Franco (Text Only‪)‬

‘Magisterial … As engagingly readable as a good novel’ Observer

The definitive biography of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, from the acclaimed historian Paul Preston.

Francisco Franco was the Caudillo of Spain, leading the Nationalists' brutal, Fascist-sponsored victory over the Republican government in the Spanish Civil War and ruling Spain as dictator from 1939 to 1975.

The biography presents a mass of new and unknown material about its subject, the fruits of research in the archives of six countries and a plethora of interviews with key figures.

About the author

SIR PAUL PRESTON CBE is Professor of Contemporary Spanish History at the London School of Economics and was previously a lecturer at the University of Reading and Professor of Modern History at Queen Mary University London. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and holds the Marcel Proust Chair of the European Academy of Yuste. He has been awarded honorary doctorates by universities in Spain and the UK. In 2006, he was awarded the International Ramon Llull Prize by the Catalan Government and, in 2018, the Guernica Peace Prize. Among his many works are Franco: A Biography, Comrades, Doves of War: Four Women of Spain, Juan Carlos, The Spanish Civil War, The Spanish Holocaust, The Last Stalinist, The Last Days of the Spanish Republic and A People Betrayed. In Spain, he was appointed a Comendador de la Orden del Mérito Civil in 1986 and awarded, in 2007, the Gran Cruz de la Orden de Isabel la Católica. He lives in London.