London Review of Books

London Revisited

No. of episodes

11

Latest episode

2026-10-08

Where can you listen?

From its beginnings as a backwater of the Roman Empire to its heyday at the heart of the British Empire and up to the eve of the Great War, Rosemary Hill charts London’s history through waves of expansion and contraction with the help of historians, antiquaries and archaeologists.London's past is everywhere beneath its streets, in the geology and archeology of its deep and ancient history, and in its mythic lives, in William Blake's Albion and Cobbett's 'Great Wen', the home of Dick Whittington and King Lud. This will be the London described by Tacitus, Shakespeare and Virginia Woolf, a city shaped by Boudicca, Christopher Wren and Joseph Bazalgette, and a story of countless disasters, recoveries and triumphs unfolding over more than 2,000 years.Rosemary Hill is a writer, historian and contributor to the London Review of Books. Her books include ‘God's Architect', 'Stonehenge' and ‘Time’s Witness: History in the Age of Romanticism’. To listen in full, and to all our other Close Readings series, sign up:Apple Podcasts: https://lrb.me/applesignuplrOther podcast apps: https://lrb.me/scsignuplrGet in touch: [email protected] is Close Readings? Close Readings is a multi-series podcast from the London Review of Books that covers different periods and themes of literature, history and philosophy. Each year there are several series running simultaneously, with a new episode appearing every week.Subscribe to Close Readings for access to all past and current series (see links above).