Podcast appearances and mentions of Jenny Uglow

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss eighteenth century 'vase-mania'. In the second half of the century, inspired by archaeological discoveries, the Grand Tour and the founding of the British Museum, parts of the British public developed a huge enthusiasm for vases modelled on the ancient versions recently dug up in Greece. This enthusiasm amounted to a kind of ‘vase-mania'. Initially acquired by the aristocracy, Josiah Wedgwood made these vases commercially available to an emerging aspiring middle class eager to display a piece of the Classical past in their drawing rooms. In the midst of a rapidly changing Britain, these vases came to symbolise the birth of European Civilisation, the epitome of good taste and the timelessness that would later be celebrated by John Keats in his Ode on a Grecian Urn.WithJenny Uglow Writer and Biographer Rosemary Sweet Professor of Urban History at the University of LeicesterAndCaroline McCaffrey-Howarth Lecturer in the History of Art at the University of EdinburghProducer: Eliane GlaserReading list:Viccy Coltman, Fabricating the Antique: Neoclassicism in Britain 1760–1800 (University of Chicago Press, 2006)David Constantine, Fields of Fire: A Life of Sir William Hamilton (Phoenix, 2002)Tristram Hunt, The Radical Potter: Josiah Wedgwood and the Transformation of Britain (Allen Lane, 2021)Ian Jenkins and Kim Sloan (eds), Vases and Volcanoes: Sir William Hamilton and his Collection (British Museum Press, 1996)Berg Maxine, Luxury and Pleasure in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Oxford University Press, 2005)Iris Moon, Melancholy Wedgwood (MIT Press, 2024)Rosemary Sweet, Grand Tour: The British in Italy, c.1690–1820 (Cambridge University Press, 2012)Jenny Uglow, The Lunar Men: The Friends who Made the Future (Faber and Faber, 2003)In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio production

In this episode we meet Don Graham, a retired emergency medicine doctor, a long-time member of the Portland Chapter of the American Rhododendron Society, and a Rhododendron gardener extra-ordinaire. We find out how he successfully transitioned his love of Rhododendron from a large-scale outdoor rock garden to a small-but-mighty indoor garden prominently featuring tropical epiphytic Rhododendron species known as Vireyas. Don shares techniques he's used to transform his second-floor condominium and balcony into a botanical wonderland so spectacular that passersby are known to shout their praise up from below, and we learn that the best thing about growing a Vireya garden in your house is that you can expect blooms anytime. Recalling the words of biographer and historian Jenny Uglow, “We may think we are nurturing our garden, but of course it's our garden that is really nurturing us.”

I speak with Carlos De la Guardia, an amateur AGI researcher and musician with a longtime interest in Popper and Deutsch. We discuss how one can apply the philosophy of critical rationalism, and some of David Deutsch’s ideas, to 'real life'. How should one act, given that problems are inevitable, and life is literally unpredictable? We also discuss how critical rationalism may help us to have more productive disagreements, effective altruism, and the universal constructor. Carlos' Twitter - https://twitter.com/dela3499 Twitter - https://twitter.com/ChipkinLogan Website - www.loganchipkin.com Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/Fallibleanimals Some books mentioned: Zero to One, by Peter Thiel - https://www.amazon.com/Zero-One-Notes-Startups-Future/dp/0804139296 The Logic of Scientific Discovery, by Karl Popper - https://www.amazon.com/Logic-Scientific-Discovery-Routledge-Classics/dp/0415278449 The Lunar Men: Five Friends Whose Curiosity Changed the World, by Jenny Uglow - https://www.amazon.com/Lunar-Men-Friends-Curiosity-Changed/dp/0374528888 --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/logan-chipkin/support

Ian McMillan presents a 'memorisable' cabaret of the word. Acclaimed biographer, historian and critic Jenny Uglow celebrates the language and rhymes of one of the most memorable poets in the English language, the 19th century artist and creator of nonsense rhymes Edward Lear. Rachel Parris and Amy Cooke-Hodgson are our improvisation 'queens' - they have worked together in award-winning improvisational theatre company 'Austentatious', and bravely take on an extreme memory challenge (inspired by Lear's poem 'The Owl and the Pussycat'). Martin Bommas from the University of Birmingham explores the importance of memory to the Ancient Egyptians (especially mummies ), and one of our best loved actors, Julian Glover, considers the role of memory and discusses strategies for remembering in the theatre. Part of Radio 3's weekend of programming in partnership with Wellcome Collection: 'Why Music? The Key to Memory'.

