The Blitz: An Alternative History

Dan Snow's History Hit

History Hit

History

4.7 • 12.9K Ratings

🗓️ 10 September 2021

⏱️ 46 minutes

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Summary

Between September 1940 and May 1941, the German Luftwaffe relentlessly pounded British cities with bombs in an attempt to force the British to surrender. Ultimately whilst killing thousands and causing extensive damage the bombing offensive failed. The morale of the British public was largely undimmed and war production was never seriously impacted. The Blitz has become a key part of the British national psyche with many celebrating the 'Blitz spirit' with people coming together and helping one another during the crisis. But, as with much of history, the reality was much messier and complex. Spivs and looters profited from the chaos, people explored new ideas and sexualities, and there were new opportunities for women. In this interview taken from our archive, Joshua Levine author of The Secret History of the Blitz discusses the myths and realities of the Blitz and the social and political changes it brought about.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi everybody, welcome to Dan Snow's History Hit. We're going to deep back into the archives.
0:04.9	The History Hit Volks, we've spun the big silver circular handle thing. We've slid back
0:10.9	the vault with Deep Underground. Like Indiana Jones when he puts the Ark of the Covenant
0:15.4	somewhere it's never going to be found. And we found this from our archives. This week
0:19.4	in 1940 was the start of the Blitz on London, the aerosol on London as Hitler director Le
0:25.7	to try and smash Britain's imperial capital. To bring the British government's their knees,
0:31.5	make them see sense, force them to negotiate a peace with Hitler so he could turn east
0:36.4	and achieve his dream of Laban's realm of empire and east. And so Le Fafa bombs fell
0:41.5	on the docks of London on the 7th September 1940 and for most of the days following
0:47.4	right up to and after Christmas. This event that's formative in Britain's national character
0:53.3	today has become mythological. So we thought we talked to Joshua Levine back in 2016 in
0:57.6	this podcast about the Blitz, the real history, the secret history of the Blitz. Joshua
1:02.5	Levine has written prize winning history books. He's written about the second world of subjects.
1:07.0	He was the historical advisor of Dunkirk, Christopher Nolan's epic adventure movie set during
1:12.8	the Dunkirk evacuation of May, June 1940. Love that film. So he is the guy to tell us
1:19.9	all about it. You can listen to other episodes in the deep, deep archives of this podcast
1:24.8	only at History Hit TV by becoming a subscriber there. Only the most recent pods are available
1:29.8	for free on the rest of the internet. The real goal, the real archive is buried away there
1:35.0	on HistoryHit.tv. Go there. HistoryHit.tv. Subscribe. You get the world's best history
1:40.2	channel. You get hundreds of hours of TV documentaries. You'll get these podcasts.
1:44.4	It's a sweet deal. This is amazing. I'm so glad we invented it. In the meantime, though,
1:48.0	here is Joshua Levine on the Blitz. Enjoy.
	...

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