The Rural Idyll?
The Rural Idyll? Laurie Taylor explores the relationship between the countryside and colonialism. Also, national identity and the English landscape.
The Rural Idyll? Last year the National Trust produced a controversial report which revealed that 93 of its properties have direct links to colonialism and slavery. In this programme, Laurie Taylor talks to Corinne Fowler, Professor of Post Colonial Literature at the University of Leicester, whose new study engages directly with this painful history, uncovering the countryside鈥檚 repressed colonial past and its relationship to notions of Englishness. How have pastoral mythologies in English literature served to erase the story of Empire? In what ways do contemporary writers of colour offer a challenge to uncritical celebrations of our 'green and pleasant' land? They鈥檙e joined by Paul Readman, Professor of Modern British History at King's College London, whose recent research considers the relationship between landscape and English national identity, from the rural to the urban. Thinking Allowed is produced in partnership with the Open University.
Producer: Jayne Egerton
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Guests and Further Reading
Green Unpleasant Land: Creative Responses to Rural England's Colonial Connections (Peepal Tree Press)
Storied Ground: Landscape and the Shaping of English National Identity (Cambridge University Press)
Broadcasts
- Wed 28 Apr 2021 16:0091热爆 Radio 4
- Mon 3 May 2021 00:1591热爆 Radio 4
Explore further with The Open University
91热爆 Thinking Allowed is produced in partnership with The Open University
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