The Invention Of... - podcast cover

The Invention Of...

BBC Radio 4•www.bbc.co.uk
History
Government

Misha Glenny investigates the borders, the histories and the people that make different nations what they are.

Last refreshed: ⓘ
Follow this podcast in the Metacast mobile app to refresh it and see new episodes.
Follow on
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
RSS
YouTube
Overcast
Pocket Casts
Episodes.fm
Download Metacast podcast app
Podcasts are better in Metacast mobile app
Don't just listen to podcasts. Learn from them with transcripts, summaries, and chapters for every episode. Skim, search, and bookmark insights. Learn more

Episodes

Return to Spain

With Sir John Eliot, plus exciting news.

Jan 06, 2023•22 min

Poland: Stalin on One Side, Hitler From the Left

Misha Glenny on the extraordinary history of Poland - includes the Miracle on the Vistula in 1920, the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, and how Solidarity set in motion the Soviet Union's collapse. Recorded on location in Warsaw, Krakow and Zamosc, with contributions from Professor Norman Davies and Olesya Khromechuk of the Ukrainian Instititute. The image shows the Warsaw Uprising Monument. The producer for BBC audio in Bristol is Miles Warde

Apr 08, 2022•36 min

Poland: A Nation Without a State

"The last king of Poland was arrested, put in chains and marched off to Russia." Professor Norman Davies. Between 1795 and 1918 there was no Poland, but the idea of Poland remained extremely strong. Travelling by bus and train around the south east, Misha Glenny and producer Miles Warde go in search of what kept Poland alive. With contributions from Professor Natalia Nowakowska and Timothy Garton-Ash. Part of the How to Invent a Country series for Radio 4 and BBC Sounds. The image shows the Wars...

Mar 28, 2022•30 min

Poland: Obliterated From the Map

Long before Putin tried it on, long before the Soviet Union as well, Ukraine was controlled by somebody else - the old Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In the first of a new series, Misha Glenny and Miles Warde travel to eastern Poland to find out more. It's a tale of terrifying power politics, when an ancient European kingdom was sliced up like a cake. Beginning in Krakow, they travel by train and tiny bus in an arc around the south east to the Renaissance city of Zamosc, near the border with Uk...

Mar 28, 2022•32 min

Scandinavia: The Narcissism of Small Differences

This is the story of how Norway threw off its patronising title of 'little brother' and emerged as the richest Scandinavian nation of all. In 1814 - just as Napoleon's rampage across Europe was drawing to a close - Sweden took control of Norway. They did this with the permission of the other great powers. Norway did not became a free and sovereign nation until 1905, and during that century they continued to produce timber and fish. But they also produced Ibsen, Grieg and Munch, who painted The S...

Nov 24, 2020•30 min

Scandinavia: The Viking Inheritance

The Swedes are very proud that they have not fought in a war since 1814, but they have not always been the knitwear pacifists they are today. Following a traumatic moment in their history - the Stockholm Bloodbath of 1520 - they set off on a two century rampage fuelled by religion and military skill. This reached a crazy crescendo when - like Napoleon and Hitler - King Charles XII of Sweden took on the Russians in what some have described as a defensive war. The Swedes don't talk much about this...

Nov 17, 2020•33 min

Scandinavia - The Bridge

The episode delves into Denmark's identity, contrasting its modern image with a rich history of regional power, rivalry with Sweden, and significant territorial losses. It examines how these historical events, alongside concepts like Hygge, shaped the Danish national character. The discussion also uncovers Denmark's surprising colonial past and highlights the distinct cultural divide between Copenhagen and Jutland.

Nov 10, 2020•36 min

Scandinavia: The Bridge

In a brief September window, Misha Glenny and Miles Warde flew into Copenhagen to begin work on a new Invention of ... series. The plan - find out why Denmark, Sweden and Norway had responded to the pandemic in such different ways. Denmark was one of the first countries in Europe to lock down. Sweden famously took another route. This is the ninth Invention series, and the aim is to understand what these three countries are - their people, the borders, the stories they tell themselves. Can histor...

