Head to Head

Society’s battle against what Richard Nixon called ‘public enemy number one’ is an ancient one. Is there any sense in fighting?

Once described as a ‘slow-motion car crash’, relations between Turkey – or Türkiye – and the rest of Europe have often been defined by suspicion and mistrust. Do historical grievances define the country’s relationship with Europe?

Over 60 years after escaping French rule, Algerian memory of the War of Independence remains a thorny issue. 

On the 50th anniversary of Watergate we ask four historians about its afterlife – beyond the impressively versatile -gate suffix.

As conventional wisdom has it, Europe began to see the light at the end of a dark age sometime around 1500. Four experts try to date the birth of modernity.

Four experts debunk the myth of modestly covered piano legs and point the finger of blame at ungrateful modernists. 

Announced on 12 March 1947 with the intention of containing Soviet expansion, the Truman Doctrine is sometimes seen as the first declaration of the Cold War. Four experts ask whether the conflict’s legacy is a defining one.

On the 100th anniversary of its publication, James Joyce’s Ulysses is widely regarded as a groundbreaking work of fiction, but can literature have any impact outside the confines of culture? 

Four historians consider whether the traditional Whig history of Britain, as one of evolutionary political progress, has ever been challenged by events. 

Four historians consider the consequences of the ‘Day of Infamy’ on 7 December 1941, and whether it was the ultimate reason for Germany, Italy and Japan’s defeat.