Kate Winslet's latest film, The Mountain Between Us, is an epic romance shot at 10,000 feet above sea level and at -38 degrees Celsius. The actress talks to Samira about working with co-star Idris Elba, the legacy of Titanic, and looks forward to making her next film, when she will be working with Woody Allen.Californian brothers Ron and Russell Mael formed the band Sparks in the early '70s, and their first hit This Town Ain't Big Enough for the Both of Us made them household names in the UK. 23 albums and more than four decades later, the brothers discuss their new album, Hippopotamus, and look back at their early days living in London at the time of power cuts and the three-day week. Edward Lear is the writer of some of our most loved poetry. The Owl and the Pussycat has been voted the UK's favourite poem many times. Jenny Uglow's new biography, Mr Lear: A Life of Art and Nonsense, explores the life behind the rhymes and reveals a natural history painter, a landscape artist, and only later a somewhat reluctant nonsense poet. A contemporary of Lewis Carroll and a friend to Tennyson and the Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood, should we see him as a product of his time or a romantic rebel? Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Julian May.

Tom Holland is joined by Dr Nick Beech from Queen Mary University of London and Professor Emma Griffin from the University of East Anglia. We're in Toxteth, Liverpool, to find out more about the history of the terraced house. Christian Wolmar joins us from King's Cross railway station where he asks whether the Flying Scotsman deserves to be so famous. And we explore the history of Easter with the Bishop of Norwich who explains why it moves around the calendar. Helen Castor catches up with Dr Oleg Benesch at the University of York who argues that the Samurai of the nineteenth century borrowed heavily from the Victorian notion of chivalry. Finally, the author Jenny Uglow shares with us her favourite year - 1798. Producer Nick Patrick A Pier production for BBC Radio 4.

Jenny Uglow talks about her book, In These Times: Living in Britain through Napoleon's Wars, 1793-1815.This podcast was recorded live as part of the Writer of the month series, which broadens awareness of historical records and their uses for writers.

Naomi Alderman tells the story of James Watt and the steam engine that nearly never got made. A breath of steam hits cold metal. It cools suddenly and becomes a drop of water. There an idea. But the designs for Watt’s radically more efficient steam engine laid on the shelf in his workshop for years. Watt, a depressive, cautious perfectionist had no interest in actually making engines. Had it not been for his friend, the businessmen Matthew Boulton driving him on, his engine might never have left the drawing board. Naomi talks to historian, Jenny Uglow about the five friends who kick started the industrial revolution. And, digital guru Bill Thompson talks about the scientific legacy of Watt’s obsession with getting a patent - an obsession which led to an Act of Parliament. Photo: James Watt. Credit: Hulton Archive)

What was Napoleon's impact during his lifetime, in France and across Europe and how much of this can we see today? With Tom Sutcliffe, Andrew Roberts examines the man in his new biography, Jenny Uglow explores living in Britain through Napoleon's Wars, 1793-1815, Sudhir Hazareesingh looks at his legend, while musicologist Gavin Plumley focuses on Schubert in Vienna in the aftermath of Napoleon. Producer: Simon Tillotson.

Jenny Uglow concentrates on Schubert and Scotland exploring his settings of Ossian poems, and Scott's The Lady of the Lake.

Tony Parsons opts for The Virgin Soldiers in the search for Open Book's Funniest Book and Mariella Frostrup talks to Jenny Uglow in the next in the series of Open Book's mini-history of comic writing. Suzy Feay and Elvie Wyld run through some of their choices for the most readable books of 2011.

Andrew McConnell Stott is an award-winning writer and academic. For several years he was a stand-up comedian, described by London’s Evening Standard as “an absurdist comic with a satirical eye for popular culture.” The world, however, was unprepared for such hilarity and so he decided to give it up. He is the author of Comedy (Routledge, 2005) and The Pantomime Life of Joseph Grimaldi (Canongate, 2009). The latter was praised by Simon Callow in the Guardian as a “great big Christmas pudding of a book, almost over-stuffed with rich and colourful life”.  Jenny Uglow in the Observer called it a “fast-paced, rumbustious biography” and said:  “A round of applause is due to this exuberant, impassioned portrait, for bringing the great Grimaldi, ‘Joey the Clown’, into the limelight again.” You can hear my interview with Andrew by clicking here. Andrew is currently a Fellow at the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers. Here is his selection of books he has enjoyed this year: I don’t tend to read that many books-of-the-moment, because …

The history of the world as told through objects that time has left behind. This week Neil MacGregor, the director of the British Museum, has chosen some of the great status symbols of the world around 700 years ago - objects with quite surprising links across the globe. Today he is with a pair of porcelain vases from Yuan dynasty China. This instantly recognisable blue-and-white designed porcelain - that we usually associate with the Ming Dynasty - rapidly became influential and desirable around the world. Neil describes the history of porcelain and the use of these vases in a temple setting. The historian Craig Clunas talks about the volatile world of Yuan China while the writer Jenny Uglow tries to put her finger on just why we find Chinese porcelain so appealing. Producer: Anthony Denselow.

