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Hi, everyone. Welcome back to Britain Under the Microscope. 欢迎回来【闲话英伦】. Hi, 安澜.

Hi. Lulu. Hi, everyone.

So in the previous episode we were focusing on nature documentaries, especially those made by BBC. In this episode, let's move on to history documentaries which I know you love.

I love history documentaries. I just love absolutely everything about history.

In this we’re so different because history has got to be one of my biggest headaches when I was in school. I think the reason why I didn't like history is because I thought it was so boring. It was mostly about memorizing dates and names and facts.

Yeah, I know that a lot of people they learn history that way, but when I was at school and also outside of school as well, I learned history by the stories and that's the thing that I found really fun is that there's so many stories, it’s not just names of kings or queens or emperors. They are actual people, they’re the stories behind all of these grand events in history.

This is what I said about, I've recently started to get into documentaries because some of these great documentaries they really bring history to life.

I know we're gonna be talking about BBC documentaries, but I can even see that now in China there's some really great history documentaries that do bring history to life.

Yeah, it's not just this really like very rigid structure and almost like textbook materials. This is the thing, they start to do things like docudrama or like reenactment就是那种场景再现. Docudrama就是documentary和drama拼在一起的. So they would hire actual actors to act as these famous historical figures. That is also very popular in the UK.

Very very popular. One of the…ones I liked the most is a bit old now is called Days that Shook the World.

Yes I love that. Days that Shook the World, when I was watching it, I did not even think I was watching documentary.

Yep. Because it's just a very simple premise. Basically it's one day that's really meant to us in history and they go through it step by step, so minute by minute.

And they get actors and actresses to act as these people. It's really gripping.

Yes, it is. And it's different from a drama because as you say it's a docudrama, so it's really authentic, it's very close to the original.

This is one trend of trying to make it into a docudrama.

The other trend I don't know if you would agree with me is that you see a lot of scholars but they are not your conventional scholars or just like being very serious and giving you all these theories.

Yeah. In the UK, I would say one of the most famous scholars who appears in these history documentaries is Mary Beard.

Mary beard. Is she the one who's doing like ancient Rome?

Yes, she's a professor of classics at Cambridge University. But she's not the typical Cambridge don and she's not dry or boring. She's actually really passionate about her subject. ( don, see also donnish, a teacher at a university, especially Oxford or Cambridge （尤指牛津大学和剑桥大学的）大学教师)

Honestly, my stereotype of an Oxford or Cambridge academic is someone who's very elitist, speak with a posh accent, and just like, basically saying ‘I'm gonna teach you this, and I know you wouldn't understand.’

Yeah, pretty much, that's one thing I really like about this particular presenter is that she makes it really engaging. She brings ancient history down to earth. So she talks about things like graffiti. She talks about how Romans go to the toilet.

Yeah, I remember watching bits of it when she was going around all these ruins in Rome and introducing the artifacts. And I think you could really see passion in her eyes. But she really isn't a TV figure. I don't like judging people's appearance but I'm not even talking about appearance but more like she doesn't really do like all these makeup or grooming and all that, she's got hair all over the place.

Not at all. Her hair is rather unkempt. She's just kind of wearing her normal clothes. So she's wandering around Rome, not dressed in high heels or anything like that. She's just wandered around in trainers.

But you could really see passion. To me, that's what makes her attractive.

Yeah, really really great presenter.

Another one I know that you particularly like as well is Lucy Worsley.

I love Lucy Worsley. I think I have recommended this to our listeners before or to my students. Lucy Worsley is kind of like the other type, is actually quite stylish. She actually does dress up but she dresses up too much.

Yeah, she always dress up in historical costumes. You could tell that she gets really, really excited.

She loves playing dress up.

Exactly. And that's one thing I really like about her as well, not only sh’s really passionate about what she does, but you can really tell that she's having fun doing it.

So if she is talking about witches, she would probably dress up as people from that period of time. If she's talking about the royal family, she will dress up like someone from the royal court.

Pretty much, in these documentaries, as soon as she mentions someone she'll dress up as them.

But we just got directly into her style. What is her identity? She is not a professor of sorts, she's not like Oxbridge professor.

No, she's a chief curator at a Historic Royal Palaces. So Historic Royal Palaces is an independent charity. They're responsible for looking after palaces which are still royal palaces, but they're not used by the royal family anymore. I see. So like Tower of London, for example.

You know, the documentary that I remembered the most that was narrated or presented by Lucy Worsley is called A Very British Murder. That's really good. She also did A Very British Romance. Yeah, and she's just recently done another series of documentaries called Lucy Worsley Investigates.

I love this title, Lucy Worsley Investigates, it sounds like Sherlock Holmes Investigates. It's that type of feeling. 好像那种探案集一样.

And for those of you who are interested in like crime and all these dark suspense things like crime stories. I highly recommend A Very British Murder. It's a three-parter, it's amazing.

It's really good, and a lot of these documentaries you can also find on the internet, and you can also find translated into Chinese.

So what do you think about this whole trend of the down to earth scholars?

I think it's really good, because in the past it was all very preachy. It was experts. I don't like the documentaries where they tried to say ‘how wonderful the past was!’ or ‘how brilliant and amazing these people were!’ They weren't in many cases, they were human, they were the same as us, they had the same feelings, they had the same loves, the same fears.

This is key to making history more accessible and more interesting is that when you think of, for example, an emperor, you don't think of them as someone who actually eats, hangs out with people that they like or goes to sleep or even goes to the toilet.

Yeah, this is the thing, I also think that was some of the more traditional documentaries in China and perhaps in the UK as well, they liked doing these grand narratives.这种宏大叙事. Everything is very grand. It's not about an individual person. It's a whole country. It's a whole army. But they are made up of each individuals. And these individuals they all had their own lives, had their own thoughts.

And that's what I was saying before that recently a lot of these online platforms I've seen some really good documentaries made in China which do that, they have the reenactments, they also make more interesting and exciting.

Yeah. Another trend that I have noticed is they start to blend history with science, like arts and science thing. I love that.

There was a really good series, it’s quite old now, it’s about 10 years old I think, called History Cold Case. Did you ever see that?

History Cold Case, when I was living in London, I believe I briefly saw it on TV I think.

Yeah, it's scientists who use modern forensic techniques to investigate ancient remains and find out how they lived and how they died.

I think Bilibili now has made something similar. Really? Like recently it's got really high rating叫“超时空鉴定”.

And for those of you who are listening to the show and you're also into crime and history and all that, seriously watch that, it's amazing. It’s the same idea. Okay. It's… first of all, they act out an ancient story and this story is based on historical facts and records, documents.

Sounds brilliant. I’d love to watch that myself.

Yeah, it's like a crime for example, and then, this is the first half, the second half is then present-day forensic scientists, experts, going in and try to replicate the crime scene and try to replicate the whole investigation but using modern technology.

I really got to watch that.

Yeah, sounds pretty cool.

And Bilibili is now collaborating with BBC as well. So hopefully more of these platforms or producers can start to collaborate and then we'll have more fascinating things to watch.

Absolutely.

If there's any documentaries that you would like to recommend, please let us know. I'm always on the lookout for really good fun documentaries to watch.

And if you also have watched some of the things that we've mentioned today, leave us comment. Let us know what you think.

Thank you 安澜, for coming to the show.

Thanks a lot Lulu and thanks everyone.

We'll see you next time.

Bye.