Episode 69. D H Lawrence Birthplace Museum
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Carolyn Melbourne, Curator and Collections Manager at the D H Lawrence Birthplace Museum and Dr Andrew Harrison, Director of the D. H. Lawrence Research Centre at the University of Nottingham. They talk about how growing up in a small mining town, Eastwood, influenced the writer and poet D H Lawrence and how, despite escaping it through self-imposed exile abroad, he returned to the ambience of his childhood in his late novel, Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
Episode 67. Prudent Revolutionaries: Portraits of British Feminists between the Wars
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Sir Brian Harrison, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Oxford about his major study of the personalities, achievements, and tactics of British feminist leaders between the Wars and associated book, Prudent Revolutionaries (1987).
Episode 64. ‘These Houses Are Ours’: The Co-operative Housing Movement, 1870-1919
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with the author and journalist, Andrew Bibby about the affordable, community-led housing alternatives that grew out of the nineteenth century co-operative movement.
Episode 63. Dick Sheppard and the Peace Pledge Union
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with the screenwriter and literary historian, Professor George M Johnson about the pacifist priest and founder of the Peace Pledge Union, Dick Sheppard.
Episode 53. Keir Hardie and the Labour Church
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Dr Neil Johnson about his separate books on Keir Hardie and the Labour Church
Episode 51. Hilaire Belloc
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Chris Hare about his 2022 book, Hilaire Belloc: The Politics of Living.
Episode 48. The Lanes: A Methodist Case Study
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with David Lane CBE about the Lane family’s Methodism and his career in social services.
Episode 46. John Ruskin and the Guild of St George
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Dr Mark Frost about his 2014 book, The Lost Companions and John Ruskin’s Guild of St George.
Episode 45. Modern Spiritualism and the Church of England
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Revd Canon Dr Georgina Byrne about her book Modern Spiritualism and the Church of England and the changing attitudes within Anglicanism to the afterlife..
Episode 41. W. T. Stead: Newspaper Prophet
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Professor Stewart J. Brown about his biography of the nonconformist and newspaper prophet, W. T. Stead.
Episode 40. Theo Hobson: Anglicanism, Liberalism and Liberty
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with the theologian, author and journalist Theo Hobson about the relationship between the Church of England and modern notions of liberty and liberalism.
Episode 36. ‘Good George Lansbury’
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Professor Pippa Catterall and Daniel Payne about the Christian Socialist politician, leader of the Labour Party and Pacifist, George Lansbury.
Episode 34. Liberalism and the Non-Conformist Conscience
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Professor David Bebbington about Liberalism and the Non-Conformist Conscience, perhaps best exemplified by the life, faith and political opinions of the Prime Minister, William Ewart Gladstone .
Episode 29. Squires in the Slums: The University Settlements
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Dr Nigel Scotland about the university settlement movement which sprang up principally in London, but also in major industrial cities, after awareness of the ‘submerged tenth’ living in extreme poverty pricked the conscience of the middle classes from the 1880s.
Episode 28. The Changing Face of Evangelicalism
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with the Reverend Dr David Hilborn about the defining characteristics of Evangelicalism, and changing face since the founding of the Evangelical Alliance in London 1846.
Episode 27. Radical Essex
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with the distinguished social historian and writer Ken Worpole about radical Essex and its experiments in communal living, some of which are associated with what is known as the “Essexodus” from London’s East End to neighbouring Essex in the east.
Episode 25. Jack and Barbara Putterill: Family Recollections
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Sally, Jenny and Martin Heath, the granddaughters and grandson of the Christian Socialist Father Jack Putterill and his wife Barbara, about their idyllic childhood visits to Thaxted and the tradition of Morris, Mummers plays, music and theatre that they encountered there.
Episode 24. The Thaxted Tradition
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Professor Arthur Burns about the seventy year tradition of Christian Socialism in the rural town of Thaxted, Essex, running from 1910 to 1984..
Episode 23. Robert Blatchford
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Dr Martin Wright, about the great crusading journalist Robert Blatchford, the Clarion magazine and movement, and Blatchford’s Merrie England which sold over 2 million copies.
Episode 21. R. H. Tawney
Dr Simon Machin in conversation with Professor Lawrence Goldman about his biography of the academic, historian, socialist and private Christian R. H. Tawney.