Astronomy and Empire
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the relationship between astronomy and the British Empire. The 18th century explorer and astronomer James Cook wrote: 'Ambition leads me not only farther than any other...
4 Maj 200642min
The Great Exhibition of 1851
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the 1851 Great Exhibition. “Its grandeur does not consist in one thing, but in the unique assemblage of all things. Whatever human industry has created you find there. ...
27 Apr 200642min
Immunisation
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the search for immunisation. In 1717, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, the wife of the British Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, wrote a letter to her friend describing how s...
20 Apr 200642min
The Oxford Movement
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Oxford Movement in the Church of England in the 19th century. Cardinal John Henry Newman is perhaps the most significant Christian theologian of the nineteenth cent...
13 Apr 200642min
Goethe
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Johann Wolfgang Goethe, the great German polymath. 'I had the great advantage of being born at a time that was ripe for earth-shaking events which continued throughout...
6 Apr 200641min
The Carolingian Renaissance
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne and the Carolingian Renaissance. In 800 AD on Christmas Day in Rome, Pope Leo III proclaimed Charlemagne Emperor. According to the Fr...
30 Mars 200642min
The Royal Society
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the formation of the Royal Society. In the 17th century the natural philosopher Francis Bacon heralded the new age of science. The frontispiece to his 1620 edition of t...
23 Mars 200642min
Don Quixote
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Miguel de Cervantes’ 17th century novel, Don Quixote. Published four hundred years ago in Madrid, the book was an immediate success and recognised as one of the classic...
16 Mars 200642min
