The West's attempt to crush Bolshevik Russia

King Philip Augustus of France was the Plantagenets’ ultimate enemy. A ruler with an iron fist and sharp political instincts, he consistently exploited the squabbles of the English dynasty, all while transforming France into a dominant power in Western Europe. Speaking to Emily B ...  Show more

Laura Ingalls Wilder’s 'Little House' books have captivated generations with tales of family, hardship and survival on the American frontier. But how closely did Wilder’s fiction reflect her real childhood – and what should we make of its more controversial portrayals? In this ep ...  Show more

The Tsar has abdicated and the provisional government rules Russia, but Petrograd is overflowing with revolutionaries who want more radical change. Lenin has returned from exile and is looking to seize power for the Bolsheviks. Their momentum is growing and with Russia still in t ...  Show more

Russian politics is fast destabilising. Strikes, assassinations, and famines have made Russia increasingly turbulent at the turn of the century. Revolutionary politics is on the rise, as is dissatisfaction with the tsar. When compounded by the strains of the defeat in the Russo-J ...  Show more

For Russians of director Sergei Eisenstein's generation, the experience of the First World War was overtaken by the revolution of 1917, which took Russia out of the war and plunged it into a bitter civil war from which the infant Bolshevik Soviet state emerged. Eisenstein seized ...  Show more

In 1917, revolution changed Russia forever. Putting an end to 300 years of the Romanov dynasty, it made way for what ordinary Russians believed would be a fairer, more egalitarian system. But what sparked the rebellion? What was it like to witness the collapse of the autocracy? A ...  Show more