Break update

Dear Readers,

Here is to tell you I am still on my break. It is a relief to be exempt from the pressure of posting every day. It is also a relief to be listening fewer podcasts and only those that I feel like listening to and not all those that I have to get a bite of in order to be able to write about them. The blogging and the listening had begun to resemble a job rather than a hobby. If it were a job, I'd do it with pleasure and ten times better than I ever did. But it is not and to have to squeeze it in with a real job and family life, while the blog was becoming more and more demanding (more and more podcasts to keep track of) got just a tad too much.

So, that is why I am away. That is why I listen less, but surely,while updating you, I might as well relate what I am listening to these days.

I find myself with three podcast about the First World War:
Veertien Achttien, the unmatched weekly bio of a participant in the war, be it on war or the home front. This remarkable Dutch podcast aims to supply a weekly bio for as long as the Great War itself lasted, that is for some 230 weeks. By now the podcast has reached week 170 without ever failing and at an outstanding constant quality. Another aim is said to translate the podcast into English and to start repeating the weekly feat from 2014 until 2018. Stay posted! (feed)

First World War Centenary podcast by the Imperial War Museum, offering extracts from their unique oral history program.

History of the First World War, an amateur podcast that offers a very accessible military history of the first world war. Currently the podcast is on hiatus, hopefully not for long. (feed)

As the Palestinian bid for statehood is pending at the UN, I also want to point you to a couple of podcast episodes that offer an unexpected perspective on the Middle-East conflict, but that I will report in another post. Stay tuned.

Anne

A break

Dear Readers,

I have begun taking a break from the blog. In due time I will be back to posting, but for the time being it will be very infrequent.

To keep you busy, here are a couple of recent finds I wish to recommend:

1- 2011 Reith Lectures; the lectures have resumed and a looking into the question of protecting Freedom in society. (feed)
2- History of England by David Crowther (feed) - a very nice history of England by following the line of the Royal Family of England as far as it can be traced back. One thing to keep in mind when you start: Crowther calls the Britons 'British' which can easily confuse or even confound (a war of the English on the British? That is between Britons and Anglo-Saxons)
3- History of the First World War - a history with emphasis on the military aspects of the war and with an interesting batch of stories about fronts other than the Western or the Eastern front. In stead of looking up the feed, I recommend to download from the site as the feed contains only the last handful of the entire 44 episodes so far.

Anne

Zomertip: Marathon Interviews

Ian Buruma kon in podcast beluisterd worden via het inmiddels ter ziele UChannel Podcast (Taming Religion). Dat was in 2009, er was toen ook een interview met hem op de VPRO radio dat ik niet kon achterhalen, maar ik kreeg wel het Marathon Interview met hem uit 2004 te pakken. Dat was echter in de oude feed en het werd wachten totdat de nieuwe feed dit interview opnieuw uit zou brengen. Dat duurde tot nu. (Djoeke Veninga in gesprek met Ian Buruma)

Het is een echte aanrader. Je kan Buruma trouwens ook kort horen in de podcast Voices on Antisemitism (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum) (feed) (Ian Buruma on Freedom of Speech), maar dat is nogal kort.

Voor lange zomerdagen is het de moeite waard om meer interessante Marathon Interviews op te zoeken. Hier zijn een paar recente die ik zelf ook beluisterd heb:

Hanny Michaelis,
Theun de Vries,
Wim Kok,
Ayaan Hirsi Ali,
Afshin Elian,
W.A. Wagenaar,
Douwe Draaisma.

Meer Ayaan Hirsi Ali:
Ideas,
UChannel,
Interview Vrijdag.

Meer W.A. Wagenaar:
New Books In Law,
Simek 's Nachts,

Meer Douwe Draaisma:
Simek 's Nachts (1),
Simek 's Nachts (2).

Summertime tip: across podcast listening

While your favorite podcast may be on a summer break you probably are looking for something else to listen to. Suppose your favorite podcast's subject is what you are generally interested in and this might be the time to look for other podcasts who touch upon the same subject and get a broader perspective.

