Beyond the Text: The Intellectual Historian's Podcast

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Who was Thomas More before he became a martyr — and why did a man at the heart of Tudor government imagine a society called “nowhere”?

Samuel Woodall and Jack Thomson begin a new Beyond the Text series on More and Utopia. We explore the lawyer, humanist and statesman behind the famous book: his education, his friendship with Erasmus, his religious commitments and his uneasy place in Henry VIII’s political world.

From Augustine and Plato to poverty, punishment and public service, we ask whether Utopia offers an ideal society, a satire of existing institutions, or a way to think more carefully about political action. Can we remake the world — or must we learn to steer the ship?

CHAPTERS
00:00 Opening music
00:10 Introducing Thomas More
01:10 Reading More through his life
02:09 Education, philosophy and law
03:40 Religious vocation and life in the world
05:16 Utopia and Tudor public life
08:03 Translation, satire and the travel narrative
09:14 Why “Utopia” means nowhere
10:29 Augustine and Plato
12:03 Poverty, theft and punishment
14:02 Wolsey, Henry VIII and political service
16:21 Oaths, conscience and the break with Rome
17:05 Trial, Socrates and the philosopher in politics
18:29 The perfect society and steering the ship
19:20 Execution and legacy
20:04 Canonisation and Erasmus
21:15 Looking ahead to Utopia

CHRONOLOGY NOTES
More served as Speaker in 1523. He was imprisoned in April 1534 and executed on 6 July 1535. The title page and island illustration shown in the video are from the 1518 edition of Utopia; the book first appeared in 1516.

READ AND DISCUSS
https://beyondthetext.co.uk
https://theintellectualhistorian.com
https://thehistoryofideasclub.co.uk

READING
Thomas More, Utopia:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/26971
Augustine, The City of God:
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1201.htm
Thomas More chronology:
https://thomasmorestudies.org/chronology/

MUSIC
“Queens Arrival” — Red Planet / TakeTones.

WATCH ON YOUTUBE
https://youtu.be/LGp0HvU3ZTI

#ThomasMore #Utopia #IntellectualHistory
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Can remembering persecution teach people to tolerate beliefs they think are wrong?

In the final episode of this three-part series, Samuel Woodall explores John Foxe’s appeal for the Dutch Anabaptists condemned in 1575, Protestant exile, Sebastian Castellio and the limits of Elizabethan toleration. Foxe opposed execution for religious error while still rejecting the beliefs of those he tried to protect. His example raises a difficult question: why can the same memory of suffering encourage both mercy and exclusion?

CHAPTERS
00:00 Theme and introduction
01:08 The problem with a history of progress
01:50 Persecution within Protestant reform
03:08 The Dutch Anabaptists of 1575
03:46 Foxe’s appeal to Elizabeth I
04:45 Toleration without approval
05:42 Exile, Castellio and conscience
07:26 The limits of Elizabethan toleration
08:11 Coexistence in everyday life
09:39 Can persecution produce toleration?
10:58 Series conclusion and bonus episode

READ ALONG
John Foxe, Acts and Monuments: The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online, University of Sheffield:
https://www.dhi.ac.uk/foxe/

SELECTED READING
John Foxe, Acts and Monuments.
Alexandra Walsham, Charitable Hatred: Tolerance and Intolerance in England, 1500–1700.
G. R. Elton, Persecution and Toleration in the English Reformation.
Susan Royal, Lollards in the English Reformation: History, Radicalism and John Foxe.

THE FOXE SERIES
Episode 1 — Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Making of Protestant England:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2238237/episodes/20104628
Episode 2 — Did Foxe Create English Anti-Catholicism?:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2238237/episodes/20104715

EXPLORE AND DISCUSS
Beyond the Text: https://beyondthetext.co.uk
The Intellectual Historian: https://theintellectualhistorian.com
The History of Ideas Reading Club: https://thehistoryofideasclub.co.uk

Music: “Queens Arrival” — Red Planet / TakeTones.
Cover: illustrative artwork created for this episode.

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Did John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs create English anti-Catholicism—or give an existing conflict its most enduring stories?

In the second of three solo episodes, Samuel Woodall examines the image of “Bloody Mary”, the changing editions of Acts and Monuments, the papal bull against Elizabeth I and Robert Persons’s Catholic response. The discussion asks how rival histories turned persecution into national memory, and why memories of suffering could encourage both religious exclusion and sympathy for conscience.

