in a foetal ball in a makeshift tent, rocking and moaning to herself.
"[74] In June 2019, he joined several other speakers in addressing an assembly of members of Parliament in the Grand Committee room of the House of Commons,[75] where he spoke about the cruelties inflicted upon the Yazidi.
He has also argued that one can draw connections between it and more recent antisemitic attitudes expressed by members of the British Labour Party under the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn.
Holland wrote that "It is not merely coincidence that ISIS currently boasts a caliph, imposes quranically mandated taxes, topples idols, chops the hands off thieves, stones adulterers, executes homosexuals and carries a flag that bears the Muslim declaration of faith.
[82] In an interview he gave to the literary website Quadrapheme the following month he explained that he wanted the lecture to promote discussion of the way Muhammad's life is interpreted, arguing that his "mythos lies at the core of what is pernicious in the goings-on of Islamic State and other radicals.