Heroism: 2. Revolution and Pragmatism
Rory Stewart: The Long History of...
BBC
4.6 • 593 Ratings
🗓️ 11 August 2025
⏱️ 29 minutes
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Summary
Rory Stewart explores ideas of what it means to be a hero from the ancient world to the present day. How have these ideas changed? Why do heroes matter? Who are the heroes we need today?
With the help of leading historians, psychologists, philosophers and theologians, he examines how heroism is continually questioned and re-invented in every age, and how these contrasting visions of the hero might speak to us in our own time. What does it mean for our moral life? How should we perceive and pursue human excellence?
In this episode, Rory explores ideas of the hero in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Presenter: Rory Stewart Producer and sound design: Dan Tierney Editor: Tim Pemberton Commissioning Editor: Dan Clarke
Transcript
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| 0:18.8 | whether we like it or not. From declining birth rates to disinformation online, can they solve the world's biggest challenges? |
| 0:26.0 | What I would love to do is go to the transfer and say radically cut the taxes of those with |
| 0:30.2 | children. |
| 0:31.3 | Radical with me and Mul Rajan. Listen on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:36.3 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:40.1 | This is Rory Stewart and welcome to the long history of heroism. |
| 0:44.8 | Episodes are released weekly, wherever you get your podcasts. |
| 0:48.5 | But if you're in the UK, you can listen to the whole series right now, first, on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:55.3 | Tonight, British servicemen and women are engaged from air, land and sea. |
| 1:00.2 | Their mission to remove Saddam Hussein from power and disarm Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction. |
| 1:07.6 | In 2003, I was appointed as the deputy governor of two provinces in southern Iraq. |
| 1:14.2 | I was a British diplomat in a landscape in which Alexander the Great had died. |
| 1:20.5 | I found myself commanding a compound under siege we were attacked by some Sadriss militia. |
| 1:25.6 | These forces attacked the CPA building and |
| 1:28.4 | patrols in and around the city starting at 1930 last night. My bodyguard team ended up on the roof |
| 1:34.6 | with heavy machine guns defending us. I thought that we were going to be overrun and killed. |
| 1:41.3 | So I evacuated the civilian staff, put them into armoured vehicles, |
| 1:46.0 | and stood on the roof with our team and watched the civilians drive out of the building into an ambush. |
| 1:53.0 | Their vehicle was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, and I felt they were all going to die. |
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