Newton, Diana 1953–

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Newton, Diana 1953–

PERSONAL:

Born November 2, 1953. Education: Earned B.A. (honours) and Ph.D.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of History, School of Arts and Media, University of Teesside, Middlesbrough, Tees Valley TS1 3BA, England. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

University of Durham, Durham, England, served as research fellow; University of Teesside, Middlesbrough, England, served as research fellow, reader in early modern British history, and chair of Centre for Regional and Local Historical Research, director of North East England History Institute, 2006—.

MEMBER:

Royal Historical Society (fellow).

WRITINGS:

Papists, Protestants, and Puritans, 1559-1714, Cambridge University Press (New York, NY), 1998.

(With Jonathan Lumby) The Grosvenors of Eaton: The Dukes of Westminster and Their Forebears, Jennet Publications (Eccleston, England), 2002.

The Making of the Jacobean Regime: James VI and I and the Government of England, 1603-1605, Boydell Press (Rochester, NY), 2005.

North-East England, 1569-1625: Governance, Culture and Identity, Boydell Press (Rochester, NY), 2006.

(Editor, with A.J. Pollard) A History of Newcastle before 1700, Phillimore (Chalford, England), 2008.

(Editor, with Bill Lancaster and Natasha Vall) An Agenda for Regional History, Northumbria University Press (Newcastle upon Tyne, England), 2008.

Contributor to books, including Northumbria: History and Identity, edited by R. Colls and B. Lancaster, Phillimore, 2007; and Regional Identities in North-east England, edited by A. Green and A.J. Pollard, Boydell Press, 2007. Contributor to periodicals, including English Historical Review, Historical Journal, Northern History, Renaissance Forum, and Studies in History.

SIDELIGHTS:

Diana Newton's doctoral research on the early years of the reign of King James I of England resulted in the publication of her book The Making of the Jacobean Regime: James VI and I and the Government of England, 1603-1605. Crowned King James VI of Scotland in infancy, James reigned there for thirty-six years before coming to the English throne upon the death of Queen Elizabeth I. Taking a holistic approach to his first two years of English rule, Newton is able "to effectively read James's governing style as ‘responses’ to events," according to Renaissance Quarterly reviewer Brett F. Parker. "One of the values of The Making of the Jacobean Regime," in Parker's opinion, is "its emphasis on James as both student and ultimately near master of English rule." Theodore K. Rabb in the Historian noted that "the traditional view of the bumbling and inattentive monarch … is convincingly exploded" in Newton's discussion of James's astute handling of Catholic-Puritan conflicts and her emphasis on "his moderation, his constant quest for information, and his efforts to improve administrative effectiveness at the local level." The critic expressed concern, however, that Newton gives inadequate attention to the areas in which James was less successful, such as revenue and the question of union between England and Scotland. Michael B. Young in H-Net Reviews claimed that "Newton's real subject is the Northamptonshire petition of 1605, the challenge it presented to James's religious policy, and his handling of the matter"—not his regime in general. Like Rabb, Young found Newton's treatment of James's rule too one-sided, but he nonetheless highlighted Newton's skill in analyzing events surrounding the Puritans' petition for religious tolerance, her use of manuscript sources, and her treatment of the tensions between Puritans and Catholics. He felt that "Newton is at her best dissecting these tensions and explaining how James's quick effort to terminate the war with Spain complicated his relations with his English subjects."

In her next book, North-East England, 1569-1625: Governance, Culture and Identity, Newton examines a region of the English-Scottish border under the respective reigns of Queen Elizabeth I and King James VI of Scotland and through the latter's reign as King James I of England. Reviewing the book for Seventeenth-Century News, Martyn Bennett remarked that it "demonstrates particularly well the differing views of the region." Under Elizabeth, for example, mingling between the region's Scots and Englishmen was a threat to national security; once James ruled both nations, it demonstrated harmony. Bennett considered North-East England, 1569-1625 "a laudable multifaceted work that creates a rounded picture of government, the regions and union."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Historical Review, April, 2006, Julian Goodare, review of The Making of the Jacobean Regime: James VI and I and the Government of England, 1603-1605, p. 558.

Historian, winter, 2006, Theodore K. Rabb, review of The Making of the Jacobean Regime, p. 886.

Journal of British Studies, April, 2006, W.B. Patterson, review of The Making of the Jacobean Regime, p. 403.

Renaissance Quarterly, spring, 2006, Brett F. Parker, review of The Making of the Jacobean Regime, p. 261.

Seventeenth-Century News, spring-summer, 2007, Martyn Bennett, review of North-East England, 1569-1625: Governance, Culture and Identity, pp. 25-27.

Times Educational Supplement, April 9, 1999, review of Papists, Protestants, and Puritans, 1559-1714, p. 21.