Nov 10, 2020•36 min

Ireland: Escalation

Declan Lawn talks to Micha Glenny about the differences between the north and the south and, in particular, the border.

Oct 01, 2019•17 min

Britain: So Many Different Little Corners

Back in the deep, dark depths of winter, we met a Scottish photographer on the top of a Glasgow multi-storey car park. "The English think I am a nationalist," he tells Misha Glenny, "but you can be British and wave the saltire, the Saint Andrew's Cross." Which suggests the word British is still alive and kicking, despite the tendency to think we are about to fragment. In this final episode, the programme travels to Scotland, Wales and Ireland to discover what binds us, and what divides us. Recor...

Mar 17, 2019•34 min

The Invention of Britain #3

Insecurity - from Dover to Dublin, presented by Misha Glenny and produced by Miles Warde

Mar 10, 2019•31 min

Britain: Insecurity… From Dover to Dublin and Beyond

In 1992 workers on the new link road between Dover and Folkestone made an amazing discovery - a Bronze Age boat, perhaps the oldest ocean going vessel in the world. Travelling to see this amazing artefact, presenter Misha Glenny starts to wonder about our island peoples, and the role the sea has played in the invention of Britain. Insecure, open to invasion, and determined to maintain its borders at all costs. This was as true in Dover as in other parts of this Atlantic archipelago - particularl...

Mar 10, 2019•31 min

Britain: Anglocentrism… or Why Britons Never Will Be Slaves

In AD 937 a mighty battle, like something from Game of Thrones, took place somewhere on the British Isles. Nobody is exactly sure where. On one side there was the king of the Scottish highlands, the king of Strathclyde, and the king of Dublin as well. On the other, Athelstan, bracelet-bestower, baron of barons, lord among earls. It was England against the rest. In part two of the Invention of Britain, Misha Glenny explores the role of England in the history of these islands - from the battle of ...

Mar 04, 2019•31 min

Britain: Like Quicksand for the Uninitiated

"Let's start with the monarchy - the Normans or Norsemen who'd settled in northern France; the Tudors, part Welsh; the Stuarts, they were Scots; then there's the Dutch, briefly, and the Hanoverians from 1714. There hasn’t been an English dynasty for almost a thousand years. And yet much of our history is centred on what London decides." This is the story of England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, from Offa's Dyke to Hadrian's Wall via Dublin and Derry, Edinburgh too. What has made this Atlantic ar...

Feb 24, 2019•30 min

France: Le Petit Napoleon and the Franco-Prussian War

Two hours north east of Paris is a famous battlefield. The defeated French leader was called Napoleon, but the battle was not Waterloo. It was Sedan, and lining up against the French, the Prussians. The defeated French leader was Napoleon's nephew, le petit Napoleon, otherwise known as the emperor Napoleon III. This battle, in 1870, set up the dynamic that led to two world wars. In the final Invention of France, Misha Glenny explores a crucial year for all western Europe. France was invaded, Par...

Nov 15, 2018•29 min

France: Maximilien Robespierre

On July 28 1794 one of the great names of the French Revolution met madame guillotine in front of the Parisian mob. Maximilien Robespierre lived quite nearby his place of execution, in Rue Saint Honore where he lodged with a master carpenter called Maurice Duplay. Robespierre was a pacifist, a man of the people ... yet no other name is more associated with the Terror than this man, and his death is among the most dramatic of all these bloody years. In the second Invention of France, Misha Glenny...

Nov 06, 2018•29 min

France: Joan of Arc

On a bridge at Montereau in northern France, two warring groups met to resolve their differences. Then in a moment straight out of Game of Thrones, supporters of one group struck the leader of the other full in the face with an axe. The kingdom was convulsed by civil war, its very existence under threat. Just four years earlier, at Agincourt, the English had won a famous victory - now the way lay open for the English king, Henry V, to claim all France as his own. And it was the murder on the bri...

Oct 18, 2018•27 min
← PrevNext →
For the best experience, listen in Metacast app for iOS or Android