Footage of Edwardian London

by Derry Nairn

While reading Time Out magazine's 'The Big Smoke' London blog, I came across this rather remarkable clip of Edwardian London. According to the author, Alex Barlow, the clip was:-

Filmed in 1904... [and] intended as a travelouge to give Australians an idea of what London was like at the turn of the century.

The footage is courtesy of the British Film Institute's Mediatheque

Lectures & Readings mark Milton Celebrations

by Paul Lay

This weekend sees the 400th anniverary of Milton's birth. The anniversary will be marked at Christ's College Cambridge by a series of lectures. In a related event, all-day readings of his masterpiece Paradise Lost were read recently by members of the English faculty and recorded in a series of podcasts. They are available on this special website.

As the site notes:

The studio [where recording took place] is a large black cube in the basement of the building. Some books were therefore read with an absolute minimum of visual stimulus, allowing listeners to remember Milton's own blindness and to relate it to the kinds of darkness - moral and visible - which he imagines in the poem.

While the hums and blips that emerge on the recordings suggest the soundman's set-up was created in the dark too, by and large the content of the podcasts are of an excellent quality, and well worth delving into for those unfamiliar with the book.

The Lady Margaret lecture series this year was devoted to Milton and featured, among others, Quentin Skinner and Geoffrey Hill. Podcasts of the lectures along with lots of other information about the celebration are available here.

Where to find the best history videos on the web

by Derry Nairn

History Today has always worked on the assumption that the study of the past is an extremely relevant activity. Being passionate about history doesn't necessarily mean you also enjoy elbow patches on tweed jackets and complex debates in stuffy university corridors. History people can be technology and internet people too. In recent weeks this has been proved by the amount of excellent multimedia content we have come across on the web. Here's a small selection:

FORA TV is a web portal for streaming video of intellectual discussion. It draws its content from the many hundreds of debates, lectures, interviews and speeches happening around the world every day. Notable content includes a broadcast of 2007's centenary Creighton Lecture (this year's lecture happens tonight) and a recent interview with Whoopi Goldberg on the evolving status of the US constitution. It has several dedicated channels, including one for history. The others are categorised according to discipline, topic and region. Commenting on each video is possible after registration. FORA TV makes a welcome change to the 'Lowest Common Denominator' factor of similar video sites like YouTube.

The Guardian's literary festival seems to be mutate further beyond the borders of provinical Hay-on-Wye each year, with associated events happening in Spain and Columbia over the winter. The website, however, is top-notch, with a massive video and audio archive. Full-length interviews and debates can be downloaded and, once again, there is a dedicated history section. Lots of heavy-hitters here too: Niall Ferguson, Gore Vidal and Orlando Figes are only a few of the many famous historical thinkers featured. Small fees apply.

Worth a look too is the podcast series of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (DNB). Choose from over fifty individuals whose story is told in professionally-produced and easily-digested 10-15 minute snippets. The selection is not merely restricted to the GCSE curriculum either. Notable biographees include the Busby Babes, Springheel Jack, Jimi Hendrix and Friar Tuck. A nice touch is the ability to subscribe via feed reader so each new podcast is delivered straight into your inbox each fortnight. The DNB's online version is also highly recommended.