My guest today is Rob from English with Rob (podcast/YouTube). Rob is an English teacher, musician from England, and my former colleague. This episode includes lots of musical fun, some chatting about how we make our podcasts, fun word games and much more. Video version also available on YouTube.
In this episode I’m talking to Robert Dylan Walker, aka Rob from English with Rob – the podcast and YouTube channel.
Rob and I already know each other in fact as we used to be colleagues at the British Council, until Rob moved to Germany.
Basically – Rob is an English teacher, a YouTuber and a podcaster. He’s also a musician who likes to make music for his podcast, a photographer and video maker, who likes to use various special effects in his videos, and he’s into jokes and films and things like that, so he’s an ideal guest for me to talk to on this podcast.
The plan is to have a bit of a ramble chat, focusing on things like how we both make our podcasts, especially how we include bits of music in our episodes – and later in this episode we will be playing some of our podcast jingles, breaking them down a bit, explaining how we made them, and we had homework for this episode – to record jingles for each other’s podcasts, but I think that we both ended up recording songs rather than jingles.
So stick around to hear some of our music and generally to get to know Rob a bit, and find out about his podcast and YouTube channel, which you might want to check out as a good resource to help you in your continuing journey to improve your English.
Ending
That was an epic one. Thanks again to Rob for his contribution. Don’t forget to check out English with Rob wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube.
I hope you enjoyed the bits about music and making jingles and that you didn’t get too exhausted by the length. Hopefully you just got carried away and enjoyed getting a nice big dose of English listening into your week.
If you’re interested in more stuff about jingles, then check out the Luke’s English Podcast App – free in the app store. It has a category called Jingles where you can hear most of the jingles I’ve made for the podcast, like the Amber & Paul jingle and more. There’s also that full app-only episode in which I break down every single sample from the LEP Jingle Megamix.
And on the subject of music, you can check out my recent tunes, like the English with Rob song that I did for this podcast and some other little bits of music I’ve been making recently – you can check them out on my soundcloud page.
The last one is a link to the music page on my website where you can find all the Korg Kaossilator tunes I’ve ever made, and also old music mixes I’ve made with my brother and a few comedy tracks too with James.
So, plenty of music stuff to get into.
I hope you enjoyed this episode. I will speak to you again on the podcast soon, but for now it’s time to say good bye…
Talking to pod-pals Amber & Paul about diverse topics including organ harvesting (yes), favourite fruits (exciting), accent challenges, guess the punchline, British Citizenship tests, What the “great” in Great Britain really means, and Amber’s son Hugo’s astonishing fluency in English.
Hello listeners and welcome back to my podcast for learners of English. How are you doing today? Doing ok?
I won’t talk at great length at the start here, suffice to say that as the title of this episode suggests, Amber & Paul are on the podcast again, after a one year absence.
Yes, the tangential trio are at it again.
I’ve been wondering What on earth I should call this episode. As you will hear, the options I had for a snappy title for this one were a bit tricky because our conversation covers some pretty diverse topics, including some quite dark themes, some potentially controversial moments and the usual fun rambling nonsense. It’s hard to sum it up in one pithy clickbait title. I think I’m just calling it “Amber & Paul are on the Podcast” but that does seem like a bit of a cop out. Anyway, we will see what I ultimately choose as a name for this episode.
Here’s a quick hint of the diverse topics which we explore.
Organ harvesting – yes, that’s right, organ harvesting. To get this, you will need to have listened to the previous episode of this podcast (#718), which was a conversation with Michael the hitchhiking shaman from Poland. In that episode Michael explained how, when hitchhiking once, he almost got kidnapped by several people who he suspected were organ harvesters – people involved in the illegal trade of human internal organs. Amber heard that podcast and was sceptical.
This prompted nearly 30 minutes of conversation about the ins and outs of organ harvesting, including how, where, why and who would do this.
