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‘Historians in Cars’: Andrew Roberts on Historical Writing and Churchill

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The distinguished British historian and biographer Andrew Roberts has just released Churchill: Walking With Destiny, which the New York Times (along with several other prominent publications) has called "the best one-volume biography of Churchill ever written." Steve Hayward borrowed a page from Jerry Seinfeld's "Comedians in Cars" and interviewed Andrew during a car ride (maybe we should start a rival series, "Historians in Cars"?), about historical writing in general, the secret behind Andrew's truly extraordinary productivity as a writer (it was only four years ago that he came out with a massive biography of Napoleon), and his favorite Churchill jokes.

The bumper music this week is highly appropriate: "Fools Overture" by the 1970s progressive rock group Supertramp, which features a few sentences from Churchill's "fight on the beaches" speech of June 4, 1940, and lyrics by Supertramp keyboardist and lead singer Roger Hodgson that evoke those epic times.

Host:
Steve Hayward
Guest:
Andrew Roberts

Discussion (3)

  • ibn Abu@ibnAbu

    I think the scene in "Darkest Hour" (however ahistorical it may have been) where Churchill rides the subway and talks to the riders is being misconstrued here. The point is not that Churchill's spine needed stiffening, as Professor Roberts interpreted it. In the film he's riding the subway to circumvent the War Cabinet to speak directly to his party MPs (which speech did actually take place). The subway ride and his conversation with the doughty yeomen of London was a cinematic device to give Churchill talking points to convince his party of the wisdom of continued resistence.