Researching Ronald Wright

Wright was selected to give the 2004 Massey Lectures. His contribution, A Short History of Progress, looks at the modern human predicament in light of the 10,000-year experiment with civilization. In it he concludes that human civilization, to survive, would need to become environmentally sustainable, with specific reference to global warming and climate change.

His next work What is America?: A Short History of the New World Order continues the thread begun in A Short History of Progress by examining what Wright calls "the Columbian Age" and consequently the nature and historical origins of modern American imperium.

His latest book The Gold Eaters, a novel set during the Spanish invasion of the Inca Empire in the 1520s–1540s, was published in 2015.

Ronald Wright is also a frequent contributor to the Times Literary Supplement, and has written and presented documentaries for radio and television on both sides of the Atlantic. He studied archaeology at Cambridge University and later at the University of Calgary, where he was awarded an honorary doctorate in 1996. He lives in British Columbia.

Wright made his first-class debut for Northamptonshire against Glamorgan in the 1923 County Championship. He next appeared for Northamptonshire in the 1930 County Championship against Worcestershire. He went on to make eight further first-class appearances for the county, the last of which came against Worcestershire in the 1931 County Championship. In his total of ten first-class appearances, he scored 160 runs at an average of 10.00, with a high score of 56 not out. This score was his only first-class fifty and came against Somerset in 1930.

He died at Northampton, Northamptonshire on 3 July 1992. His brother, Alan Wright, also played first-class cricket for Northamptonshire.