The King Charles III Space Station Summer Reading List
A summer syllabus from the King Charles III Space Station library, spanning Sheffield foundries, Arthurian legend, and the dark forest of deep space.
The library aboard the King Charles III Space Station is in need of refreshing, so we asked our friends, guests, and fellow travellers what they’d stow in the hold. The result is the first Anglofuturist summer reading list: a syllabus for national renewal, assembled by people who are variously legislating for it, building it, or writing its poetry.
Contributors include three sitting or former MPs: Katie Lam, who has found the definitive guide to the British state in a Terry Pratchett novel, Alex Burghart, who is preparing for the Bayeux Tapestry’s arrival by reading up on King Harold, and Douglas Carswell, who recommends a Polish science-fiction classic on the question of what intelligence actually is. From industry, Isembard founder Alex Fitzgerald makes the case that as the cost of intelligence collapses, the real rate limiter on human progress becomes moving atoms in the physical world. Elsewhere you’ll find the writer Nina Power on hermits and English eccentricity, the political scientist Philip Cunliffe on the coming neo-feudalism, Civic Future’s Pamela Dow on Buchan and Milner’s Kindergarten, and our own Tom Ough on why the silence of deep space (like the calm of the post-war order) should not be mistaken for safety.
The recommendations range from Anglo-Norman chronicles to Chinese industrial policy, from Sheffield steel foundries to the dark forest of interstellar space, with a detour through post-Napoleonic social climbing for those exhausted by statistics on car production. We’ve sorted them into sections, though the theme running through the whole list is hard to miss: the world is less forgiving than the good years had us believe, the hour is later than we think, and sharp minds are needed for the hard yards ahead.
Isembard is hiring for factory owner-operators. Find out more here.
The Inner Workings of the British State
1. Terry Pratchett, Going Postal
A brilliant, and very funny, study in the absurdity of bureaucratic institutions. I can think of no better guide to the inner workings of the British state!
Katie Lam, Member of Parliament for Weald of Kent and Opposition Assistant Whip. Also posts on @Katie_Lam_MP.
2. John Brewer, The Sinews of Power: War, Money and the English State 1688-1783
For an understanding of the British state, I would recommend The Sinews of Power by John Brewer. Much like the declinist and conservative historian Corelli Barnett, Brewer issues a powerful counter to what might be described as the Whiggish history of British power, built around law, liberty and commerce. Brewer comprehensively shows that Britain’s early success rests largely on the establishment of a fiscal-military state that could collect and borrow money at unprecedented rates to fund unprecedented military and naval adventures. From the Glorious Revolution to the onset of the French Revolutionary Wars, British tax receipts greatly exceeded commercial growth, with the fiscal bureaucracy growing more than threefold throughout the century.
Rian Chad Whitton, analyst and researcher at Bismarck Analysis. Also posts on @RianCFFWhitton.
3. David Held, Models of Democracy
China’s different development model — the deeper history of which can be understood through John King Fairbank’s The Great Chinese revolution [see below], 1800-1985 made me think about the necessary radical changes to our political system, for which I recommend David Held’s Models of Democracy as a reader. It helps clarify the fact that no system can be treated as static. Democracy is not defined by its mechanisms — Parliament, first-past-the-post etc — but by it’s purpose, which is collective self-mastery. Its essence lies in the abductive process of discovering the best means by which a society can act effectively in a complex world.
Tom Jones, Deputy Online Editor of the Critic and Councillor for Scotton & Lower Wensleydale. Also posts on @93vintagejones.
Atoms and Artisans
1. Ed Conway, Material World
Everyone is talking about the rise of AI. No one is talking about the rise of the physical world. As intelligence cost collapses the real rate limiter for human progresses becomes moving atoms in the real world. Ed’s book is great. Charting the history, economics and geopolitics of salt, sand, oil, lithium, copper and steel. A must-read.
Alexander Fitzgerald, Isembard founder & CEO. Also posts on @AFitzgerald1992.
2. James Fox, Craft Land: A Journey Through Britain’s Lost Arts & Vanishing Trades
For all ye budding cræftsmun, James Fox’s Craftland: A Journey Through Britain’s Lost Arts and Vanishing Trades (2025) is a beautifully written portrait of craft across modern Britain. From the hedgerow layers and withy pot makers to the steel foundries of Sheffield and the watchmakers of the Isle of Man, Fox brings the wonder of craft into focus offering a sliver of hope for those who fear our best craft days are behind us. Most importantly for those keen to reindustrialise Britain, Fox shows how just as the great industries of today were once crafts, so too can craft serve as a blueprint for the the cutting-edge of tomorrow.
Louis Elton, Founder of Nation of Artisans. Also posts on @LouisElton96.
3. Alexander Langland, Cræft: An Inquiry Into the Origins and True Meaning of Traditional Crafts
For those seeking more than history but a way of thinking about craft as a uniquely valuable way of working, I also highly recommend Alexander Langland’s Cræft: An Inquiry Into the Origins and True Meaning of Traditional Crafts (2017). Langlands’ revival of King Alfred’s “cræft” as a category that connotes the virtuous application power, skill, and knowledge in deep harmony of hand, eye, brain, heart, culture, and tools to forge excellence is the inspiration for Nation of Artisans’ British Cræft Prize!
