Plate Tectonics

Melvyn Bragg examines plate tectonics, a theory that transformed our idea of the earth.

• 45 mins

Rudolph II

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Rudolph II and his Renaissance Court in Prague.

• 45 mins

The Social Contract

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Social Contract; a key idea in political philosophy.

• 45 mins

The Statue of Liberty

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Statue of Liberty. .

• 45 mins

The Multiverse

Melvyn Bragg and guests explore the Multiverse.

• 45 mins

Lear

Melvyn Bragg and guests examine Shakespeare’s bloodthirsty tragedy, King Lear.

• 45 mins

Ada Lovelace

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Ada Lovelace - the Victorian ‘enchantress of numbers’.

• 45 mins

The Greek Myths

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Greek myths from Achilles to Zeus.

• 45 mins

Kierkegaard

Melvyn Bragg examines the rich and radical ideas of the philosopher Soren Kierkegaard.

• 45 mins

The Dissolution of the Monasteries

Melvyn Bragg examines Henry VIII's policy of the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

• 45 mins

The Laws of Motion

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Isaac Newton’s Laws of Motion.

• 45 mins

The Norman Yoke

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss ‘the Norman Yoke'.

• 45 mins

Yeats and Irish Politics

Melvyn Bragg examines the effect of Irish politics on the work of the poet W.B. Yeats.

• 45 mins

Materialism

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Materialism in Philosophy.

• 45 mins

The Enclosures of the 18th Century

Melvyn Bragg examines the enclosure movement that fenced in the British countryside.

• 45 mins

The Brain

The history of cultural, medical, artistic and philosophical ideas about the human brain.

• 45 mins

The Library at Nineveh

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss a treasure house of Assyrian ideas.

• 45 mins

The Black Death

Melvyn Bragg and guests examine the Black Death and its effect on medieval society.

• 45 mins

Probability

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the strange mathematics of probability.

• 45 mins

Lysenkoism

Melvyn Bragg examines the destructive career of the Soviet geneticist Trofim Lysenko.

• 45 mins

The Riddle of the Sands

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the prescient thriller about Anglo-German relations.

• 45 mins

The Music of the Spheres

Melvyn Bragg explores the ancient astrological idea of the music of the spheres.

• 45 mins

The Arab Conquests

Melvyn Bragg examines the Arab conquests which helped communicate Islam to the world.

• 45 mins

The Metaphysical Poets

Melvyn Bragg examines the Metaphysical poets, including John Donne and Andrew Marvell.

• 45 mins

Tacitus and the Decadence of Rome

Melvyn Bragg examines the life and chronicles of the the Roman historian Tacitus.

• 45 mins

Miracles

Melvyn Bragg and guests explore the history of miracles.

• 45 mins

The Translation Movement

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss classical Greek ideas in the Arabic and the Islamic world.

• 45 mins

Godel's Incompleteness Theorems

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the mathematician Kurt Godel and his work.

• 45 mins

Vitalism

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the 18th and 19th century quest for the spark of life.

• 45 mins

Dante's Inferno

Melvyn Bragg examines Dante’s ‘Inferno’, a medieval journey through Hell’s nine circles

• 45 mins