Anglotopia Podcast

About Anglotopia Podcast

The Anglotopia Podcast is your deep dive into the rich and diverse world of British culture, hosted by Jonathan and Jacqueline Thomas, publishers of Anglotopia.net and Londontopia.net. Each episode takes you on a journey through iconic British television, captivating historical events, and essential travel tips, ensuring you experience the very best of the British Isles. Our engaging discussions feature important British guests and authors, covering everything from the latest trends and timeless traditions to hidden gems and popular landmarks. Whether you're a passionate Anglophile or simply curious about the UK, our podcast offers a delightful mix of insights and entertainment. Join us as we celebrate the charm, heritage, and unique allure of Britain, making every episode a must-listen for anyone who loves all things British.

Publisher

Anglotopia LLC

Category

society & culture · society & culture · tv & film

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

3 Jan 2019

Latest episode

19 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

130 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   19 Oct 2026

   Strictly Jane Austen Episode 6: The King of Bath – Beau Nash – The Man Who Talked an Entire City Into Existence

   This is part of a special Jane Austen series, sponsored throughout by Strictly Jane Austen. It is one of Jonathan's favorite kinds of story: the man who talks an entire city into existence. Picture him arriving in Bath in the early 1700s — a chancer, a gambler, a womanizer, with no visible income, no rank, no property, and nothing to recommend him but charm, brilliant conversation, gold braid and an unmistakable white hat. Within a few years he has made himself the absolute monarch of the place. He writes the rules. He decides who dances with whom and when the evening ends. He turns a provincial spa town into the most fashionable destination in Britain. His name was Richard Nash, and everyone called him Beau. If you have read Northanger Abbey or Persuasion, you have walked through the world Beau Nash built — the Pump Room, the Lower Rooms, the ceremonies of introduction, the etiquette that governs whether Catherine Morland may even speak to Mr. Tilney. Dr. Moira Rudolf, historian of Georgian and Regency Bath, returns to introduce the man who wrote those rules, and the extraordinary trio who built the city he ruled. Along the way: the small debt and the pair of boots, two plays, a tobacco box and a fiddle Nash left behind at Oxford; the pageant that earned him a knighthood from William III, which he refused; the duel that vacated the post of Master of Ceremonies and handed him the city; the Brussels lace apron he tore from the waist of the Duchess of Queensbury and flung into the back benches, and her entirely good-humored apology; the royal princess told she could not dance after eleven; the fortune Ralph Allen made from reforming the postal service and then made again from the stone under Combe Down; the gravity railway that ran it down the hill with a nervous brakeman on the back; John Wood the Elder's plan to rebuild Bath as ancient Rome, and his death weeks after laying the foundation stone of the Circus; a full walk through a typical Bath day, from the six o'clock bath and the sweating cure to the Pump Room arrivals book and the supper boxes in the pleasure gardens; and the sorry end — a court case over a proto-roulette game called EO that cost Nash the city's trust and left him downsizing into his mistress's house. 🎀 OUR SPONSOR: STRICTLY JANE AUSTEN This Jane Austen series is brought to you by Strictly Jane Austen — Bath's most Austentatious travel company. If this episode has put you in the mood to experience the Regency for yourself, there is no better way than stepping into Jane Austen's Bath with an expert guide — and this is an episode that rewards walking the ground. Nash's Bath is still there to be found: the Pump Room, Terrace Walk and Parade Gardens where Harrison's Rooms once stood, the Lower Rooms' riverside setting, Queen Square, the Circus, the Royal Crescent, and the house beside the Theatre Royal with its plaque to Beau Nash. What they offer: Expert Guided Tours of Jane Austen's Bath — Private walking tours led by expert Janeite guides Period Dress Hire & Afternoon Tea in Bath — Regency costume delivered to your hotel, then promenade through Bath and take afternoon tea in a historic tearoom Bridgerton in Bath — The city's Bridgerton filming locations and Regency high society Jane Austen & Bath's Gothic History Twilight Tour — Northanger Abbey, Frankenstein, and the darker side of Regency Bath Discovering Jane — A Three-Night Travel Experience in Bath & Hampshire — The full immersive short break Escape to Bath by Rail from London — Paddington to Austen's Bath in style Bespoke Group Tours of Bath & Hampshire — For individuals, couples, book clubs and groups of any size Annual Jane Austen Celebrations — Dance, discussion and Regency merriment at the Gainsborough Bath Spa 🎁 Gift Vouchers — The perfect present for the Janeite in your life Book or learn more at strictlyjaneausten.com · Call +44 1225 333747 (Mon–Fri, 09:00–17:00 GMT) Follow them:

