The Real Cyrano de Bergerac

At its height, Ming China was one of the most powerful states on Earth. Its cities bustled with merchants and scholars, its goods travelled across continents, and its treasure fleets sailed as far as East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. At the heart of this vast empire stood th ...  Show more

The fate of the Mediterranean hung in the balance during this bloody battle between the Knights of St John and the armies of Suleyman the Magnificent in the summer of 1565. The Ottoman Empire had carved its way across three continents and now turned its sights to the tiny island ...  Show more

Cyrano de Bergerac is often called a man of letters, a philosopher, a soldier, a duelist, a playwright and many more things. But what he may have been best at was self-invention. His real story is blurry to begin with, and he contributed to that blur, but it’s been even more obsc ...  Show more

Centuries before Proust's Remembrance of Things Past took us on a tour of memory and James Joyce played with stream of consciousness, a 16th century nobleman - Michel de Montaigne - developed a wholly new style of reflective prose that examined his place in the world. ...

Ahead of his BBC Radio 3 documentary Exit Burbage, the journalist and author Andrew Dickson explores the remarkable career of Richard Burbage, a Jacobean actor who played many of Shakespeare’s best-known roles for the first time. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more in ...  Show more

Greg Jenner is joined by historian Prof Olivette Otele and comedian Sophie Duker in 18th century France to meet the Chevalier de Saint-Georges. Born the son of a slave and a white plantation owner, he lived a remarkable life in France, becoming a master fencer, violin virtuoso, c ...  Show more