‘Complex marriage’, ‘male continence’ and the selection of the perfect partner were all themes propounded by a 19th-century cult in New York State. Clive Foss explores the influence of Plato’s Republic on John Humphrey Noyes and his Perfectionist movement.
In 1959 Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba after a masterly campaign of guerrilla warfare. Drawing on this success, Castro and his followers, including Che Guevara, sought to spread their revolution, as Clive Foss explains.
Clive Foss enjoys the architecture of Cuba’s capital, with varied elements from every era of its past making an exotic mix.
Clive Foss introduces the Kharijites, a radical sect from the first century of Islam based in southern Iraq and Iran, who adopted an extreme interpretation of the Koran, ruthless tactics and opposed hereditary political leadership. After causing centuries of problems to the caliphate, they survive in a quietist form in East Africa and Oman.
As preparations are made for Saddam Hussein’s trial in Iraq, Clive Foss examines the precedents for bringing tyrants to justice and finds the process fraught with political complexity.
Clive Foss looks at the way in which Kemal Atatürk rewrote history as part of his radical modernization of the Turkish nation.
Clive Foss investigates how Stalin changed the calendar to keep the Soviet people continually at work.
With Evita as its star, Juan Perón’s propaganda campaign won Argentina's affection for the populist dictatorship, at least for a while.
Clive Foss tells how the airship phenomenon caught the imagination of the Soviet Union – becoming a key propaganda tool to Stalin, both at home and abroad.
