On the Spot: Nicholas Radburn
‘Who is the most underrated person in history? Olaudah Equiano. His resilience in the face of adversity was phenomenal.’
Why are you a historian of the Atlantic World?
The Atlantic World is so vast and diverse; I’ll never run out of places and peoples to study.
What’s the most important lesson history has taught you?
The depths of evil to which humans can plunge, but also their enormous capacity for goodness.
Which history book has had the greatest influence on you?
Marcus Rediker’s The Slave Ship: A Human History, as it pushed me to study the trans-Atlantic slave trade from the bottom up.
What book in your field should everyone read?
Saltwater Slavery by Stephanie Smallwood.
Which moment would you most like to go back to?
The first meeting between Cortés and Montezuma in 1519.
Which historian has had the greatest influence on you?
Alfred Crosby, as he made me appreciate how the natural world shaped human history.
Which person in history would you most like to have met?
No one as they’d probably give me a deadly virus – or vice versa.
How many languages do you have?
English, French, and Spanish. I’m going to learn Māori next year.
What historical topic have you changed your mind on?
The Industrial Revolution. Was it industrial? Was it a revolution?
What is the most common misconception about your field?
That Africa was unimportant to the making of the Atlantic World.
What’s the most exciting field in history today?
Environmental history, as it speaks so clearly to the crises we face today.
Who is the most underrated person in history…
Olaudah Equiano. His resilience in the face of adversity was phenomenal.
… and the most overrated?
George Washington. He was a terrible general!
Is there an important historical text you have not read?
The most glaring is probably Time on the Cross.
What’s your favourite archive?
The National Archives in London.
What’s the best museum?
The Mary Rose Museum in Portsmouth.
What technology has changed the world the most?
The steam engine, as it sparked the fossil fuel revolution.
Recommend us a historical novel...
Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth.
... and a historical drama?
Sharpe.
You can solve one historical mystery. What is it?
To find the lost journal of Christopher Columbus’ first voyage to the Americas.
Nicholas Radburn is Senior Lecturer in the history of the Atlantic World at Lancaster University and author of the Wolfson Prize-shortlisted Traders in Men: Merchants and the Transformation of the Transatlantic Slave Trade (Yale University Press, 2024).