2. 

   16 Oct 2026

   I Walked Hadrian’s Wall Coast to Coast — Here’s What It Was Actually Like – Blisters, Meat Pies & Beautiful Countryside

   Jonathan is finally ready to talk about it. After fifteen years of wanting to, a year of preparation and nine days of walking, he completed the Hadrian's Wall Path National Trail — coast to coast across the neck of England, from Wallsend in the east to Bowness-on-Solway in the west, following a line a Roman emperor drew across Britain nearly two thousand years ago. This is the full account: what it was actually like, what he learned, the glorious bits and the genuinely hard bits, and whether you should do it too. The honest version includes a first leg out of Newcastle that was frankly a disappointment — graffiti on every information board, burnt-out shopping trolleys, an industrial hum he recognized from growing up near the Indiana steel mills. It includes three cafés and leisure centers that turned out to be shut when he arrived starving. It includes a thousand-foot climb he's not sure he could have managed if he hadn't broken the first day in half, and a final fifteen-mile stretch across open marshland with no shade and cars passing at sixty that was, he says plainly, the hardest day of the whole thing. But it also includes the day that made the entire walk worth it: a tiny church alone on a hill at Heavenfield, sheltered from a ferocious wind by ancient trees, empty, silent, and one of the most beautiful places he has ever been. And a man in a lay-by whose entire job is selling two-pound cups of tea to walkers, who became his hero. And honesty sheds with kettles and PayPal QR codes. And a communal dinner with eleven strangers at a Lanercost B&B that he dreaded and which turned out to be one of his favorite evenings of the trip. And standing at the little hut at Bowness with Scotland in the distance, phoning his wife in tears. Plus the practical stuff: how the self-guided model actually works, why you will walk considerably more than 84 miles, why distance is a bad measure of difficulty, and what he'd tell you to do differently. 🥾 OUR SPONSOR: MACS ADVENTURE This episode is brought to you by Macs Adventure — the self-guided walking and cycling specialists who planned and booked Jonathan's entire Hadrian's Wall walk and made it possible. The self-guided model is the reason a walk like this is achievable for someone who isn't a hardened hiker. You walk at your own pace, on your own, but everything else is arranged: a bed booked every night along the route, breakfast included, and — the genuinely magic part — luggage transfer, so you leave your bag at reception each morning and it appears at your next stay while you carry only a day pack. You also get their app, which handles navigation, distance, pace, elevation profiles and a written briefing for each day including where to find food and facilities. There's a 24-hour emergency line if things go wrong. As Jonathan puts it: you still have to walk every hard mile yourself, and nobody carries you. But the logistics are handled by a staff of people who have done these walks themselves, and that is what makes it manageable. Hadrian's Wall Path — East to West — 9 days, 8 nights (the direction Jonathan walked) Hadrian's Wall Path — West to East — 9 days, 8 nights, with the prevailing weather and sun at your back Best of Hadrian's Wall Path — shorter options if you want the finest central section without the full coast-to-coast All Macs Adventure Hadrian's Wall itineraries Book one a year ahead if you can — there is a limited stock of accommodation near the trail, and Jonathan's was booked the October before he walked. Links The Trail Itself Hadrian's Wall Path National Trail — the official trail site Hadrian's Wall Path Passport — £6, stamped at points along the route, with the fee going toward maintaining the trail AD 122 Hadrian's Wall Bus — the seasonal bus along the central section, and a perfectly honorable way to skip a stretch SplashMaps — the fabric maps that also sponsored the walk, and which everyone along the trail

3. 