Louis Elton, Founder of Nation of Artisans. Also posts on @LouisElton96.
4. Geoffrey Owen, From Empire to Europe: The Decline and Revival of British Industry Since the Second World War
For a thorough understanding of Britain’s turbulent industrial history, I would recommend From Empire to Europe: The Decline and Revival of British Industry Since the Second World War by the Financial Times journalist Geoffrey Owen. Chronicling Britain’s manufacturing base from the mid-20th century to the dawn of the new millennium, Owen goes through the travails of different industries in rich detail. Owen’s analysis diverges from others on the matter of British industry as it ends on a broadly positive note. First published in 1999, the book argues persuasively that British industry, after many failures and painful adjustments, entered the 21st century in relatively fine fettle. He captures a view held at the time that, while Britain’s future would be characterised by services, manufacturing would continue to grow. It is particularly interesting to read the final chapter outlining potential future challenges, which does not mention China once. The book, therefore, serves not just as a repository of statistics and facts, but as a reminder that national success is extremely hard to maintain.
Rian Chad Whitton, analyst and researcher at Bismarck Analysis. Also posts on @RianCFFWhitton.
The Bedrock of Our Culture
1. Tom Licence, Harold: Warrior King
I am reading Tom Licence’s new Harold: Warrior King, as well as an assortment of Anglo-Norman texts in preparation for the opening of the Bayeux Tapestry exhibition
Alex Burghart, Member of Parliament for Brentwood and Ongar, Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. Also posts on @alexburghart.
2. Malcolm Guite, Galahad and the Grail: Merlin’s Isle, Volume 1
A new work from one of our most masterful living poets. Restoring the power to a myth that lives in the bedrock of our culture; the Arthurian legend. Rich and epic, but read with ease. It is something to hear the man himself recite it, pipe in one hand, whiskey in the other.
Henry Palmer, Founder and Managing Partner at Lightridge. Also posts at @HenryJPalmer and on Substack.
3. Quentin S. Crisp, The Hermitage (Verdurin, forthcoming, December 2026).
England is nothing without eccentricity. Our strange, thoughtful, and determined men have built churches in the wilds of Africa, tunnels through mountains, engines, rockets, cars, computers and civilisation itself. Consummate Englishman, Quentin S. Crisp (his real name, unlike the flamboyant chap who assumed it!), tells the story of two hermits, one pastoral, the other entirely modern. The spirit of our country runs through both, dreaming, singular, visionary. It is only by rebuilding and remembering our past that we can see a way to our future: long may the hermit be protected against the deadening forces that seek to crush us!
Nina Power, writer and philosopher. Also posts on @Nina_Power_.
The Silence is Not Benign
1. Cixin Liu, The Dark Forest
To modern humanity, the vast silence of space connotes emptiness rather than danger. In Cixin Liu’s “Remembrance of Earth’s Past” trilogy, though, that complacency is shattered. I’m currently reading the trilogy’s second instalment, The Dark Forest, which invites us to think of the cosmos as a forest stalked by nameless terrors. In such environments, it is foolish to assume that silence is benign.
I’m not giving too much away by saying that, in The Dark Forest, humanity finds itself in trouble. As such, this grand novel has Anglofuturist resonance for those who wish to find it. For decades, Britain has assumed that the law of the jungle has been suspended and that we can be complacent about our security, our energy, our demographics and all the rest. Yet the world beyond our borders is more hostile than the good years had us believe.
Tom Ough, co-host of Anglofuturism, senior editor at UnHerd, and author of The Anti-Catastrophe League, newly published in paperback.
2. Stanisław Lem, Solaris
It is a novel – and one ought to read more novels. It examines fundamental questions as to what constitutes intelligence. An apt topic at this time.
Douglas Carswell, president and CEO of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy.
The Hour Is Later Than We Think
1. Joel Kotkin, The Coming of Neo-Feudalism
Joel Kotkin’s The Coming of Neo-Feudalism. It’s immensely stimulating and thought-provoking even when you disagree wth it, which makes it a very worthwhile read. The core argument is that a new social structure is emerging in the wake of deindustrialisation in the West in which the growth of Californian oligarchy and erosion of social mobility is the result of the fragmentation of the middle classes, rents are substituting for competitive profit-seeking as the dominant mode of wealth extraction, and a new clerisy has formed the universities; green ideology provides a secular apocalypse in place of medieval theology - the result is a new, rigid and hierarchical social order more akin to feudalism than modern capitalism. The argument probably applies more to post-industrial Europe than the US, as Kotkin sees hope for America in the sun-belt rather than the coastal strips.
Philip Cunliffe, Associate Professor of International Relations at the Department of Risk and Disaster Reduction, University College London. Also posts on @thephilippics.
2. Dan Wang, Breakneck and John King Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution, 1800-1985
Doubtless someone else will Recommend Dang Wang’s Breakneck, and they’re right to.
