Arts & Ideas Folgen

Chocolate is an indulgent luxury used to mark special points in the calendar like Valentine's Day, Easter and Christmas. But it's also everywhere, from breakfast cereals to protein shakes. Shahidha Bari unravels this paradox, tracing the meanings of chocolate from ancient Central America, via the Aztecs and Maya, over the Atlantic to the Spanish court, the coffee houses and palaces of 17th century London, to the invention of mass-produced milk chocolate as we know it today in Switzerland in the late 19th and early 20th century. It's a story of pleasure, intoxication, conquest and industrialisation, all following from the specific culinary qualities of a bean. With:Bee Wilson, food writer whose most recent book is The Secret Of Cooking: Recipes For An Easier Life In The KitchenSean Williams, Radio 3 & AHRC New Generation Thinker and Senior Lecturer in German and European Cultural History at the University of SheffieldCaroline Dodds Pennock, Senior Lecturer in International History at the University of Sheffield, whose most recent book is On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered EuropeMisha Ewen, Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of BristolProducer: Luke Mulhall

An indulgent luxury used to mark special points in the calendar like Valentine's Day, Easter and Christmas, but it's also everywhere, from breakfast cereals to protein shakes. Shahidha Bari unravels this paradox, tracing the meanings of chocolate from ancient Central America, via the Aztecs and Maya, over the Atlantic to the Spanish court, the coffee houses and palaces of 17th century London, to the invention of mass-produced milk chocolate as we know it today in Switzerland in the late 19th and early 20th century. It's a story of pleasure, intoxication, conquest and industrialisation, all following from the specific culinary qualities of a bean. With:Bee Wilson, food writer whose most recent book is The Secret Of Cooking: Recipes For An Easier Life In The KitchenSean Williams, Radio 3 & AHRC New Generation Thinker and Senior Lecturer in German and European Cultural History at the University of SheffieldCaroline Dodds Pennock, Senior Lecturer in International History at the University of Sheffield, whose most recent book is On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered EuropeMisha Ewen, Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of BristolProducer: Luke MulhallYou can find other Free Thinking episodes exploring food, picnics, breakfast available on BBC Sounds and as the Arts & Ideas poodcast

In February 1894, the French anarchist Martial Bourdin was killed in Greenwich Park when the bomb he was carrying exploded accidentally. The event provided Joseph Conrad with the inspiration for his novel The Secret Agent, and the resulting backlash against anarchist groups in London eventually led to the first British immigration legislation - the 1905 Aliens Act. As a conference takes place exploring the incident and its legacy, Matthew Sweet is joined by historians Charlotte Jones, Ruth Kinna and Thomas Jones to discuss the bombing that was dubbed "the Greenwich Outrage".Producer: Torquil MacLeod