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history, political history, 20th century history, european history, karl marx, marxism, das kapital, darwin, charles darwin, natural history, communists, communism
London is home to two of the oldest working theatres in the world both founded by Charles II’s patents. Professor Thurley looks at the significance and impact of these great institutions on the development of London.
After Stalin’s death in 1953, successive leaders tried to find ways to revitalise the Soviet regime and rethink its promises to the Soviet people. Life within a system no longer based on terror and intense industrial transformation offered citizens strange alternatives.
Edwardian architecture in particular provides a fascinating commentary on broader historical themes – not only in its use of style and its remodelling of old buildings but also in the range of new activities it provided for.
Based on new research into the origins of St. James’s, Simon Thurley looks into the ingredients that went into making a court quarter there and the way it formed a blueprint for the new West End of London.
After the founding of the Chinese Communist Party in 1921, many artists and intellectuals in China saw the overthrow of ‘tradition’ as the means to rescue the nation from poverty and backwardness.
In the first of two lectures with the theme ‘Merchants, Money and Megalomania’, Simon Thurley will unearth the lost mercantile buildings of medieval London and show how influential they were.