
I have a note on my desk that reminds me what Explaining History is for. It says:
“Create useful stuff for students and teachers”
And that’s what I am trying to do here. Each video or audio podcast is created for students to help them not just master modern history so they can get good pass marks, but to become fascinated by it. To become absorbed into it, enmeshed in it, connected to it. As we move away from the 20th Century (which my work is predominantly about), it becomes harder to understand this brutal and yet enigmatic period. The meaning of the 20th Century is highly contested and hard enough for professional academic historians to grapple with, let alone mere history teachers such as I.
For exclusive extra content, please visit the Explaining History Patreon page below, the work is a labour of love, and it happens through the kindness of patrons around the world.
Investigating the 20th Century

Update: Sinn Fein, Northern Ireland and the prospects for reunion – Explaining History
- Update: Sinn Fein, Northern Ireland and the prospects for reunion
- Empire, Fascism and War 1931-39
- Rebuilding Germany – 1945
- Britain's Convoys, Germany's U-Boats
- Update: Roe vs Wade
- Update: The long game emerging in Ukraine
- Stalin's War (Part One)
- Two revolutions and a constitution: In conversation with James Philips
- Update: Musk and Twitter
- Chiang Kai Shek and war with Japan – 1937 (Part Two)
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Latest Posts
Talking about JB Priestley
Hi there everyone, I had the great pleasure to be interviewed on the East Marshian Chronicles podcast recently about the writer JB Priestley and the historical context of his work. You can hear the show here: https://eastmarshianchronicles.buzzsprout.com/1764181/9442034-historian-nick-shepley-on-the-background-and-context-of-an-inspector-calls
When British corruption drops the ball
Traditionally, Britain has managed to avoid appearing to be a corrupt country, because so much of what any rational onlooker might call graft is actually legal. The rewarding of party donors with the ear of cooperative ministers, peerages and other honours enables British politicians to be easily and cheaply bought. This process acts as aContinue reading “When British corruption drops the ball”
Brexit’s Leninists
Reading Everyday Stalinism by Sheila Fitzpatrick (one of my favourite social histories of the USSR, as regular listeners will know), one thing becomes abundantly clear about the Soviet view of time and history itself. The historical and social state that the party would describe as communism was always something to be eventually reached and neverContinue reading “Brexit’s Leninists”
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