Then we go on to do various random questions & challenges from my list of random questions and challenges, so you will get some accent fun, a thrilling discussion of Amber’s favourite fruit and vegetables, a story about Amber’s son Hugo and his surprising articulacy in English, a joke about Spanish firemen, some British citizenship questions about Easter holidays, British overseas territories and why Great Britain is actually called Great Britain, and plenty more besides. So, other than organ harvesting, there isn’t just one theme for this episode, hence the rather generic title.
It’s a thrill ride of an episode which has everything you could expect from a a conversation with Amber & Paul. I hope you enjoy it. Nothing more needs to be said except that you are about to hear a rapid conversation between friends and it might be difficult to follow, so strap in, hold on tight and let the tangential chat commence…
Episode Ending Transcript
Well, there you have it. Amber & Paul reunited on the podcast once more. We’d been waiting for ages for that to happen, and I hope you were not disappointed.
Just in case you were wondering what “tangential” means (and you’re not a long-term listener)
A tangent or a conversational tangent is when someone starts talking about something that is unrelated from the main topic of the conversation. To go off on a tangent.
Tangential is the adjective and it refers to something different from the subject you were talking about. This is typical of all my podcast conversations, but especially those ones with Amber & Paul, and so we are the tangential trio.
As ever I am curious to know what you think about all of this.
Sometimes our conversations become quite rude and inappropriate, but I’m just presenting you a natural conversation between friends, and this sort of thing is normal when socialising in English.
Here are some questions for your consideration:
What do you think of Michael’s organ harvesting story? Do you believe it? Is it possible?
What is your favourite fruit or vegetable?
Why is Great Britain called Great Britain?
Did you hear about the Spanish fireman and his two sons?
Let us know your thoughts and comments in the comment section.
I’ve got a ton of episodes in the pipeline which will be coming out over the next few weeks and months.
Here’s a little taster of things to come:
Bahar from Iran
A couple of episodes about expanding your vocabulary using word quizzes and dictionaries with a returning guest
More episodes in the vague Beatles season including some stuff about the psychology of John Lennon, adjectives for describing personality traits and some analysis of Beatle song lyrics, with a sort of expert guest.
Various stories which I have been searching for and then reading out on the podcast, with YouTube versions (this is because the recent Roald Dahl story I read out was a popular one)
More special guests for interviews and collaborations, more bits of comedy analysed and broken down, and plenty of other things too…
I am still waiting for my shiny thing from YouTube but when it arrives I will be doing another YouTube live stream. Who knows, I might do one before it arrives, but I will let you know.
Premium subscribers, I have the rest of the “What did Rick say” series coming up, and then a similar series called “What did Gill say?” focusing on language from my recent conversation with my mum about The Beatles, following a suggestion from a listener.
So, new premium content is either being published, written or recorded all the time, so watch out for new episodes. www.teacherluke.co.uk/premiuminfo if you’d like to find out more.
I will be back soon with more episodes, but for now it’s time to say goodbye…
Talking to my mum about a book which you could read as part of your English learning routine. The book tells the story of The Beatles and their impact on society. We review the book and then discuss many aspects of The Beatles story, especially the four Beatles themselves.
This is a new episode of Gill’s Book club and I’m talking again to my mum, Gill Thompson about a specific book which you might want to read as part of your English learning routine.
Hello Mum, how are you?
Introduction
The book this time is all about The Beatles, which is a band from England that you *might* have heard of.
You could read this book, and if you did I’m sure you would learn plenty of things both in terms of language and general knowledge, but there’s no pressure to do so. If you like, you can just listen to this conversation with my mum and hopefully this will be interesting and useful enough on its own.
But if you are looking for a good book to read in English, then this one could be a good choice, and hopefully this conversation will help you to understand the whole thing a bit more, which in turn should help you pick up more English from it. So, my advice is: listen to this conversation with my mum and if you’re inspired, get a copy of the book and read it, or if you prefer, just listen to us without feeling any pressure to read the book at all. Hopefully this will still be enjoyable and interesting even if you haven’t read the book and have no plans to do so.