When I listened to the Irish History Podcast (feed) I got fascinated by its episodes about the Viking era in Irish history. For lack of a Viking History Podcast, some holes in this history are not covered by the Irish History Podcast. What was their trade? Where did they exactly come from? Why did they go on plunder?And how is it they got to be so successful? It goes to show there is much to be found out about Vikings and Normans, Scandinavian history in general and the time in the Middle Ages that they dominated Europe. Although there is not one podcast that takes care of the subject, there are several that touch upon it (like the Irish History podcast) and by listening across podcasts, a lot can be learned.

Not only Ireland was beset by Vikings, also Anglo-Saxon England was visited and the podcast History of England (feed) by David Crowther does a very good job of relating this era. In a good portion of the first thirty episodes you get to learn a lot and it wonderfully complements the Irish story. For example, from David we learn that the Vikings that landed in Ireland were mostly from Norway, whereas England was dominated by the Danes. The Swedes concentrated their efforts towards the Baltic. Those Vikings that got hold of Normandy, eventually became the Normans, a Francophone branch of this Scandinavian family. The podcast Norman Centuries (feed) is dedicated to the Normans.

The Norman story and the English story obviously come together around 1066, which is also elegantly told by Notes on History (feed), but apart from England, Norman conquests also take us into the Mediterranean and eventually all the way to Constantinople, where Normans became the famous Varangian Guard, about whom you will also learn in the podcast 12 Byzantine Rulers (feed)

There in the east, the Normans met Vikings who reached the same point but through a different route. Swedish Vikings conquered eastward and became known as the Rus, the founders of later Russia as we learn in the opening issues of the Russian Rulers History Podcast (feed)

As usual with Historic subjects, the archives of BBC's In Our Time are worth a visit and offer among others:
Athelstan,
Volga Vikings,
The battle of Stamford Bridge,
Alfred and the battle of Edington
And The Norman yoke.

More:
Irish History Podcast,
Norman Centuries,
Notes on History,
12 Byzantine Rulers,
Russian Rulers History Podcast.

Summer time tip: learn a language

What to do these months when your regular podcasts are on a summer break and you, the listener, actually has more time to spend on listening. Gotten past the backlog yet? Here is something new to try: why not take up a foreign language through podcast?

Podcasting is highly developed in the realm of language learning and although a lot of good content comes at a premium, also a lot is free. If you search 'learn nn through podcast', especially when nn is a rather commonly used language, you will find an astonishing amount of productions. Many are very similar and most of the free content is on beginners level, but through a couple of sessions of initial listening you can certainly identify the podcast that matches your level and preferences.

For example pick up some French. Here is a quick sample of what I collected when I was looking for a refresher of my high school French:

Beginners:
French for beginners; Real life French (feed)
Learn French by Podcast (feed)
Learn French With Alexa (feed)
Learn French with daily podcasts (feed)
The FrenchPodClass - Frenchie Productions (feed)

More advanced:

One thing in a French day (feed)

More learning language on Anne is a Man:
Learn German through podcast,
Learn Hebrew through podcast,

Learn Dutch through podcast.

Summer time tip: Mystery at Geneva

If you are looking for something different to listen to during long Summer days, whether on vacation or on dreary office days, you might consider listening to a piece of ironic narration from the public domain. Breakaway fro a moment from the lectures, the panel discussions and the interviews.

I was mesmerized by Mystery at Geneva: An Improbable Tale of Singular Happenings, written by Dame Rose Macaulay and skillfully read to us by Cathy Barratt at Librivox (feed)

Henry Beechtree is a British journalist who attends a session of the League of Nations in the early twenties and tries to solve the disappearance of the president of the League. Soon enough Beechtree not only gets into trouble, he also gets involved in the case. While on the surface the story evolves around the mystery plot, some of the best stuff Macaulay has to offer is not related to the plot, but rather the elegant irony with which she describes the machinations of international politics, lobbyists and journalists. In that respect the story is just as relevant today as it was in the 1920s and it can apply just as much to the buzz around UN sessions as the activities around Capitol Hill or any other political power center for that matter.

More Librivox:
Beyond Good and Evil,
Bhagavad Gita,
Frankenstein,
History of Holland.