In Our Time

In Our Time Returns for a New Series

In Our Time returns for a new series with host Misha Glenny. A world class seminar, every week. In Our Time explores the ideas, people and discoveries that have shaped o

Archive: Empress Dowager Cixi

Misha Glenny delves in to the In Our Time archive to select ten episodes for listeners to revisit. His fifth choice, first released in May 2024, is the Empress Dowager Ci

Archive: Plate Tectonics

Misha Glenny delves in to the In Our Time archive to select ten episodes for listeners to revisit. His fourth choice, first released in January 2008, explores how the sci

Archive: Hatshepsut

Misha Glenny delves in to the In Our Time archive to select ten episodes for listeners to revisit. His third choice, first released in November 2014, is the Egyptian phar

Archive: Coffee

Misha Glenny delves in to the In Our Time archive to select ten episodes for listeners to revisit. His second choice, first released in December 2019, is the history and

Pockets (from Here For The History)

To the frustration of many, a lot of women’s clothes don’t have pockets. But why on Earth is that the case? Especially when men’s clothing seems to be full of pockets. O

Archive: Aphra Behn

Widely regarded as the first professional woman writer in English literature, Aphra Behn (1640-1689) is best known for her plays and her novel Oroonoko, she's been an ins

Seashells

Misha Glenny and guests discuss a familiar feature of our beaches: seashells, from their astonishing shapes and patterns that teach us about Earth’s oceans, to the ways t

Vigée Le Brun

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the French portrait painter Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (1755 - 1842). From her teens she delighted her high society subjects in and around Pa

The Delian League

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the origins and evolution of an alliance which transformed the geopolitics of the classical world: the Delian League. Since the start of t

Machado de Assis

Misha Glenny and guests discuss one of the towering figures of Brazilian and world literature, Machado de Assis (1839 - 1908). He was the descendant of slaves and built h

The Evolution of Trees

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the earliest evidence we have of the existence of trees and how even plants we might have on windowsills or as vegetables in gardens can a

The Welsh Marches

At the Hay Festival, Misha Glenny and guests discuss the impact of the Norman invasion on the people and land of Wales and across the modern border with England in what b

The Levellers

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the group which came to be known as the Levellers and emerged during what would become arguably one of the bloodiest and most turbulent pe

The Garamantes

Misha Glenny and guests discuss an ancient civilisation who lived over 2000 years ago in the southwest of modern-day Libya. During prehistoric times, the Sahara Desert wa

Joseph Roth

Misha Glenny and guests discuss one of the great writers on Central Europe after the first world war and on the dying of the old orders with the collapse of the Austro-Hu

Cybernetics

Misha Glenny and guests discuss cybernetics – the field of study which gave us the prefix ‘cyber’ and helped lay the foundations for the information age. After the Second

Indian Indentured Labour

Misha Glenny and guests discuss how, after the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1833, sugar planters recruited workers from India to replace or compete with

M.C. Escher

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the work of Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972), the graphic artist and printmaker best known for his impossible buildings, paradoxical pe

Handel's Messiah

Misha Glenny and his guests discuss the most famous oratorio of George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) and his librettist Charles Jennens (1700-1773). For his libretto, Jenne