Over 700 episodes and 12 years ago, in the 3rd episode of this podcast, I interviewed my mum about her memories of seeing The Beatles performing live on stage in the 1960s, which she did, twice.
Now, we’re going to talk about the band again, this time focusing on a book which is all about the Beatles phenomenon and their place in history. The plan is to review the book as a text for learners of English, and then have a deeper discussion about The Beatles.
You probably know that I’m a big fan of The Beatles and grew up with their music, as my parents were (and still are) fans too. For years I’ve been thinking about doing more episodes about The Beatles story, and mentally preparing myself for it, but I have never actually got round to recording anything, mainly because the topic is just too big and there’s too much to say! But finally I have actually recorded some episodes that might scratch the surface of this topic a bit, and hopefully will give you something insightful and interesting to listen to, whether you are a fan of this band or whether you know almost nothing about them at all.
So this is going to be the first in a series of episodes in which I talk about Beatle-related things. There’s this one with my mum and then a few episodes with another guest who is an English teacher and something of an expert on The Beatles, and John Lennon in particular.
So, Beatle episodes are coming. I suppose, for some of you, episodes about The Beatles are like busses. You wait ages for one and then loads of them arrive at the same time.
And by the way, I am certainly not forgetting the main focus of this podcast, which is all about helping you learn English. I think The Beatles can help you learn English, reading is very important in learning English, and so why not do some reading about The Beatles?
Plus, later in this Beatles series there will be some language-focused episodes, using The Beatles as a context – focusing on some specific descriptive vocabulary and also some analysis of the Beatles’ song lyrics.
Maybe you’re not a fan of The Beatles. This is fine. I’m not going to try to convince you that you should like their music. That’s a matter of taste. But I do think that their story is something else entirely. I think it is hard to deny the fact that the story of these 4 individuals, the things that happened to them and the impact they had on the world – this is all simply fascinating. It’s an epic story. So, even if you don’t like the music, I hope you stay just for the story.
Now, let’s start this episode of Gill’s Book Club, talking about a recently published book about The Beatles.
Length – Is it a long book?
It’s long (642 pages) but the chapters are short, so it’s possible to read it in little chunks.
It’s available in audiobook and Kindle versions.
Appropriacy for Learners of English
The language is modern and plain in style. It’s quite literary of course, because it is a book and not a screenplay or something, but generally speaking it is clearly written and should be readable for learners with an Upper Intermediate level or above, although there will be some difficult words of course, but that’s good. I would say that overall the style is modern, neutral and definitely the kind of English that I would recommend as a good model of English for my listeners.
The short chapters make the whole thing quite easy to digest. It’s in bitesize chunks.
You can dip into it and you don’t necessarily have to read it in order. It’s almost like a collection of essays.
Audiobook version
The audiobook version on Audible is good – different voices and voice actors doing different accents, including pretty good impressions of the main people involved.
Why is it called “One Two Three Four”?
This is the first thing you hear on the first song on side 1 of The Beatles’ first album “Please Please Me”, released in early 1963 – You can hear Paul McCartney counting the band in at the start of the song by saying “1, 2 , 3 , 4”. Also, there were four Beatles, so…
Ending
So there you have it, after more than 700 episodes I finally returned to the topic of The Beatles with my mum and I think it’s fair to say that we went into quite a lot more depth than we did in episode 3 back in 2009, although episode 3 does include stuff we didn’t mention here, specifically my mum’s account of actually seeing The Beatles perform live, twice. So check out episode 3 if you haven’t done so.
Also you could check out that episode in which I asked my uncle Nic to tell us about the time he met Paul McCartney. He told the story in episode 414, and not only has he met Paul, he’s also played football with the members of Pink Floyd and hung out with The Who backstage at one of their concerts, and more. So check that one out too. Links for those episodes are on the page for this one on my website of course.
