17th century
65 episodes
Aphra Behn
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the life and work of Aphra Behn, known for her plays for the Restoration stage such as The Rover and for her novel Oroonoko.
12 October 2017
Featuring: Janet Todd, Ros Ballaster, Claire Bowditch
CultureEnglish feminist writers, English feministsEnglish women novelists17th-century English women writers17th-century English poetsEnglish women dramatists and playwrightsTory poetsFeminism and historyEnglish women poets17th-century English dramatists and playwrights17th-century English writersEnglish spiesBurials at Westminster Abbey17th century18th centuryBedlam
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the early years of Europe's oldest psychiatric hospital, which opened as St Mary of Bethlehem outside Bishopsgate and soon became known as Bedlam.
17 March 2016
Featuring: Hilary Marland, Justin Champion, Jonathan Andrews
Bishop Berkeley
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the philosopher George Berkeley, one of the most significant thinkers of the 18th century.
20 March 2014
Featuring: Peter Millican, Tom Stoneham, Michela Massimi
PhilosophyScholars of Trinity College Dublin17th-century Anglo-Irish people18th-century Irish philosophers18th-century Irish writersEmpiricistsAlumni of Trinity College DublinIdealistsPeople educated at Kilkenny College18th-century Anglican theologiansAcademics of Trinity College DublinEnlightenment philosophers18th-century Anglo-Irish people, 18th-century Irish male writers17th-century Anglican theologiansEpistemologistsAnglican philosophersHistory of calculusPhilosophers of science17th century18th centuryIrelandMathematicsTheologyCoffee
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of coffee, from its origins in Ethiopia to its role in the spread of ideas, its part in the slave trade and its social impact.
12 December 2019
Featuring: Judith Hawley, Markman Ellis, Jonathan Morris
Comenius
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Czech man who tried to use education to build a better understanding between the peoples of Europe who were otherwise divided by religious wars.
19 May 2022
Featuring: Vladimir Urbanek, Suzanna Ivanic, Howard Hotson
Heidelberg University alumni17th-century German bishops, 17th-century Protestant theologians, 17th-century writers from Bohemia, Bishops of the Moravian Church, Burials in North Holland, Czech Protestant clergy, Czech Renaissance humanists, Czech bishops, Czech educational theorists, Czech emigrants, Czech exiles, Czech expatriates in Germany, Czech expatriates in Hungary, Czech expatriates in the Dutch Republic, Czech male writers, Czech people of Hungarian descent, Czech people of the Moravian Church, Czech philosophers, Czech schoolteachers, Czech scientists, Czech theologians, Grammarians from the Czech Republic, Immigrants to the Dutch Republic, John Amos Comenius, People from Uherské Hradiště District, Writers of the Moravian Church17th-century writers in LatinPhilosophers of educationLutheran saints17th centuryLanguageTheologyCommon Sense Philosophy
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss 18th century common sense philosophy which involves the most profound questions about human knowledge we are capable of asking.
21 June 2007
Featuring: A. C. Grayling, Melissa Lane, Alexander Broadie
Crystallography
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history and achievements of crystallography, a scientific discipline that has revolutionised our understanding of the world.
29 November 2012
Featuring: Judith Howard, Chris Hammond, Mike Glazer
Don Quixote
Melvyn Bragg discusses the importance, originality and enduring appeal of Cervantes’ classic 17th century Spanish novel Don Quixote, a cornerstone of Western literature.
16 March 2006
Featuring: Barry Ife, Edwin Williamson, Jane Whetnall
Epistolary Literature
Melvyn Bragg discusses the 18th Century fashion for epistolary literature including Aphra Benn, Samuel Richardson and Jane Austen.
15 March 2007
Featuring: John Mullan, Karen O'Brien, Brean Hammond
George Fox and the Quakers
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the foundation of the Religious Society of Friends, otherwise known as the Quakers, in the 17th century.
5 April 2012
Featuring: Justin Champion, John Coffey, Kate Peters
George Herbert
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the author of 'the most beautiful poem in the world' whose works on his relationship with God offered comfort to Charles I when he faced execution.