   12 Oct 2026

   Strictly Jane Austen Episode 5: America’s Love Affair with Jane Austen — One of Literature’s Strangest Romances

   This is Episode 5 of a special six-part Jane Austen series, sponsored throughout by Strictly Jane Austen. It is, when you stop to think about it, one of the strangest love affairs in literary history. Here is a country founded on tearing up the rule book of aristocracy, of inherited rank, of who married whom — a nation that fought a war precisely to be free of all of it. And what does it do? It falls utterly and permanently for a clergyman's daughter from Hampshire who wrote six novels about the English gentry. Americans fill ballrooms in Regency gowns. They queue for Chawton. They've given the world Clueless, Bridget Jones, and Mr. Darcy fighting zombies. Mark Twain loathed her so passionately he said he wanted to dig her up — and lost, comprehensively, to his own countrymen. Jonathan Thomas is joined by Dr. Gabrielle Malcolm, who holds a PhD from the University of Kent, is the author of Fan Phenomena: Jane Austen and There's Something About Darcy, and is the creative director of Strictly Jane Austen — so there is nobody better placed to explain what draws people across an ocean to walk in Austen's footsteps. The conversation starts with the tote bag that started it all: Gabrielle moved to Bath, saw students and tourists carrying bags reading "I ♥ Darcy," and realized no other character in English literature could possibly warrant one. Along the way: why everybody calls her Jane and nobody calls Dickens Charlie; the Netherfield scene that demonstrates exactly how Austen gets inside everyone's head at once; her genuinely provocative argument that Americans recognized Austen's contribution before the English did; the Victorian children's novel in which an American girl visits Austen's grave and the cathedral warden has no idea who she's talking about; why male academics were still dismissing Austen as a romance writer within living memory; what makes Darcy structurally different from Rochester and Heathcliff — he is the one who actually changes, rather than needing to be set on fire first; why the 1995 adaptation and the growth of the internet were a tandem phenomenon; why Austen fandom is, improbably, the kindest corner of the internet; and why Bath — a city Austen never much liked — became the heart of the pilgrimage. 🎀 OUR SPONSOR: STRICTLY JANE AUSTEN This entire six-part series is brought to you by Strictly Jane Austen — Bath's most Austentatious travel company. Today's guest, Dr. Gabrielle Malcolm, is their creative director, and in this episode she explains exactly what she was brought in to build. Gabrielle's role is to recruit the speakers and specialists — experts in Georgian embroidery, fashion, architecture and gardens, the literary history of Austen's writing and her family — so that guests spend each day of a residency doing something different. Guests stay at the Gainsborough Bath Spa, with access to the warm spa waters, the opportunity to dress in Regency costume (which in Bath, as Gabrielle notes, causes nobody to bat an eyelid), and the chance to actually spend time with those speakers rather than simply hear them. Novelist Gill Hornby, whose Miss Austen has now been dramatized for television, has been among them. And if you want a shorter visit, the expert guided walk is the thing: an architectural historian or literary specialist who will take you to the nooks and crannies of Jane Austen's Bath — Sydney Place and Sydney Gardens, Gay Street, the Old Theatre Royal, Milsom Street — the places we know from her letters that she shopped, bought her walking boots, and bought the stationery she wrote them on. What they offer: Expert Guided Tours of Jane Austen's Bath — Private walking tours led by expert Janeite guides Period Dress Hire & Afternoon Tea in Bath — Regency costume delivered to your hotel, then promenade through Bath and take afternoon tea in a historic tearoom Bridgerton in Bath — The city's Bridgerton filming locations and Regency high society Jane Austen & Ba

Who has been a guest on Anglotopia Podcast

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Charles F Rosenay
• Mary Valentine
• Ian Russell
• Gillian Healey
• Becky Aikman

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.6 / 5

8 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 58 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

71

Social presence

94

YouTube

0

Engagement

67

Contact Anglotopia Podcast

Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

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