I really hope you enjoyed listening to this episode. I must admit that although I feel compelled to talk about this subject at length, part of me is concerned that this is all too much for my audience but I suppose those people who aren’t into this can just skip this stuff. It’s completely up to you. But do let me know what you think.
Remember, any time you have any thoughts about what you are hearing on this podcast, if you have responses or comments in your head as you listen, you can express them in English and I will read those comments, and so will many other LEPsters. The best place to leave your comments is on the page for the relevant episode on my website. Go to EPISODES in the menu and find the relevant episode page, scroll to the bottom and that’s where you will find the comment section. I am curious to see what you think. Any Beatle fans, get in touch. Non Beatle fans, I want to know what you’re thinking. Remember, sometimes doing this podcast is a bit like talking into the void and not quite knowing what people are thinking while I’m doing it.
I won’t talk much more at the end here, except that of course there are millions of things I wish I could have mentioned or talked about in this conversation.
We didn’t talk enough about Ringo!
There are also loads of other people and events that I wanted to mention.
I hope I didn’t talk too much.
Just in case this wasn’t quite enough rambling about The Beatles on this podcast, remember there are four (count them) four more episodes on The Beatles to come, but hopefully those episodes will be different enough to justify this series.
Anyway, 4 more Beatle related episodes are coming up.
One is a discussion about John Lennon.
Another two are language focused and we’ll be talking about adjectives for describing personality traits.
And the last one is about Beatles song lyrics and little phrases and idioms that you can learn from them.
So it’s not just rambling about The Beatles, although that will be part of it too.
Thanks again to mum for her great contribution to this episode, and yes I am lucky to have a mum who is this cool. I appreciate that and I’m really glad to get her voice on the podcast along with my other guests.
And thank you as ever for listening all the way to the end, you are the best.
Take care, look after yourselves and each other and I will speak to you again soon. I think the next episode will be Michael from Poland. But until then it’s time to say good bye bye bye bye bye.
More random questions, talking points, accent challenges and “guess the idiom” with pod-pal Paul Taylor. Includes discussion of accents in English, cancel culture in comedy, some rude Spanish phrases and more. Video version available.
Here is a brand new episode, hot on the heels of the last one and my friend Paul Taylor is back on the podcast again this time and I just wanted to add a few things here before we start properly. This is not going to be a 15 minute introduction though, I promise. It’ll be 14 minutes.
Firstly, there is a video version of this episode and you can watch it on my YouTube channel or on the page for this episode on my website and if you’re watching on YouTube, don’t forget to like and subscribe.
By the way, I reached 100,000 subscribers on YouTube the other day, which is nice. Thank you very much if you wrote me a message saying congratulations. It’s a nice milestone and if YouTube decides I’m eligible, I should receive one of those shiny things from them – a kind of plaque which I can proudly display in my pod-room at home. If and when that shiny plaque arrives I’ll do some kind of YouTube livestream in which I unbox the plaque and do some of the usual live streaming shenanigans. So listen out for announcements about the time and date for that on the podcast soon.
*By the way – this text is all written on the page for this episode*
Talking of YouTube live, after recording this episode, Paul invited me onto his Happy Hour Live – his weekly YouTube live stream, and we had a lot of fun celebrating my 100,000 subscriber milestone with a bottle of nice champagne, some funny accent challenges – reading famous lines and quotes from films in different accents, and also we looked at some common French idioms and tried to translate them into English.
You’ll be able to find that on Paul’s YouTube channel for Happy Hour Live and also that will be embedded on page for this episode on my website, along with the video for the episode you are listening to now. So, plenty of video content for you to check out if you like.
This episode is very similar to the last one featuring Paul, which was episode 698, published just before Christmas last year.
I decided to use the same format as last time, with a few random questions and little challenges and things, the idea being that we’d get a selection of different topics and bits of language during the conversation. So, it doesn’t really focus on one thing in particular, but a variety of things, some of them quite silly and others more serious.