7 November 2024
Featuring: Helen Wilcox, Victoria Moul, Simon Jackson
CulturePoet priestsAnglican poetsAnglican saintsTuberculosis deaths in England17th-century English poets17th-century Christian mysticsPeople celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendarAlumni of Trinity College, CambridgeProtestant mysticsAnglo-Welsh poets17th-century deaths from tuberculosisSonneteers17th-century English male writersEnglish male poets17th-century English Anglican priestsAnglican writersPeople educated at Westminster School, LondonLutheran saints17th centuryWalesHeaven
Melvyn Bragg discusses heaven and the afterlife, from Ancient Egypt, Zoroastrianism and Judaism through to Christianity, the arch promoter of heaven.
22 December 2005
Featuring: Valery Rees, Martin Palmer, John Carey
Hobbes
Melvyn Bragg discusses Thomas Hobbes, the great 17th century philosopher who famously said that ungoverned man lived a life that was ‘solitary, poor, brutish and short’.
1 December 2005
Featuring: Quentin Skinner, David Wootton, Annabel Brett
PhilosophyCritics of the Catholic ChurchPhilosophers of culture17th-century writers in LatinPhilosophers of mind17th-century English writersRhetoric theoristsPhilosophers of religionMaterialistsEnglish political philosophersPhilosophers of languageBritish critics of ChristianityPolitical realistsEpistemologistsBritish philosophers of educationPhilosophers of lawEmpiricistsMetaphysiciansBritish critics of religionsPhilosophers of mathematics17th-century English male writersAlumni of St John's College, CambridgeTheorists on Western civilizationPhilosophers of sciencePhilosophers of historyThomas HobbesSocial philosophersNatural law ethicistsEnglish theologians17th-century English philosophersEnglish physicistsOntologists17th centuryLanguageMathematicsMedicineTheologyJohannes Kepler
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the German astronomer Johannes Kepler.
29 December 2016
Featuring: David Wootton, Ulinka Rublack, Adam Mosley
John Donne
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the extraordinary life and work of one of England's finest love poets and, as Dean of St Paul's Cathedral, most remarkable preachers.
12 January 2023
Featuring: Mary Ann Lund, Sue Wiseman, Hugh Adlington
CultureCritics of the Catholic ChurchAlumni of Hart Hall, OxfordPhilosophers of religionLiteracy and society theoristsEpigrammatistsEnglish people of Welsh descentIndependent scholars17th-century English poets16th-century English male writersMetaphor theoristsWriters about activism and social changeChristian poetsSonneteersEnglish male poets17th-century Anglican theologiansLutheran saintsAnglican poetsAnglican saints16th-century English poetsPeople celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendarWriters from LondonPeople from the City of London17th-century English male writersLiterary theoristsMetaphysical poetsEnglish satiristsPoet priestsEnglish male non-fiction writersPamphleteers17th-century English Anglican priests16th century17th centuryTheologyMary Astell
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the philosopher Mary Astell (1666 – 1731) who has been described as "the first English feminist".
5 November 2020
Featuring: Hannah Dawson, Mark Goldie, Teresa Bejan
PhilosophyFeminist studies scholars17th-century English writers18th-century English women writers17th-century pseudonymous writersBritish women's rights activistsFeminism and history18th-century English philosophers18th-century British philosophersEnglish feminist writers, English feminists18th-century English non-fiction writersEnglish women non-fiction writersEnglish women activists18th-century English writers17th-century English women writersPseudonymous women writers17th-century English educatorsEnglish educational theorists18th-century pseudonymous writers17th-century English philosophersEnglish rhetoricians17th century18th centuryMicrobiology
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of microbiology and how microscopic creatures dominate life on earth.
8 March 2007
Featuring: John Dupré, Anne Glover, Andrew Mendelsohn
Milton
Melvyn Bragg examines the literary and political career of the 17th century poet John Milton, examining work such as Paradise Lost as well as his role as propagandist during the English Civil War.
7 March 2002
Featuring: John Carey, Lisa Jardine, Blair Worden
Critics of the Catholic ChurchChristian humanistsBritish free speech activistsNeoclassical writersRhetoricians17th-century writers in Latin17th-century English writersMythopoeic writersRhetoric theoristsEnglish Anglican theologiansLiteracy and society theoristsBlind poetsEnglish political philosophersEnglish essayistsEpic poets17th-century English poetsEnglish male dramatists and playwrightsMetaphor theoristsWriters about activism and social changeChristian poetsSonneteersEnglish male poetsCalvinist and Reformed poetsDeaths from kidney failure in the United KingdomAnglican philosophersAnglican poetsBlind writersAnti-Catholicism in the United KingdomMale essayistsWriters from LondonPeople from the City of London17th-century English male writersEnglish writers with disabilitiesEnglish non-fiction writersLiterary theoristsBritish philosophers of religionEnglish DissentersAlumni of Christ's College, Cambridge17th-century English educatorsEnlightenment philosophersSocial philosophersPamphleteersEnglish educational theorists17th-century English philosophers17th-century English dramatists and playwrightsEnglish theologiansEnglish republicans17th centuryTheologyMolière
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the life and work of the great French playwright and actor whose best known plays include Tartuffe, Le Misanthrope and Le Malade Imaginaire.
24 April 2025
Featuring: Noel Peacock, Jan Clarke, Joe Harris
Montesquieu
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the ideas of the French political philosopher (1689-1755) whose work on liberty and republicanism, banned at home, influenced the US constitution.
14 June 2018
Featuring: Richard Bourke, Rachel Hammersley, Richard Whatmore
HistoryFrench Roman CatholicsMembers of the Académie FrançaisePhilosophers of lawEnlightenment philosophersMembers of the Prussian Academy of Sciences18th-century French philosophersFrench philosophers of historyContributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)18th-century French male writersFrench political writersFrench political philosophersFellows of the Royal Society17th century18th centuryFrancePascal
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life and work of the French polymath Blaise Pascal.
19 September 2013
Featuring: David Wootton, Michael Moriarty, Michela Massimi
CultureChristian humanistsFrench physicistsPeople with hypochondriasisCritics of atheismRoman Catholic mysticsChristian apologistsCatholic philosophersFrench fluid dynamicists, French mathematicians, French probability theoristsAphoristsFrench Roman Catholic writersCartesianism17th-century Christian mysticsConverts to Roman Catholicism17th centuryFranceMathematicsPocahontas
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life of Pocahontas, the 17th-century Native American woman who to English eyes became a symbol of the New World.
21 November 2013
Featuring: Susan Castillo, Tim Lockley, Jacqueline Fear-Segal
Robert Boyle
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life and work of Robert Boyle, a pioneering scientist and one of the first Fellows of the Royal Society.
12 June 2014
Featuring: Simon Schaffer, Michael Hunter, Anna Marie Roos
Science17th-century Anglo-Irish peopleIndependent scientistsFluid dynamicistsEnglish alchemistsIrish AnglicansDiscoverers of chemical elementsPeople educated at Eton College17th-century English male writers17th-century English writersWriters about religion and science17th-century English philosophersEnglish physicistsPhilosophers of science17th centuryIrelandRobert Hooke
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Robert Hooke, the 17th-century scientist with a wide variety of interests from elasticity to microscopes who fell out with Newton.
18 February 2016
Featuring: David Wootton, Patricia Fara, Rob Iliffe
Seventeenth Century Print Culture
Melvyn Bragg discusses 17th century print culture, the new technology of printed text reflected controversy in every area of politics, society and religion.
26 January 2006
Featuring: Kevin Sharpe, Ann Hughes, Joad Raymond
Shakespeare and Literary Criticism
Melvyn Bragg discusses the enduring popular and academic appeal of Shakespeare and examines whether literary criticism and the academic institution ruins the pleasure of reading.
4 March 1999
Featuring: Harold Bloom, Jacqueline Rose
English Renaissance dramatists16th-century English poets17th-century English poetsEnglish male dramatists and playwrights16th-century English male actors, 17th-century English male actors, Burials in Warwickshire, English male stage actors, King's Men (playing company), Male actors from Stratford-upon-Avon, People educated at King Edward VI School, Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare family, William Shakespeare, Writers from Warwickshire16th-century English dramatists and playwrightsPeople of the Elizabethan eraSonneteers17th-century English male writersEnglish male poets17th-century English dramatists and playwrights16th century17th centuryShakespeare's Life
Melvyn Bragg discusses what we know about the life of William Shakespeare, a tantalising conundrum that has exercised minds since the day the playwright died.
15 March 2001
Featuring: Katherine Duncan-Jones, John Sutherland, Grace Ioppolo
English Renaissance dramatists16th-century English poets17th-century English poetsEnglish male dramatists and playwrights16th-century English male actors, 17th-century English male actors, Burials in Warwickshire, English male stage actors, King's Men (playing company), Male actors from Stratford-upon-Avon, People educated at King Edward VI School, Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare family, William Shakespeare, Writers from Warwickshire16th-century English dramatists and playwrightsPeople of the Elizabethan eraSonneteers17th-century English male writersEnglish male poets17th-century English dramatists and playwrights16th century17th centuryShakespeare's Sonnets
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the 154 sonnets collected and printed in 1609 of which some are famous, many are glorious, most are inspiring and several are unsettling.
24 June 2021
Featuring: Hannah Crawforth, Don Paterson, Emma Smith
Shakespeare's Work
Melvyn Bragg discusses whether the work of William Shakespeare is 'not of an age but for all time' or increasingly irrelevant museum pieces embalmed in out of reach language.
11 May 2000
Featuring: Frank Kermode, Michael Bogdanov, Germaine Greer
English Renaissance dramatists16th-century English poets17th-century English poetsEnglish male dramatists and playwrights16th-century English male actors, 17th-century English male actors, Burials in Warwickshire, English male stage actors, King's Men (playing company), Male actors from Stratford-upon-Avon, People educated at King Edward VI School, Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare family, William Shakespeare, Writers from Warwickshire16th-century English dramatists and playwrightsPeople of the Elizabethan eraSonneteers17th-century English male writersEnglish male poets17th-century English dramatists and playwrights16th century17th centurySir John Soane
Melvyn Bragg and guests explore the life and work of John Soane, architect of the old Bank of England and collector of the antiquities displayed in his home which became a museum.
6 February 2025
Featuring: Frances Sands, Frank Salmon, Gillian Darley
Sir Thomas Browne
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the life, ideas and language of Browne (1605-82), a doctor sharing his personal views on science, history and religion at a time of great change
6 June 2019
Featuring: Claire Preston, Jessica Wolfe, Kevin Killeen
Sovereignty
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of the idea of sovereignty, from ancient Greece and Rome to wars in France in the 1500s, to Thomas Hobbes and the revolutionary era.
30 June 2016
Featuring: Melissa Lane, Richard Bourke, Tim Stanton
Spinoza
Melvyn Bragg discusses the philosopher Spinoza whose profound and complex ideas about God had him celebrated as an atheist in the 18th century.
3 May 2007
Featuring: Jonathan Rée, Sarah Hutton, John Cottingham
PhilosophyCritics of the Catholic ChurchPhilosophers of culture17th-century writers in LatinPhilosophers of mindMetaphilosophersPhilosophers of religionJewish translators of the BibleBaruch SpinozaEpistemologistsPhilosophy writersPhilosophers of educationDeterministsMetaphysiciansJewish philosophersPhilosophers of scienceRationalistsPhilosophers of historyCritics of JudaismEnlightenment philosophersSocial philosophersPeople of the Age of EnlightenmentPantheistsAge of EnlightenmentOntologists17th century18th centuryMedicineSwift's A Modest Proposal
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Jonathan Swift's satirical 1729 pamphlet A Modest Proposal, which reveals much about attitudes to the Irish and the poor in 18th-Century Britain.
29 January 2009
Featuring: John Mullan, Judith Hawley, Ian McBride
CulturePeople educated at Kilkenny College18th-century Irish writersEnglish fantasy writersNeoclassical writersEnglish male novelistsAlumni of Hart Hall, OxfordEnglish pamphleteersAlumni of Trinity College DublinEnglish AnglicansEnglish male poetsIrish satiristsEnglish short story writersEnglish male short story writers18th-century Irish novelists, 18th-century Irish poetsAnglican writers18th-century English novelists17th-century Anglo-Irish peopleEnglish satiristsJonathan SwiftEnglish political writers18th-century Anglo-Irish people, 18th-century Irish male writers18th-century pseudonymous writersAnglo-Irish artists, Irish fantasy writersIrish male poets17th century18th centuryIrelandThe Anatomy of Melancholy
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss a masterpiece of 17th-century medicine and literature: Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy.
12 May 2011
Featuring: Julie Sanders, Mary Ann Lund, Erin Sullivan
The Barbary Corsairs
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the sailors from around Europe and North Africa, licensed by the Barbary States to capture people to be sold into slavery until the 19th century.
9 November 2023
Featuring: Joanna Nolan, Claire Norton, Michael Talbot
The Baroque Movement
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the culture of the Baroque, from Bach and Caavaggio to the Colonnades of St Peter’s.
20 November 2008
Featuring: T. C. W. Blanning, Nigel Aston, Helen Hills
The Brain
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of cultural, medical, artistic and philosophical ideas about the human brain.
8 May 2008
Featuring: Vivian Nutton, Jonathan Sawday, Marina Wallace
The Divine Right of Kings
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Divine Right of Kings. The idea that kingly authority derives from God alone bit deep into the culture of 17th century Britain.
11 October 2007
Featuring: Justin Champion, Thomas Healy, Clare Jackson
The Dutch East India Company
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Dutch East India Company, which dominated the Asian spice trade in the 17th century and is sometimes called the first multinational corporation.
3 March 2016
Featuring: Anne Goldgar, Chris Nierstrasz, Helen Paul
The Fire of London
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss The Great Fire of London in 1666 and how the city rose from the ashes.
11 December 2008
Featuring: Lisa Jardine, Vanessa Harding, Jonathan Sawday
The Four Humours
Melvyn Bragg discusses the four humours, a medical theory that saw the body as a concoction of four essential juices.
20 December 2007
Featuring: David Wootton, Vivian Nutton, Noga Arikha
The Glencoe Massacre
Melvyn Bragg and guests Karin Bowie, Murray Pittock and Daniel Szechi discuss the 1692 Glencoe Massacre, why it happened, and its lasting repercussions.
21 January 2010
Featuring: Murray Pittock, Karin Bowie, Daniel Szechi
The Glorious Revolution
Melvyn Bragg examines the Glorious Revolution of 1688 but were the events of 1688 really either Glorious or Revolutionary?
19 April 2001
Featuring: John Spurr, Rosemary Sweet, Scott Mandelbrote
HistoryJames II of EnglandInvasions of EnglandSuccession to the British crownAnti-Catholicism in ScotlandAnti-Catholicism in the United KingdomAnti-Catholicism in WalesStuart England, The RestorationMary II, William III of EnglandCivil wars in EnglandMonarchy of the United KingdomAnti-Catholicism in England17th centuryThe Great Wall of China
Melvyn Bragg and guests Julia Lovell, Rana Mitter and Frances Wood discuss The Great Wall of China.
29 April 2010
Featuring: Julia Lovell, Rana Mitter, Frances Wood
The Heart
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of ideas about the heart, a symbol to our spiritual, emotional, and moral core.
1 June 2006
Featuring: David Wootton, Fay Bound Alberti, Jonathan Sawday
The Jesuits
Melvyn Bragg discusses the Jesuits and their role in the education, art, politics and mythology of the Counter-Reformation.
18 January 2007
Featuring: Nigel Aston, Simon Ditchfield, Dame Olwen Hufton
The Metaphysical Poets
Melvyn Bragg discusses the Metaphysical poets John Donne, Andrew Marvell and George Herbert, examining their rich and strange metaphors of sex, death and love.
3 July 2008
Featuring: Thomas Healy, Julie Sanders, Tom Cain
The Microscope
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the microscope, from its invention in the 17th century to the latest sophisticated imaging techniques.
28 November 2013
Featuring: Jim Bennett, Colin Humphreys, Michelle Peckham
The Pilgrim Fathers
Melvyn Bragg discusses the Pilgrim Fathers and why their 1620 voyage on the Mayflower has become iconic in the American imagination.
