Sunday, July 22, 2007

History Network - Peninsular war

Occasionally I listen to the history podcast of the History Network. By the name, one would expect a general history podcast, but in practice this is a podcast about military history. I am much less into military history, hence, the history network is not exactly my thing. The issues I listen to are the ones that have my general historic interest.

Thus it was with the latest show, 301, I listened again. This show is about the peninsular campaign; the battle between Napoleonic France and the English, the Spanish and the Portuguese on the Iberian peninsula. This was a rather long cast, 25 minutes. Usually the casts take between 10 and 20 minutes. They are well read and well written and I like the British accent, but here we run into, also, a relative weak point of the podcast.

First of all, it is one of those monologue podcasts that consist of somebody reading out loud an essay on the subject. Only on account of it being well written and well read, the podcast is still worthwhile, otherwise it would have been choked by this less than perfect approach of podcasting. Second, the British perspective makes it a bit one sided in the particular podcast about the Peninsular War. We hardly are informed about the French side.

All in all a reasonable podcast, but my recommendation only for those who are interested in military history.

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