China’s different development model — the deeper history of which can be understood through John King Fairbank’s The Great Chinese Revolution, 1800-1985 made me think about the necessary radical changes to our political system, for which I recommend David Held’s Models of Democracy [see above] as a reader. It helps clarify the fact that no system can be treated as static. Democracy is not defined by its mechanisms — Parliament, first-past-the-post etc — but by it’s purpose, which is collective self-mastery. Its essence lies in the abductive process of discovering the best means by which a society can act effectively in a complex world.
Tom Jones, Deputy Online Editor of the Critic and Councillor for Scotton & Lower Wensleydale. Also posts on @93vintagejones.
3. Émile Zola, La Débâcle
There’s always a propensity to recommend serious, weighty non-fiction, but recently I’ve begun to enjoy more fiction. I enjoyed in particular Zola’s La Débâcle, the story of sclerotic France’s national humiliation and during the Franco-Prussian War, “a series of disasters greater than any nation had ever undergone: continual defeats, provinces lost, milliards to pay, the blood-bath of the most dreadful of civil wars, whole districts full of ruins and dead, no money left, no honour left, a whole world to build up again.” One can only hope Britain never needs to learn quite so painfully that renewal need not wait upon catastrophe.
Tom Jones, Deputy Online Editor of the Critic and Councillor for Scotton & Lower Wensleydale. Also posts on @93vintagejones.
4. William Rees-Mogg and James Dale Davidson, The Sovereign Individual: Mastering the Transition to the Information Age
I recommend this not to endorse it, but to suggest it as remedial literature for those still entertaining a naive idea of remedying Britain’s cultural malaise simply by changing the government. Here in writing at the close of the 20th century, we see two ideologues eagerly awaiting the dissolution of nation-states into economic zones and identity into preference for lower taxation. It is all the more disturbing to read, only a few decades later, now that many of their predictions have come to pass. I find it useful as a reminder that the world has changed a great deal in our lifetimes and will continue to do so, but the direction of travel remains largely predictable. For those who care about the preservation of culture and identity, it serves well as a corrective: to change anything, we must first have a clear-sighted view on how things actually are. What we can retain of ourselves in this ever more fluid system of network states is, I feel, one of the most urgent questions of politics today. (A note—the opening chapter on the Y2K bug is infamously dated, although it is perhaps gaining new relevance as we face a new technological doomsday in our own time.)
Aeron Laffere, Anglofuturism producer. Also posts on @aeronlaffere.
The Perils of Personal Ambition
1. John Buchan, Greenmantle
I’m reading John Buchan’s Greenmantle at the moment: a rollicking good end of Ottoman romp about a plot to create a holy war and take resources from Western Front. In parallel, I’m reading about the early formation of “Milner’s Kindergarten”, and how this group of brilliant thinkers and doers, forged in adversity, went on to shape a nation.
Pamela Dow, Chief Operating Officer of Civic Future.
2. Stendhal, The Red and the Black
My final recommendation, Stendhal’s The Red and the Black, should be a tonic for those exhausted by statistics on car production and customs duties. The novel, set in post-Napoleonic France, follows the travails of the ambitious young upstart Julien Sorel, a commoner with a revolutionary spirit and a penchant for high-status women. The book is already popular with the aspiring little Jacobins attending various Anglofuturist meetups.
Rian Chad Whitton, analyst and researcher at Bismarck Analysis. Also posts on @RianCFFWhitton.
Georgian Townhouses on the Moon
1. Gerard O’Neill, The High Frontier
There are many books about space colonisation, some good and some bad, but anybody interested in the topic must go back to this foundational text. Gerard O’Neill started the serious scientific study of space colonisation in the 1970s at Princeton and showed the engineering was possible; and his work is key to understanding what Elon Musk means when he talks about “Mass drivers” and why Jeff Bezos thinks we should live in giant tubes. Read it and you too will understand the immense opportunities available beyond our planet.
Peter Hague, astrophysicist writing Planetocracy. Also posts on @peterrhague.
England Is Nothing Without Eccentricity
1. Georges Bataille, Eroticism
Georges Bataille’s Eroticism can be read as a criticism of modern utilitarianism which refuses to engage it on its own terms, making it pretty different from the alternative criticisms that feel more intuitive and familiar today -- what if Abundance is actually bad not because it fails to deliver, but regardless of whether it does? This approach and the broader tradition are probably unconvincing, but still worthwhile and interesting. Bataille does an especially good job of making the case aesthetically compelling.
Yung Macro, @apralky.
2. Peter Watson, The German Genius: Europe’s Third Renaissance, the Second Scientific Revolution and the Twentieth Century
The 19th century sits awkwardly in many people’s historical understanding. After the Stuarts and before the First World War, this was the period when the modern world as we know it came into being. This book covers the intellectual history of Germany between 1750 and 1933, a period and region of feverish innovation where modern science, the university, history, research, the individual and many other concepts were first laid down.
Calum Drysdale, co-host of Anglofuturism.
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