William Linn St Clair, (7 December 1937 – 30 June 2021) was a British historian, senior research fellow at the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London, and author.

Biography

William St Clair received his education at Kilsyth Academy, Comely Park School, Falkirk, Edinburgh Academy, and St John's College, Oxford. He started his career as an author and book reviewer; his reviews appeared in the Financial Times, The Times Literary Supplement, and The Economist. St Clair was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature (FRSL) in 1973. He was visiting fellow at All Souls College, Oxford, in 1981–82. In 1985, he became a fellow of Huntington Library, California. In 1992, he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA), the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and social sciences, and was a Member of Council from 1996 to 2000. From 1992 to 1996, he was a fellow of All Souls College, Oxford. In the 1998/99 academic year, he was a visiting fellow commoner at Trinity College, Cambridge. From 1999 to 2006, he was a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. From 2005, he was senior research fellow at the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London. From 2008, he was also senior research fellow at the Joint Centre for History and Economics (between Cambridge University and Harvard University). William St Clair was also chairman of Open Book Publishers, an academic publisher of peer-reviewed monographs in the humanities and social sciences since 2008. Since 2008 he was also member of the Enterprise Management Committee, Re Enlightenment Project, main partners New York University, New York Public Library, and University of Cambridge. William St Clair died on 30 June 2021.

Work

His research interests lay, in large part, in the history of books and reading, ancient Greece and biography. St Clair was a founding member of Open Book Publishers, based in Cambridge (UK), and an active supporter of the Open Access movement.

Relating to the history of books and reading

Relating to the Parthenon Marbles

History and biography

Conduct literature

Evaluation

As part of work in the Treasury, William St Clair authored: