Ali Ansari on the secret to Cyrus the Great’s success
Few ancient monarchs have enjoyed such a consistent positive reputation as Cyrus the Great. Perhaps it’s time to become reacquainted. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: The Tomb of Cyrus, Iran. Photograph taken in 1898. Credit: Penta Springs Limited / Alamy Stock Photo
19m Aug 16, 2024
19m
Andrew Wilton on Amanda McKittrick Ros, the Florence Foster Jenkins of the romantic novel
Andrew Wilton (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/andrew-wilton/) profiles Amanda McKittrick Ros (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/amanda-mckittrick-ros-romance-unbounded/) , a late Victorian novelist admired in her day but now largely forgotten. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: A typical late Victorian scene. Credit: Dave Rheaume / Alamy Stock Photo
13m Aug 15, 2024
13m
Lucy Ward on the invention of Catherine the Great
Catherine II’s inoculation against smallpox was an extraordinary act of political self-creation. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: A portrait of Catherine the Great (1729-1796) by Alexey Antropov. Credit: Pictorial Press Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo
18m Aug 09, 2024
18m
The atomic human with Neil D. Lawrence
Neil D. Lawrence (https://www.cst.cam.ac.uk/people/ndl21) , inaugural DeepMind Professor of Machine Learning at the University of Cambridge and author of The Atomic Human: Understanding Ourselves in the Age of AI, (https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/455130/the-atomic-human-by-lawrence-neil-d/9780241625248) joins the EI team to challenge received wisdom on our AI future. Engelsberg Ideas is funded...
55m Aug 08, 2024
55m
Alexander Lee on why Machiavelli wrote The Prince
If we want to understand the ‘meaning’ of The Prince, we should start with Machiavelli himself. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: A statue of Niccolo Machiavelli in Florence, Italy. Credit: Goran Bogicevic / Alamy Stock Photo
21m Aug 02, 2024
21m
Rana Mitter on Tsiang Tingfu, pre-revolutionary China’s last bridge with the West
Rana Mitter (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/rana-mitter/) profiles Tsiang Tingfu (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/tsiang-tingfu-pre-revolutionary-chinas-last-bridge-with-the-west/) , the American-educated diplomat and historian, who sought Chinese national revival on cosmopolitan lines. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: Tsiang Tingfu raises his arm to veto a proposal introduced by the ...
14m Aug 01, 2024
14m
Francis J. Gavin on the terrible dilemmas of leadership in a thermonuclear world
Nuclear weapons are likely to be around for a long time to come – and the predicaments they create for world leaders are unlikely to be easily solved. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: President John F. Kennedy with Robert McNamara during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Credit: RBM Vintage Images / Alamy Stock Photo
16m Jul 26, 2024
16m
Paris in the Belle Époque with Marie Kawthar Daouda
Marie Kawthar Daouda (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/marie-daouda/) , author and a lecturer in French language and literature at the University of Oxford, joins EI's Alastair Benn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/alastair-benn/) to discuss how Belle Époque-era Paris continues to fascinate, with its burgeoning commercial culture, everyday beauty and glittering department stores. Engelsbe...
24m Jul 25, 2024
24m
James Marriott on why human art matters in the age of AI
A world of machine art would be an eerie one. Art connects us to one another. We cannot, and we should not, replace that connection with an uncanny simulacrum of it. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: The Tribuna of the Uffizi by John Zoffany. Credit: PAINTING / Alamy Stock Photo
15m Jul 19, 2024
15m
Lawrence Freedman on John McDonald, poker-playing popularizer of game theory
Lawrence Freedman profiles the Fortune journalist and best-selling author who played a key role in shaping mid-20th century perceptions of strategy and the role of the corporation. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: From left to right: Dorothy McDonald (wife of John, née Eisner), Leon Trotsky and John McDonald in Coyoacan, Mexico, in the 1930s. McDonald was recruited to help defend Trotsky from c...
14m Jul 19, 2024
14m
Bringing history to the public with Alice Loxton
The historian and broadcaster Alice Loxton joins the EI team to discuss her forthcoming book, Eighteen: A History of Britain in 18 Young Lives (https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/alice-loxton/eighteen/9781035031283) , and her fight to bring serious history to a wider public. Image: A jigsaw puzzle from the early nineteenth century, bearing representations of the Kings and Queens of England f...
31m Jul 18, 2024
31m
Katja Hoyer on East Germany's battle for technology
East Germany’s quest to catch up with the technological innovations of the West prompted some remarkable successes, but also expanded the oppression of its mass surveillance apparatus. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: The Trabant car being manufactured at the East German Sachsenring car plant. Credit: Classic Picture Library / Alamy Stock Photo
20m Jul 12, 2024
20m
How advertising consumed the counter-culture with Ian Leslie
EI's Alastair Benn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/alastair-benn/) sits down with Ian Leslie (https://www.ian-leslie.com/) , author of Conflicted: Why Arguments Are Tearing Us Apart and How They Can Bring Us Together (https://ian-leslie.com/conflicted/) , to discuss how the counterculture went mainstream. Image: An advert on the Nike store at Oxford Circus. Credit: Matthew Chattle / Alamy ...
18m Jul 11, 2024
18m
Gudrun Persson on Russia’s forever war against Ukraine
An often-overlooked fact about the current Russo-Ukrainian War is that over the centuries Russia has waged several wars to try to conquer Crimea and the Donbas area. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: Ukrania quae et Terra Cosaccorum cum vicinis Walachiae, Moldoviae, by Johann Baptiste Homann (1664–1724), 1720. Credit: history_docu_photo / Alamy Stock Photo
22m Jul 05, 2024
22m
Catherine Ostler on Maria Antonia of Bavaria, Electress of many talents
Catherine Ostler (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/catherine-ostler/) profiles Maria Antonia (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/maria-antonia-of-bavaria-electress-of-many-talents/) , Electress of Saxony, an artistic polymath who helped re-shape elite culture in the Enlightenment age. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: An 18th-century portrait of Maria Antonia of Bavaria, Electress of Saxony...
13m Jul 04, 2024
13m
Ronald Reagan's grand strategy with William Inboden
EI's Angus Reilly (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/angus-reilly/) discusses how Ronald Reagan put economic openness at the heart of the battle for ideas against Soviet Communism with William Inboden, author of The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink. Image: Ronald Reagan at the Durenberger Republican convention Rally, 1982. Credit: World History Archive / Ala...
32m Jul 04, 2024
32m
Iskander Rehman on early modern information overload
The sense of being overwhelmed and constantly distracted is nothing new. Historians and policymakers should look to the 17th century for guidance on how to grapple with information overload. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: Rembrandt's 'Portrait of a Scholar', 1631. Credit: PRISMA ARCHIVO / Alamy Stock Photo
23m Jun 28, 2024
23m
Marketing Classical music with Richard Bratby
EI's Alastair Benn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/alastair-benn/) discusses the condition of Classical music today with Richard Bratby (https://richardbratby.co.uk/) , chief Classical music critic of The Spectator. Image: Music scores. Credit: Tim Gainey / Alamy Stock Photo
22m Jun 27, 2024
22m
Julian Jackson on De Gaulle’s world in motion
Part statesman, part prophet, Charles de Gaulle knew instinctively that political success and failure are inevitably interlinked, and that history would be the ultimate judge of both. Read by Helen Lloyd. Image: The President of France Charles de Gaulle marches through the streets under the Arc de Triomphe in 1944. Credit: ZUMA Press, Inc. / Alamy Stock Photo
18m Jun 21, 2024
18m
John Law and financial crises with Kwasi Kwarteng
EI's Iain Martin (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/iain-martin/) is joined by Kwasi Kwarteng, historian and former Chancellor of the Exchequer, to discuss the turbulent life of the 18th-century financial speculator John Law, whose innovative ideas were credited with bringing Ancien Régime France to the brink of ruin. There are echoes of what happened when the Truss government tried its own fi...
28m Jun 20, 2024
28m
Laura Freeman on Helen Sutherland, brave cultivator of the beautiful
Laura Freeman (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/laura-freeman/) profiles Helen Sutherland (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/helen-sutherland-brave-cultivator-of-the-beautiful/) , an isolated, austere, and fastidious heiress who dedicated herself to art. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: Woman Playing a Piano, by Winifred Nicholson. Her work was championed by Helen Sutherland. Credit: Paul...
13m Jun 19, 2024
13m
Josef Joffe on Germany, the engine that couldn't
Celebrated as predestined shepherd in the glory days of Angela Merkel, Germany in the 2020s is an uncertain giant who has defied expectations, good or bad. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: The top of the Reichstag Building. Credit: Artur Bogacki / Alamy Stock Photo
23m Jun 14, 2024
23m
Women of the ancient world with Daisy Dunn
The leading classicist Daisy Dunn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/daisy-dunn/) joins EI's Paul Lay (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/paul-lay/) to discuss her new book, The Missing Thread: A New History of the Ancient World Through the Women Who Shaped It. Image: Nikolaos Gyzis, a 19th Century painter, depicts Sappho playing the lyre. Credit: Photo 12 / Alamy Stock Photo
37m Jun 13, 2024
37m
Maurizio Viroli on how we can learn from history
We cannot afford not to rediscover the fine art, nowadays almost forgotten, of learning from history. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: 16th Century engraving by Theodoor Galle, titled The Printing of Books. Credit: The Granger Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
18m Jun 07, 2024
18m
James Barr on George McGhee, American father to Britain’s Suez Crisis
James Barr (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/james-barr/) profiles the debonair and open-faced diplomat, George McGhee (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/george-mcghee-american-father-to-britains-suez-crisis/) , whose shuttle diplomacy helped accelerate Britain's decline as a player in the Middle East. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: President John F. Kennedy (left, in rocking chair) mee...
13m Jun 06, 2024
13m
Philip Bobbitt on the decay and renewal of the US constitutional order
A new constitutional order is coming. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: The Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC. Credit: Lane Erickson / Alamy Stock Photo
34m May 31, 2024
34m
The history of democracy with Erica Benner
Erica Benner (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/erica-benner/) applies ancient wisdom to modern problems in her new book Adventures in Democracy: The Turbulent World of People Power (https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/453228/adventures-in-democracy-by-benner-erica/9780241609750) . She shares her insights with EI's Deputy Editor, Alastair Benn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/alastair-benn/) . ...
56m May 30, 2024
56m
Lars Trägårdh on the origins of Swedish democracy
‘Democracy’ is in Sweden built on a basis fundamentally different from the one associated with the development of liberal democracy in the West. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Midsummer Dance by Swedish artist Anders Zorn (1860-1920) painted in 1897. A classic of Swedish art history showing traditional folk dancing in the Dalarna countryside in the extended summer evening light. Credit: Univers...
35m May 24, 2024
35m
Dominic Sandbrook on Jesse Ventura, the wrestling governor who blazed a trail for Trump
Dominic Sandbrook (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/dominic-sandbrook/) profiles Jesse Ventura (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/jesse-ventura-the-wrestling-governor-who-blazed-a-trail-for-trump/) , the former Navy SEAL and WWE champion who won Minnesota’s governorship in 1999 on an anti-elite ticket. His transition from showbiz to politics was a precursor of the age of Trump – but ’the ...
15m May 23, 2024
15m
Josef Joffe on the future of the European Union
What is the future of the European Union? The EU is sui generis. It certainly cannot be a nation state. Nor is it destined to turn into a Staatsnation or willed nation. Then what? Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: European Union flags. Credit: Brian Lawrence / Alamy Stock Photo
18m May 17, 2024
18m
The age of upheaval
EI's Paul Lay (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/paul-lay/) and Alastair Benn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/alastair-benn/) ask: do we really live in an age of upheaval? Image: Turner's Vesuvius in Eruption. Credit: Artefact / Alamy Stock Photo
45m May 17, 2024
45m
Simon Mayall on the history of the modern Middle East
The current violence and turmoil in the Middle East is expressive of a conflict between rival ideas, between the modern nation state and an old, historical concept of an Islamic caliphate. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Abdel Nasser at a rally after the rupture of relations with Syria. Credit: colaimages / Alamy Stock Photo
23m May 10, 2024
23m
James Hardie on Heinrich Biber, composer of rapture and ravings
James Hardie (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/james-hardie/) on the violinist-composer (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/heinrich-biber-composer-of-rapture-and-ravings/) who mixed the sacred and profane in his fantastical music, a lost genius of the 17th century. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: A print of Heinrich Biber. Credit: The Picture Art Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
10m May 09, 2024
10m
Lawrence James on the invention of jingoism
Jingoism was a natural offshoot of late Victorian imperialism. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Poster for a British imperial railway company. Credit: Pictorial Press Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo
34m May 03, 2024
34m
Caravaggio’s ‘last’ painting
A small but riveting exhibition at London's National Gallery tells the dramatic story of the troubled Renaissance master's 'last' painting. Image: The Martyrdom of St Ursula, 1610. Credit: incamerastock / Alamy Stock Photo
37m May 02, 2024
37m
Steven Grosby on the persistence of nationhood
What is a nation, what is its significance, and to what problems of life is its persistence a response? Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Lucas Cranach's The Crossing of the Red Sea, 1530. Credit: Heritage Image Partnership Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo
22m Apr 26, 2024
22m
Vanessa Harding on Nehemiah Wallington, Puritan chronicler who had far less fun than Pepys
Vanessa Harding (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/vanessa-harding/) on the God-fearing diarist Nehemiah Wallington (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/nehemiah-wallington-puritan-chronicler-had-far-less-fun-than-pepys/) whose personality was far removed from the cosmopolitanism of Samuel Pepys, his fast-living contemporary. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: An excerpt from Nehemiah Wallingt...
13m Apr 25, 2024
13m
Adrian Wooldridge on meritocracy
The biggest division in modern society is between the meritocracy and the people, the cognitive elite and the masses, the exam-passers and the exam-flunkers. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Caricature of a Cambridge University library in the Georgian era. Credit: Thomas Rowlandson / Alamy Stock Photo
30m Apr 19, 2024
30m
The Entente Cordiale with T.G. Otte
Self-interest, imperial competition and new threats in Europe - T.G. Otte (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/t-g-otte/) examines the complex 120-year long history of the Entente Cordiale (https://engelsbergideas.com/essays/the-entente-cordiale-bad-history-but-good-politics/) with EI's senior editor, Paul Lay (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/paul-lay/) . Image: First prize winner at the Cov...
36m Apr 18, 2024
36m
Mariano Sigman on how language has shaped human consciousness
How did our ancestors think? Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: A play is performed in an ancient Greek theatre. Credit: Classic Image / Alamy Stock Photo
14m Apr 12, 2024
14m
Peter Frankopan on Anna Komnene, the princess who chronicled Byzantium’s changing fortunes
Peter Frankopan (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/peter-frankopan/) on the Byzantine princess Anna Komnene (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/anna-komnene-the-princess-who-chronicled-byzantiums-changing-fortunes/) who, banished to a convent for her political ambition, devoted her gifts of observation to charting the fortunes of her father's empire – etching her legacy as Europe's first fe...
13m Apr 12, 2024
13m
Nathan Shachar on ideology in science
There is no linear, moral progress in knowledge and science. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Triple-microscope made by the optician Camille Sebastien Nachet in Paris. Credit: gameover / Alamy Stock Photo
20m Apr 05, 2024
20m
The evolution of terrorist threat
EI's Deputy Editor Alastair Benn (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/alastair-benn/) speaks to Suzanne Raine (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/suzanne-raine/) , visiting professor in the Department of War Studies at King's College London, about the evolution of the terrorist threat (https://engelsbergideas.com/essays/what-should-we-do-when-the-terrorists-go-quiet/) and its long history (https...
37m Apr 05, 2024
37m
Gregory Feifer on the mirage of Russian power
The mistake many Western countries make is to take Russia largely at face value. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Nesting Russian dolls showing former leaders. Credit: Mr Standfast / Alamy Stock Photo
17m Mar 29, 2024
17m
Gillian Clark on the many ways of seeing Saint Monica
Gillian Clark (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/gillian-clark/) on Saint Monica (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/the-many-ways-of-seeing-saint-monica/) , mother to Augustine of Hippo and lionized by the Latin Church, a women of many names and many more mysteries. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: Saint Augustine and his mother, Saint Monica. Credit:: Carlo Bollo / Alamy Stock Photo
14m Mar 28, 2024
14m
Peter Heather on empire and development in first millennium Europe
The story of first millennium Europe is one of remarkable economic change and demographic upheaval; a precocious analogue to the modern era of globalisation. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Charlemagne. Credit: The Picture Art Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
37m Mar 22, 2024
37m
Will AI revolutionise education?
Daisy Christodoulou (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/daisy-christodoulou/) punctures the hype around the applications of Large language models (LLMs) and chatbots to the field of learning. Will AI really revolutionise education? (https://engelsbergideas.com/essays/will-ai-revolutionise-education/) Image: Mechanical brain. Credit: Sibani Das / Alamy Stock Vector
40m Mar 21, 2024
40m
Barry Strauss on Ancient Greek geopolitics
The Greeks invented the notion of the interrelationship of geography and politics; indeed, they elaborated it in myriad ways. Read by Leighton Pugh. https://engelsbergideas.com/essays/duality-determinism-and-demography-the-greeks-on-geopolitics/ Image: The Athenian fleet. Credit: INTERFOTO \ Alamy Stock Photo
28m Mar 15, 2024
28m
Jenny McCartney on Jean Denis, Comte Lanjuinais, fearless opponent of The Terror
Jenny McCartney (https://engelsbergideas.com/author/jenny-mccartney/) on Comte Lanjuinais (https://engelsbergideas.com/portraits/jean-denis-comte-lanjuinais-fearless-opponent-of-the-terror/) , who risked his life by defying the Jacobins. Read by Sebastian Brown. Image: Comte Lanjuinais speaks at a febrile meeting of the National Convention, 1793. Credit: Chronicle / Alamy Stock Photo
13m Mar 14, 2024
13m
Josef Joffe on the end of 'the end of history'
We equated a brief respite from history with the dawn of a new age. Read by Leighton Pugh. Image: Fall of the Berlin Wall. Credit: Agencja Fotograficzna Caro / Alamy Stock Photo
28m Mar 08, 2024
28m