The EI Podcast
The EI Podcast brings you weekly conversations and audio essays from leading writers, thinkers and historians. Hosted by Alastair Benn and Paul Lay. Find the EI Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or search The EI Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Latest episodes
May 17, 2024 • 45min
EI Talks... the age of upheaval
EI's Paul Lay and Alastair Benn ask: do we really live in an age of upheaval?
Image: Turner's Vesuvius in Eruption. Credit: Artefact / Alamy Stock Photo
May 10, 2024 • 23min
EI Weekly Listen — Simon Mayall on the history of the modern Middle East
The current violence and turmoil in the Middle East is expressive of a conflict between rival ideas, between the modern nation state and an old, historical concept of an Islamic caliphate. Read by Leighton Pugh.
Image: Abdel Nasser at a rally after the rupture of relations with Syria. Credit: colaimages / Alamy Stock Photo
May 9, 2024 • 10min
EI Portraits — James Hardie on Heinrich Biber, composer of rapture and ravings
James Hardie on the violinist-composer who mixed the sacred and profane in his fantastical music, a lost genius of the 17th century. Read by Sebastian Brown.
Image: A print of Heinrich Biber. Credit: The Picture Art Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
May 3, 2024 • 34min
EI Weekly Listen — Lawrence James on the invention of jingoism
Jingoism was a natural offshoot of late Victorian imperialism. Read by Leighton Pugh.
Image: Poster for a British imperial railway company. Credit: Pictorial Press Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo
May 2, 2024 • 37min
EI Talks... Caravaggio
A small but riveting exhibition at London's National Gallery tells the dramatic story of the troubled Renaissance master's 'last' painting.
Image: The Martyrdom of St Ursula, 1610. Credit: incamerastock / Alamy Stock Photo
Apr 26, 2024 • 22min
EI Weekly Listen — Steven Grosby on the persistence of nationhood
What is a nation, what is its significance, and to what problems of life is its persistence a response? Read by Leighton Pugh.
Image: Lucas Cranach's The Crossing of the Red Sea, 1530. Credit: Heritage Image Partnership Ltd / Alamy Stock Photo
Apr 25, 2024 • 13min
EI Portraits — Vanessa Harding on Nehemiah Wallington, Puritan chronicler who had far less fun than Pepys
Vanessa Harding on the God-fearing diarist Nehemiah Wallington whose personality was far removed from the cosmopolitanism of Samuel Pepys, his fast-living contemporary. Read by Sebastian Brown.
Image: An excerpt from Nehemiah Wallington's diary, dated 1654. Credit: Folger Shakespeare Library.
Apr 19, 2024 • 30min
EI Weekly Listen — Adrian Wooldridge on meritocracy
Adrian Wooldridge, an expert on meritocracy, discusses the societal divide between the cognitive elite and the masses. Topics include the rise of populism as a response to meritocratic elitism, declining life prospects for non-college-educated individuals, political correctness wielded by elites, and the tension between meritocracy and populism.
Apr 18, 2024 • 36min
EI Talks... the Entente Cordiale with T.G. Otte
Self-interest, imperial competition and new threats in Europe - T.G. Otte examines the complex 120-year long history of the Entente Cordiale with EI's senior editor, Paul Lay.
Image: First prize winner at the Covent Garden fancy dress ball in 1905, a lady dressed in an elaborate costume as the Entente Cordiale. Credit: Chronicle / Alamy Stock Photo
Apr 12, 2024 • 14min
EI Weekly Listen — Mariano Sigman on how language has shaped human consciousness
How did our ancestors think? Read by Leighton Pugh.
Image: A play is performed in an ancient Greek theatre. Credit: Classic Image / Alamy Stock Photo