5 July 2007
Featuring: Kathleen Burk, Harry Bennett, Tim Lockley
The Putney Debates
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Putney Debates of 1647, when factions of the New Model Army considered a possible new constitution for England.
18 April 2013
Featuring: Justin Champion, Ann Hughes, Kate Peters
The Renaissance
Melvyn Bragg explores the veracity of modern claims about the Renaissance and whether our current perceptions about its role in cultural history stem from a 19th century historian.
8 June 2000
Featuring: Francis Ames-Lewis, Peter Burke, Evelyn Welch
The Royal Society
Melvyn Bragg discusses how the formation of the Royal Society heralded the dawning of a new scientific era in the 17th century.
23 March 2006
Featuring: Stephen Pumfrey, Lisa Jardine, Michael Hunter
ScienceRoyal Society1660 establishments in EnglandSocial history of the United KingdomLearned societies of the United Kingdom, Members of the International Council for Science, Members of the International Science Council, National academies of sciences, Non-profit organisations based in London, Organisations based in London with royal patronage, Organizations associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, Professional associations based in the United Kingdom, Scientific organizations established in 166017th centuryThe Salem Witch Trials
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Salem witch trials of 1692 and 1693, which led to the execution of 20 people in the New England colony of Massachusetts.
29 November 2015
Featuring: Susan Castillo, Simon Middleton, Marion Gibson
The Shimabara Rebellion
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the 1637-8 Christian uprising in Japan, which led the Shogun to close the country to foreigners for the next 250 years.
11 May 2023
Featuring: Satona Suzuki, Erica Baffelli, Christopher Harding
The Siege of Vienna
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the 1683 siege of Vienna by the Ottoman Army. The ensuing tale of blood and drama helped define the boundaries of Europe.
14 May 2009
Featuring: Jeremy Black, Andrew Wheatcroft, Claire Norton
The Social Contract
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Social Contract. A key idea in political philosophy, it states that political authority is held through a contract with those to be ruled.
7 February 2008
Featuring: Melissa Lane, Susan James, Karen O'Brien
The Speed of Light
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the speed of light, from its first measurement in the 17th Century to Einstein’s groundbreaking ideas on relativity.
30 November 2006
Featuring: John Barrow, Iwan Morus, Jocelyn Bell Burnell
The Sublime
Melvyn Bragg discusses a transcendental idea that 18th century British artists, poets, philosophers and scientists seized upon and adapted to the intellectual and physical landscape.
12 February 2004
Featuring: Janet Todd, Annie Janowitz, Peter de Bolla
The Thirty Years War
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss a topic suggested by listeners: the war which was centred on the Holy Roman Empire from 1618 and was unequalled in scale until C20th
6 December 2018
Featuring: Peter Wilson, Ulinka Rublack, Toby Osborne
The Treaty of Limerick
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the impact of the treaty ending the Williamite War in 1691, with the disbanding of the Jacobite army and assertion of rights for the defeated gentry
7 November 2019
Featuring: Jane Ohlmeyer, Clare Jackson, Thomas O'Connor
The Trial of Charles I
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the trial of Charles I, recounting the high drama in Westminster Hall and the ideas that led to the execution.
4 June 2009
Featuring: Justin Champion, Diane Purkiss, David Wootton
The Unintended Consequences of Mathematics
Melvyn Bragg and guests explore the unintended consequences of mathematical discoveries, from alternating current to predicting the path of asteroids.
11 February 2010
Featuring: John D. Barrow, Colva Roney-Dougal, Marcus du Sautoy
The Venetian Empire
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the remarkable rise of the Venetians who settled on some marshy islands on a lagoon after the fall of Rome and went on to build an empire.
31 October 2024
Featuring: Maartje van Gelder, Stephen Bowd, Georg Christ
Thomas Middleton
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss one of the star writers for the London stage in the age of Shakespeare, much in demand for his own work and for rewriting the work of others.
20 March 2025
Featuring: Emma Smith, Lucy Munro, Michelle O’Callaghan
