Episodes

Sunday Jul 23, 2023
HoP 426 - A Face Without a Heart - Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Individualism
Sunday Jul 23, 2023
Sunday Jul 23, 2023
How the Renaissance turn towards individual identity is reflected in Shakespeare's most famous play.

Sunday Jul 09, 2023
HoP 425 - Patrick Gray on Shakespeare
Sunday Jul 09, 2023
Sunday Jul 09, 2023
We're joined by Patrick Gray to discuss Shakespeare's knowledge of philosophy, his ethics, and his influence on such thinkers as Hegel.

Sunday Jun 25, 2023
HoP 424 - Hast Any Philosophy In Thee? - William Shakespeare
Sunday Jun 25, 2023
Sunday Jun 25, 2023
How should we approach Shakespeare’s plays as philosophical texts? We take as examples skepticism and politics in Othello, King Lear, and Julius Caesar.

Sunday Jun 11, 2023
HoP 423 - Heaven-Bred Poesy - Philip Sidney and Edmund Spenser
Sunday Jun 11, 2023
Sunday Jun 11, 2023
We begin to look at Elizabethan literature, as Sidney argues that poetry is superior to philosophy, and philosophy is put to use in Spenser’s "Fairie Queene".

Sunday May 28, 2023
HoP 422 - The World’s Law - Richard Hooker
Sunday May 28, 2023
Sunday May 28, 2023
Richard Hooker defends the religious and political settlement of Elizabethan England using rational arguments and appeals to the natural law.

Sunday May 14, 2023
HoP 421 - With Such Perfection Govern - English Political Thought
Sunday May 14, 2023
Sunday May 14, 2023
The evolution of ideas about kingship and the role of the “three estates” in 15th and 16th century England, with a focus on John Fortescue and Thomas Starkey.

Sunday May 07, 2023
HoP 420 - No Place Will Please Me So - Thomas More
Sunday May 07, 2023
Sunday May 07, 2023
What is the message of the famous, but elusive, work "Utopia", and how can it be squared with the life of its author?

Sunday Apr 23, 2023
HoP 419 - Write Till Your Ink Be Dry - Humanism in Britain
Sunday Apr 23, 2023
Sunday Apr 23, 2023
Humanism comes to England and Scotland, leading scholars like Thomas Eylot and Andrew Melville to rethink philosophical education.

Sunday Apr 09, 2023
HoP 418 - Diarmaid MacCulloch on the British Reformations
Sunday Apr 09, 2023
Sunday Apr 09, 2023
A leading expert on the history of the Reformation joins us to explain the very different stories of England and Scotland in the 16th century.

Sunday Mar 26, 2023
HoP 417 - To Kill a King - The Scottish Reformation
Sunday Mar 26, 2023
Sunday Mar 26, 2023
John Knox polemicizes against idolaters and female rulers, while the humanist George Buchanan argues more calmly for equally radical political conclusions.

Sunday Mar 12, 2023
HoP 416 - God’s is the Quarrel - The English Reformation
Sunday Mar 12, 2023
Sunday Mar 12, 2023
The historical context of English philosophy in the sixteenth century, with particular focus on Thomas Cranmer, and the role of religion in personal conscience and social cohesion.

Sunday Feb 26, 2023
HoP 415 - The Tenth Muse - Marie de Gournay
Sunday Feb 26, 2023
Sunday Feb 26, 2023
Marie le Jars de Gourney, the “adoptive daughter” of Montaigne, lays claim to his legacy and argues for the equality of the sexes.

Sunday Feb 12, 2023
HoP 414 - Henrik Lagerlund on Renaissance Skepticism
Sunday Feb 12, 2023
Sunday Feb 12, 2023
No doubt that we're in good hands with interview guest Henrik Lagerlund, who brings his expertise in the history of skepticism to bear on the French Renaissance.

Sunday Jan 29, 2023
HoP 413 - Don’t Be So Sure - French Skepticism
Sunday Jan 29, 2023
Sunday Jan 29, 2023
The sources and scope of the skepticism of Montaigne, Charron, and Sanches.

Sunday Jan 15, 2023
HoP 412 - Not Matter, But Me - Michel de Montaigne
Sunday Jan 15, 2023
Sunday Jan 15, 2023
In his “Essays” Montaigne uses his wit, insight, and humanist training to tackle his favorite subject: Montaigne.

Sunday Jan 01, 2023
HoP 411 - Pen Pals - Later French Humanism
Sunday Jan 01, 2023
Sunday Jan 01, 2023
Joseph Scaliger, Isaac Casaubon, and Guillaume du Vair grapple with history and the events of their own day.

Sunday Dec 18, 2022
HoP 410 - Ann Blair on Jean Bodin’s Natural Philosophy
Sunday Dec 18, 2022
Sunday Dec 18, 2022
A chat with Ann Blair about the "Theater of Nature" by Jean Bodin, and other encyclopedic works of natural philosophy.

Sunday Dec 04, 2022
HoP 409 - One to Rule Them All - Jean Bodin
Sunday Dec 04, 2022
Sunday Dec 04, 2022
The polymath Jean Bodin produces a pioneering theory of political sovereignty along the way to defending the absolute power of the French king.

Sunday Nov 20, 2022
HoP 408 - Constitutional Conventions - the Huguenots
Sunday Nov 20, 2022
Sunday Nov 20, 2022
Protestant French thinkers like François Hotman and Theodore Beza propose a radical political philosophy: the king rules at the pleasure of his subjects.

Sunday Nov 06, 2022
HoP 407 - Maria Rosa Antognazza on Early Modern Toleration
Sunday Nov 06, 2022
Sunday Nov 06, 2022
An interview on the nature of religious tolerance, and the forms it took during the Reformation and in the thought of early modern thinkers like Locke and Leibniz.