Jenny Uglow gives us the lowdown on Charles II and the Restoration. Plus Emma Robertson explores the origins of chocolate in the British Empire. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Melvyn Bragg discusses the discovery of Oxygen by Joseph Priestley and Antoine Lavoisier. In the late 18th century Chemistry was the prince of the sciences – vital to the economy, it shaped how Europeans fought each other, ate with each other, what they built and the medicine they took. And then, in 1772, the British chemist, Joseph Priestley, stood in front of the Royal Society and reported on his latest discovery: “this air is of exalted nature…A candle burned in this air with an amazing strength of flame; and a bit of red hot wood crackled and burned with a prodigious rapidity. But to complete the proof of the superior quality of this air, I introduced a mouse into it; and in a quantity in which, had it been common air, it would have died in about a quarter of an hour; it lived at two different times, a whole hour, and was taken out quite vigorous.” For the British dissenting preacher, Joseph Priestley, and the French aristocrat, Antoine Lavoisier, Chemistry was full of possibilities and they pursued them for scientific and political ends. But they came to blows over oxygen because they both claimed to have discovered it, provoking a scientific controversy that rattled through the laboratories of France and England until well after their deaths. To understand their disagreement is to understand something about the nature of scientific discovery itself. With Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge; Jenny Uglow, Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick; Hasok Chang, Reader in Philosophy of Science at University College London.

Melvyn Bragg discusses the discovery of Oxygen by Joseph Priestley and Antoine Lavoisier. In the late 18th century Chemistry was the prince of the sciences – vital to the economy, it shaped how Europeans fought each other, ate with each other, what they built and the medicine they took. And then, in 1772, the British chemist, Joseph Priestley, stood in front of the Royal Society and reported on his latest discovery: “this air is of exalted nature…A candle burned in this air with an amazing strength of flame; and a bit of red hot wood crackled and burned with a prodigious rapidity. But to complete the proof of the superior quality of this air, I introduced a mouse into it; and in a quantity in which, had it been common air, it would have died in about a quarter of an hour; it lived at two different times, a whole hour, and was taken out quite vigorous.” For the British dissenting preacher, Joseph Priestley, and the French aristocrat, Antoine Lavoisier, Chemistry was full of possibilities and they pursued them for scientific and political ends. But they came to blows over oxygen because they both claimed to have discovered it, provoking a scientific controversy that rattled through the laboratories of France and England until well after their deaths. To understand their disagreement is to understand something about the nature of scientific discovery itself. With Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge; Jenny Uglow, Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick; Hasok Chang, Reader in Philosophy of Science at University College London.

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Lunar Society. In the late 18th century, with the ascendant British Empire centred on London, a small group of friends met at a house on the crossroads outside Birmingham and applied their minds to the problems of the age. Between them they managed to launch the Industrial Revolution, discover oxygen, harness the power of steam and pioneer the theory of evolution. They were the Lunar Society, a gathering of free and fertile minds centred on the remarkable quartet of Matthew Boulton, James Watt, Joseph Priestly and Erasmus Darwin. The potter Josiah Wedgwood, another member, summed up the ethos of this group when he said that they were ‘living in an age of miracles in which anything could be achieved'.But how did the Lunar Society operate? What was the blend of religious dissent, entrepreneurial spirit and intellectual adventure that proved so fertile and how did their discoveries permanently change the shape and character of this country?With Simon Schaffer, Reader in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge; Jenny Uglow, Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick and author of The Lunar Men: The Friends who Made the Future; Peter Jones, Professor of French History at the University of Birmingham.

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Lunar Society. In the late 18th century, with the ascendant British Empire centred on London, a small group of friends met at a house on the crossroads outside Birmingham and applied their minds to the problems of the age. Between them they managed to launch the Industrial Revolution, discover oxygen, harness the power of steam and pioneer the theory of evolution. They were the Lunar Society, a gathering of free and fertile minds centred on the remarkable quartet of Matthew Boulton, James Watt, Joseph Priestly and Erasmus Darwin. The potter Josiah Wedgwood, another member, summed up the ethos of this group when he said that they were ‘living in an age of miracles in which anything could be achieved’.But how did the Lunar Society operate? What was the blend of religious dissent, entrepreneurial spirit and intellectual adventure that proved so fertile and how did their discoveries permanently change the shape and character of this country?With Simon Schaffer, Reader in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge; Jenny Uglow, Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick and author of The Lunar Men: The Friends who Made the Future; Peter Jones, Professor of French History at the University of Birmingham.