27 September 2005
Tuesday 27 September 2005 22:00-22:30 (Radio 3)
Philip Dodd talks to two men who have exerted their influence on contemporary culture in vastly different ways, the historian Simon Schama and the publicist Max Clifford.
Simon Schama, one of this country's most celebrated historians, best known for his BBC TV series The History of Britain, talks about his new book Rough Crossings, Britain, The Slaves and the American Revolution, in which he tells the little-known story of the thousands of African American slaves who opted to join the British during the American War of Independence in return for the promise of freedom from the British.
The book follows the mass exodus of African American slaves from America to Nova Scotia and to Britain, and tells of the foundation of a colony in Sierra Leone of free Blacks. How free were the Blacks from a different kind of British tyranny, what was the impact on Anglo-American relations then and now, and how does Schama himself feel about exposing the less than honourable history of the country he has lived in for the last 20 years?
Max Clifford is a public relations supremo and no stranger to exposing the truth as he sees it. With the publication on his autobiography Read All About It, Phillip Dodd asks him about the way in which his view of the world influences how he attempts to have it portrayed to others and the impact this has on contemporary culture.
Presented by Philip Dodd.
