New Books Network Podcast

British Studies November 29, 2023

Shakespeare’s House

A Window onto his Life and Legacy

Richard Schoch

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

In the wide realm of Shakespeare worship, the house in Stratford-upon-Avon where William Shakespeare was born in 1564 – known colloquially as the 'Birthplace' – remains the chief shrine. It's …

General History November 28, 2023

The Pirates’ Code

Laws and Life Aboard Ship

Rebecca Simon

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

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In The Pirate's Code: Laws and Life Aboard Ship (Reaktion, 2023), Dr. Rebecca Simon presents a rollicking account of pirates’ codes, the strict rules essential for survival at sea. Pirates …

East Asian Studies November 28, 2023

The Perils of Interpreting

The Extraordinary Lives of Two Translators Between Qing China and the British Empire

Henrietta Harrison

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos

The Perils of Interpreting: The Extraordinary Lives of Two Translators Between Qing China and the British Empire (Princeton UP, 2021) is a fascinating history of China's relations with the West--told through …

Jewish Studies November 27, 2023

Hasdai Crescas: Collected Writings

Roslyn Weiss

Hosted by Ari Barbalat

Today I talked to Roslyn Weiss, editor of Hasdai Crescas: Collected Writings (Library of the Jewish People, 2023). Hasdai Crescas spent his life in public service - as a rabbi and …

Literary Studies November 24, 2023

Black Shakespeare

Reading and Misreading Race

Ian Smith

Hosted by John Yargo

In Black Shakespeare: Reading and Misreading Race (Cambridge University Press, 2022), Ian Smith urges readers of Othello, The Merchant of Venice, and Hamlet to develop “racial literacy.” Through both wide …

Early Modern History November 24, 2023

Love Spells and Lost Treasure

Service Magic in England from the Later Middle Ages to the Early Modern Era

Tabitha Stanmore

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Magic is ubiquitous across the world and throughout history. Yet if witchcraft is acknowledged as a persistent presence in the medieval and early modern eras, practical magic by contrast – …

British Studies November 21, 2023

Being Single in Georgian England

Families, Households, and the Unmarried

Amy Harris

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Being Single in Georgian England: Families, Households, and the Unmarried (Oxford University Press, 2023) by Dr. Amy Harris is the first book-length exploration of what family life looked like, and …

Economic and Business History November 20, 2023

Networks, Innovation, and Knowledge: the North Staffordshire Potteries, 1750-1851

Joe Lane

Hosted by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the industrial district of the North Staffordshire Potteries dominated the British earthenware industry, producing local goods that sold in global markets. Over this time …

General History November 18, 2023

Fake History

101 Things That Never Happened

Jo Teeuwisse

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

Fake news about the past is fake history. Did Hugo Boss design the Nazi uniforms? Did medieval people think the world was flat? Did Napoleon shoot the nose off the …

Chinese Studies November 13, 2023

Porcelain for the Emperor

Manufacture and Technocracy in Qing China

Kai Jun Chen

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos

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Porcelain for the Emperor: Manufacture and Technology in Qing China (University of Washington Press; 2023) looks at the history of court-sponsored porcelain production in Qing China through the work and career of …

General History November 4, 2023

The Great Defiance

How the World Took on the British Empire

David Veevers

Hosted by Michael Vann

The story of the British Empire is a familiar one: Britain came, it saw, it conquered, forging a glorious world empire upon which the sun never set. In fact, far …

History Ex Silo November 3, 2023

Empires, States, Corporations

A Discussion with Historians Philip J. Stern and Quinn Slobodian

Philip J. Stern and Quinn Slobodian

Hosted by Erika Monahan

Adam Smith wrote that, “Political economy belongs to no nation; it is of no country: it is the science of the rules for the production, the accumulation, the distribution, and …

Chinese Studies November 3, 2023

The Price of Collapse

The Little Ice Age and the Fall of Ming China

Timothy Brook

Hosted by Huijun Mai

In 1644, after close to three centuries of relative stability and prosperity, the Ming dynasty collapsed. Many historians attribute its demise to the Manchu invasion of China, but the truth …

Irish Studies October 31, 2023

Dublin

Mapping the City

Joseph Brady and Paul Ferguson

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

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Maps are essential tools in finding our way around, but they also tell stories and are great depositories of information. Until the twentieth century and the arrival of aerial images …

General History October 31, 2023

Witchcraft

A History in Thirteen Trials

Marion Gibson

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

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Witchfinder General, Salem, Malleus Maleficarum. The world of witch-hunts and witch trials sounds archaic and fanciful, these terms relics of an unenlightened, brutal age. However, we often hear ‘witch-hunt’ in …

Early Modern History October 30, 2023

A Culture of Curiosity

Science in the Eighteenth-Century Home

Leonie Hannan

Hosted by Jana Byars

Leonie Hannan's book Culture of Curiosity: Science in the Eighteenth Century Home (Manchester University Press, 2023) explores the practice of scientific enquiry as it took place in the eighteenth-century home. While histories …

Indian Ocean World October 29, 2023

Persian and Arabic Literary Communities in the Seventeenth Century

Migrant Poets between Arabia, Iran and India

James White

Hosted by Ahmed Almaazmi

A wealth of scholarship has highlighted how commercial, political and religious networks expanded across the Arabian Sea during the seventeenth century, as merchants from South Asia traded goods in the …

Early Modern History October 29, 2023

Frames That Speak

Cartouches on Early Modern Maps

Chet Van Duzer

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

Frames That Speak: Cartouches on Early Modern Maps (Brill, 2023) is the first systematic exploration of cartographic cartouches, the decorated frames that surround the title, or other text or imagery, on historic …

Irish Studies October 28, 2023

Indian, Black and Irish

Indigenous Nations, African Peoples, European Invasions, 1492-1790

James V. Fenelon

Hosted by Aidan Beatty

In this interview James Fenelon discusses his new book entitled Indian, Black and Irish: Indigenous Nations, African Peoples, European Invasions, 1492-1790, recently published with Routledge (2023). The book traces 50 …

Japanese Studies October 23, 2023

Writing Violence

The Politics of Form in Early Modern Japanese Literature

David C. Atherton

Hosted by Jingyi Li

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Edo-period Japan was a golden age for commercial literature. A host of new narrative genres cast their gaze across the social landscape, probed the realms of history and the fantastic …