David Cannadine awarded a Knight Batchelor

Lunarman David Cannadine was awarded a knighthood in the 2009 New Years Honours List. Our congratulations to him. The Guardian leader on 2nd January was 'in praise' of him and his wife, Linda Colley who was awarded a CBE in the same List.

He is a regular contributor to Radio 4's A Point of View, and his recordings through January and February 2008 can be heard here.

Sir David was born in Birmingham and attended King Edward VI Five Ways School where he (much later!) gave the first annual Jubilee Lecture. He read history at Clare College, Cambridge, and wrote a doctorate on the history of the development of the Calthorpe Estate, Edgbaston, Birmingham while at St John's College, Oxford, also spending time at Princeton University. After holding academic posts at Birmingham University and at Columbia, in 1998 he became Director of the Institute for Historical Research at the University of London and in 2003, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother Professor of British History there. Since 2005, he has been Chair of the National Portrait Gallery.