Union With David Olusoga review – finally! A history show that’s not deathly dull

Most history documentaries are so drearily simplistic they make you cross-eyed with boredom. Thank goodness then for this fascinating, first-rate effort about how our septic isle came to be

I am woefully lacking in all sorts of knowledge, but none more than the historical kind. My cohort’s history GCSE comprised “the evolution of medicine” and “Britain 1815-51”. Not more. Not less. As an education in how the political, social or cultural shaped the world into its current form, it was wildly lacking. Although if you ever need to trepan a Chartist, give me a call.

So I am always on the lookout for kind people and programmers ready, willing and able to try to disperse some of my profound ignorance. Such a person and such a programme is Union With David Olusoga (although my English GCSE tells me there should ideally be a comma in the title to prevent unwanted misunderstandings). This ambitious and stylishly confident four-part series looks at the origins and development of our septic isle, Great Britain, and the identity that has emerged out of the maelstrom of forces, influences, actions and reactions that have operated on it over the centuries.

Union With David Olusoga aired on BBC One and is on iPlayer now.

Continue reading...

from The Guardian https://ift.tt/UkcRiaO

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Two years after Buffalo mass shooting, an art exhibit focuses on the victims

A few months after 14 May 2022, a curator sought out three local artists. The resulting exhibition, Before and After Again, is thought to be the first of its kind Two years ago, a white supremacist drove 200 miles to Buffalo, New York, and opened fire in a grocery store in the city’s predominantly Black East Side neighborhood, killing 10 people and injuring three. Though the Tops Friendly Markets where the racist mass shooting took place has been remodeled, and most of the country has forgotten about the violence that occurred on 14 May 2022, Buffalo’s East Side is forever changed. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/mqu1LFv
Read more

£1 Thursdays review – nightclubbing, sex talk and big decisions

Finborough theatre, London A mix of sweet observations about female friendship and cheeky brazenness about sex, Kat Rose-Martin’s play finds two young women at a crossroads in their lives In the cold air outside a sticky nightclub in Bradford, 17-year-olds Stacey and Jen are at a crossroads. In one direction lies the world they know: the family stress, the looming exams, the pumping pop beats at the club where they’ll reliably pull boys from school. In the other direction lies an uncertain path, and questions of who they are apart from one another, whether they could be the first in their families to go to university, and how to afford it if they do. Constantly on their minds, while they’re drunkenly dancing the nights away, is where they’ll end up, and what to do if they are the ones left behind. Thoughtful if not revelatory, £1 Thursdays covers an uneasy period of big decisions in these characters’ lives, as the gap between them widens. Monique Ashe-Palmer (Six) is ebullient as St
Read more

Eric Trump testifies ‘I don’t recall’ when asked about involvement in Trump Organization valuation - live

Prosecutors ask Eric Trump about financial statements and executives who cited calls with him for valuation, but he testifies he doesn’t remember conversation Sign up for Trump on Trial: a free newsletter on all the latest court developments Prosecutor Colleen Faherty asked Donald Trump Jr whether it’s a fair statement that he was generally familiar with the overall finances of the Trump Organization between 2011 and the present. “I would think so, yes,” Trump Jr replied, Law360’s Stewart Bishop reports. Continue reading... from The Guardian https://ift.tt/wzrfXa1
Read more