CHAPTERS
00:00 Theme and introduction
01:07 Foxe’s polemical history
03:28 Why the editions and political context matter
05:25 Robert Persons and the Catholic response
07:24 Evidence, credibility and rival histories
07:57 Memory, identity and the Catholic other
09:01 Tolerance and intolerance together
10:14 Did Foxe create English anti-Catholicism?
11:21 The question of toleration

READ ALONG
John Foxe, Acts and Monuments: The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online, University of Sheffield:
https://www.dhi.ac.uk/foxe/

SELECTED READING
John Foxe, Acts and Monuments (English editions: 1563, 1570, 1576 and 1583).
Robert Persons (also known as Parsons), A Treatise of Three Conversions of England (1603–1604).
Alexandra Walsham, Charitable Hatred: Tolerance and Intolerance in England, 1500–1700.

PREVIOUS EPISODE
Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Making of Protestant England:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2238237/episodes/20104628

EXPLORE AND DISCUSS
Beyond the Text: https://beyondthetext.co.uk
The Intellectual Historian: https://theintellectualhistorian.com
The History of Ideas Reading Club: https://thehistoryofideasclub.co.uk

Music: “Queens Arrival” — Red Planet / TakeTones.
Cover: illustrative artwork created for this episode.
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John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments was one of the most influential books of the English Reformation. In the first of three solo episodes, Samuel Woodall explores how Foxe transformed persecution, exile and martyrdom into a history of Protestant England—and asks what we gain and lose when suffering becomes national memory.

From Foxe’s continental exile and the Lollards to the Marian burnings, the episode examines the book’s woodcuts, documentary sources, changing editions and collaborative production. It also considers the tension between a powerful Protestant identity and the disturbing question preserved in these stories: should governments have the power to kill people for belief?

CHAPTERS
00:00 Theme and introduction
01:10 John Foxe’s life and exile
02:24 The Lollards and a Protestant prehistory
03:38 Edward VI, Mary I and religious reversal
04:28 Martyr narratives and the woodcuts
05:08 Foxe’s sources and historical evidence
05:45 The book’s physical form and the power of print
06:41 Cranmer’s story
07:09 A book that kept changing
08:39 How to read martyr stories
09:07 A network of Protestant remembrance
09:31 The making—and costs—of Protestant England
10:35 Persecution, memory and the next episode

READ ALONG
John Foxe, Acts and Monuments: The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online, University of Sheffield:
https://www.dhi.ac.uk/foxe/

SELECTED READING
John N. King (ed.), Foxe’s Book of Martyrs: Select Narratives.
Alexandra Walsham, Charitable Hatred: Tolerance and Intolerance in England, 1500–1700.
Susan Royal, Lollards in the English Reformation: History, Radicalism and John Foxe.

EXPLORE AND DISCUSS
Beyond the Text: https://beyondthetext.co.uk
The Intellectual Historian: https://theintellectualhistorian.com
The History of Ideas Reading Club: https://thehistoryofideasclub.co.uk

Music: “Queens Arrival” — Red Planet / TakeTones.
Cover: illustrative artwork created for this episode.

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Was seventeenth-century England travelling inevitably towards constitutional liberty? Samuel Woodall explores a century in which monarchy, Parliament, religion and conscience repeatedly collided, from James VI and I to the Civil Wars and the Glorious Revolution. Drawing on Quentin Skinner, J. G. A. Pocock, Patrick Collinson, Johann Sommerville, John Morrill, Jonathan Scott, Mark Goldie and Steve Pincus, this solo episode examines how intellectual historians reconstruct arguments in their own historical settings. We consider divine right and the ancient constitution, Charles I and the crisis across the Stuart kingdoms, the Levellers and Putney Debates, Hobbes and Harrington, Restoration politics, Locke, and the contested settlement of 1688-89. CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction 01:23 Historians and method 03:45 James VI and I 06:02 Charles I and the Civil Wars 09:20 Cromwell, Hobbes and Harrington 10:33 Restoration and Locke 12:24 James II and the Glorious Revolution 14:29 Conclusion: who has the authority to judge? PRIMARY WORKS DISCUSSED James VI and I, The True Law of Free Monarchies and Basilikon Doron Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan James Harrington, The Commonwealth of Oceana Robert Filmer, Patriarcha John Locke, Two Treatises of Government STAY CONNECTED Essays and reading guides: https://theintellectualhistorian.com/ Free monthly newsletter: https://theintellectualhistorian.com/newsletter/ Beyond the Text: https://beyondthetext.co.uk/podcasts/ History of Ideas Reading Club: https://thehistoryofideasclub.co.uk/ Support the podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2238237/support Hosted by Samuel Woodall. Theme: “Queens Arrival” by Red Planet, licensed through TakeTones.
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