New Books Network
British Studies
South Asian Studies March 3, 2021

Slave in a Palanquin

Colonial Servitude and Resistance in Sri Lanka

Nira Wickramasinghe

Hosted by Samee Siddiqui
For hundreds of years, the island of Sri Lanka was a crucial stopover for people and goods in the Indian Ocean. For the Dutch East India Company, it was also …

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Christian Studies March 2, 2021

Duty and Destiny

The Life and Faith of Winston Churchill

Gary Scott Smith

Hosted by Zachary McCulley
Though Churchill harbored intellectual doubts about Christianity throughout his life, he nevertheless valued it greatly and drew on its resources, especially in the crucible of war. In Duty and Destiny …
Biography March 1, 2021

The Afterlife of Anne Boleyn

Representations of Anne Boleyn in Fiction and on the Screen

Stephanie Russo

Hosted by Mark Klobas
In the centuries since her execution in 1536, Anne Boleyn’s presence in Western culture has grown to extraordinary proportions. In The Afterlife of Anne Boleyn: Representations of Anne Boleyn in …
Princeton UP Ideas Podcast March 1, 2021

The Life of Geoffrey Chaucer

A Discussion with Marion Turner

Marion Turner

Hosted by Marshall Poe
More than any other canonical English writer, Geoffrey Chaucer lived and worked at the centre of political life—yet his poems are anything but conventional. Edgy, complicated, and often dark, they …
Indian Religions February 24, 2021

Education and Modernity in Colonial Punjab

Khalsa College, the Sikh Tradition and the Webs of Knowledge, 1880-1947

Michale P. Brunner

Hosted by Raj Balkaran
Michael P. Brunner's Education and Modernity in Colonial Punjab: Khalsa College, the Sikh Tradition and the Webs of Knowledge, 1880-1947 (Palgrave, 2020) explores the localisation of modernity in late colonial India.  As a …
Critical Theory February 24, 2021

Penguin Books and Political Change

Britain's Meritocratic Moment, 1937–1988

Dean Blackburn

Hosted by Dave O'Brien
Why do books and publishing matter to the contemporary history of Britain? In Penguin Books and Political Change: Britain's Meritocratic Moment, 1937–1988 (Manchester UP, 2020), Dean Blackburn, a Lecturer in Modern …
History February 22, 2021

London and the Seventeenth Century

The Making of the World's Greatest City

Margarette Lincoln

Hosted by Joshua Tham
Margarette Lincoln's London and the Seventeenth Century (Yale University Press, 2021) explores the ups and downs of life in Stuart London through the eyes of those who lived through it.  The Gunpowder Plot, the …
History February 22, 2021

A New History of England

Jeremy Black

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
'Remember that you are an Englishman, and have consequently won first prize in the lottery of life.' Cecil Rhodes's characteristically nineteenth-century confidence rings rather hollow as England enters the twenty-first …
Medicine February 19, 2021

The Filth Disease

Typhoid Fever and the Practices of Epidemiology in Victorian England

Jacob Steere-Williams

Hosted by Claire Clark
Typhoid fever is a food- and water-borne infectious disease that was insidious and omnipresent in Victorian Britain. It was one of the most prolific diseases of the Industrial Revolution. There …
Christian Studies February 16, 2021

They Knew They Were Pilgrims

Plymouth Colony and the Contest for American Liberty

John G. Turner

Hosted by Ryan Shelton
John G. Turner's excellent new history of the early American separatists, They Knew They Were Pilgrims: Plymouth Colony and the Contest for American Liberty (Yale University Press, 2020) provides a new …
History February 15, 2021

Reluctant European

Britain and the European Union from 1945 to Brexit

Stephen Wall

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
In 2016, the voters of the United Kingdom decided to leave the European Union. The majority for 'Leave' was small. Yet, in more than 40 years of EU membership, the …
Intellectual History February 12, 2021

Dreamworlds of Race

Empire and the Utopian Destiny of Anglo-America

Duncan Bell

Hosted by Yi Ning Chang
Published in December 2020, Duncan Bell’s Dreamworlds of Race: Empire and the Utopian Destiny of Anglo-America (Princeton University Press, 2020) concludes his loose trilogy of books about the metropolitan settler imaginary in …
Science February 8, 2021

The Experimental Fire

Inventing English Alchemy, 1300-1700

Jennifer M. Rampling

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
A four-hundred-year history of the development of alchemy in England that brings to light the evolution of the practice. Tracing the development of alchemy in England from the beginning of …
Military History February 4, 2021

The Compleat Victory

Saratoga and the American Revolution

Kevin Weddle

Hosted by Scott Lipkowitz
British hopes that the American War for Independence would be brought to a swift conclusion began to wane in the early months of 1777. Despite brilliant victories over Washington and …
Christian Studies February 4, 2021

Christian Socialism as Political Ideology

The Formation of the British Christian Left, 1877-1945

Anthony A.J. Williams

Hosted by Crawford Gribben
Anthony A.J. Williams is a political scientist who has taught at the University of Liverpool and at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK. Anthony is the author of an outstanding new account …
Architecture February 2, 2021

Estate Regeneration

Learning from the Past, Housing Communities of the Future

Brendan Kilpatrick and Manisha Patel

Hosted by Bryan Toepfer
One hundred years ago, the Addison Act created the circumstances for the large scale construction of municipal housing in the UK. This would lead to the most prolific phases of …
History February 2, 2021

Rogue Empires

Contracts and Conmen in Europe's Scramble for Africa

Steven Press

Hosted by Vladislav Lilic
Steven Press is an Assistant Professor of History at Stanford University. His marvelous first book, Rogue Empires: Contracts and Conmen in Europe’s Scramble for Africa (Harvard University Press, 2017), is …
Christian Studies February 2, 2021

Sermons on Jeremiah's Lamentations

David Dickson

Hosted by Crawford Gribben
Matthew A. Vogan, who has published several books on the religious history and literature of seventeenth-century Scotland, and several editions of works by Covenanter preachers and theologians, talks today about …
History February 2, 2021

Hotel London

How Victorian Commercial Hospitality Shaped a Nation and Its Stories

Barbara Black

Hosted by Mark Klobas
During the nineteenth century, the grand hotel emerged as a vital part of London life. Originally catering to elite visitors needing a place to stay in the short term, they …
Christian Studies February 1, 2021

One Small Candle

The Plymouth Puritans and the Beginning of English New England

Francis J. Bremer

Hosted by Crawford Gribben
Frank Bremer's outstanding new book, One Small Candle: The Plymouth Puritans and the Beginning of English New England (Oxford UP, 2020), describes the fortunes of the congregation of pilgrims that settled …