You’ll see that this time I chose to call the episode “Lucky Dip with Paul Taylor”. I also could have called it “Pot Luck with Paul Taylor”.
I thought that would be a slightly snappier title than what I went with before, which was “Random Questions with Paul Taylor” although that is more descriptive. It’s possible to overthink the titles of episodes – it probably doesn’t matter that much as I expect or hope that most of you will listen to my episodes regardless of the title. Anyway, I should probably explain what those things mean now.
Lucky Dip and Pot Luck – they both refer to situations where you don’t really know what you are going to get, but you hope they will be good things.
A Lucky Dip is a game that you might play at a funfair or at a children’s party.
This is when some items, or gifts, are put into a bag and you have to dip your hand into the bag, rummage around and pick something out. You don’t know what you’re going to get, although you know it will be some kind of gift, prize or treat – like a bag of sweets, a little toy or something like that.
I thought that was a good title for this one because this episode is a bit like a lucky dip – Paul is essentially blindly dipping into my list of questions and picking things out, not knowing what he’ll get, and it’s just supposed to be a bit of fun.
Pot luck is another phrase which could be used to describe a game like the lucky dip, but it’s also a general phrase for any situation in which you don’t know exactly what you’re going to get, but you hope that it’ll be good.
Here are some examples of pot luck (A couple are from the Oxford Dictionary for Learners of English – other dictionaries are available)
It’s pot luck whether you get good advice or not.
When you sign up to English lessons at a school it’s pot luck what kind of teacher or fellow classmates you’ll get.
So I think you can see how those phrases relate to the concept for this episode.
Just a heads-up – there is some swearing in this episode, and not just in English. There’s a bit of Spanish swearing in here too, which I hope you don’t mind too much if Spanish is your first language – it’s probably ok isn’t it? I expect so, but I should say that I hope my mum doesn’t listen to this episode. I’ll let you find out more as you listen.
There was certainly no intention for us to be offensive to anyone in particular during this conversation and we only talk about rude expressions in order to understand them and perhaps laugh about them a bit (because some rude expressions in Spanish seem pretty funny when you translate them into English).
Also, there’s the usual fast talking that you get from episodes with my friends, so I hope you’re ready for that.
Alright, that’s it for my introduction then. I just couldn’t help doing some kind of introduction here at the start of the episode, but you can now listen to our conversation in full and completely unedited. So, let’s begin.
Song Lyrics for “I’m Only Sleeping” by The Beatles
Continuing the text adventure game about the zombie apocalypse from episode 706, with text on the screen so you can read with me while you listen. Video version available. Play the game with me – follow the links below. [Part 2 of 2] Listen to part 1 first!
Playing a text adventure game about the zombie apocalypse, with text on the screen so you can read with me while you listen. Video version available. Play the game with me – follow the links below.
Works best on full-screen mode. Don’t forget to like & subscribe 👍
Links
Play “Zombolocaust” by Peter Carlson https://textadventures.co.uk/games/view/5kjlubyvzuitox6z52xipq/zombolocaust
Text Adventures website http://www.textadventures.co.uk
Part 2 will be available here https://wp.me/p4IuUx-oBv
Notes (used at the start of the episode)
Let’s Play Another Text Adventure Game – Zombie Survival
Let’s just have some fun in this episode, and also work on your English a bit.
I’m going to play another text adventure game.
Read the text and make decisions to progress through the game.
This is good for your English because you can practise your listening and reading, and there’s bound to be some vocabulary that you can pick up too.
This works best if you can read the text that I’m reading too, either by visiting the text adventures website or by watching the video version of this.
I’ll give you some learning tips in a second.
As well as the audio version of this, there is a video version on YouTube and the episode page on teacherluke.co.uk
I’m sharing my screen, so you can see the text that I’m reading.
I’ll try to be clear and to explain things as we go, so this should also work as an audio episode.
textadventures.co.uk – “Zombolocaust” by Peter Carlson
Previous episodes like this in the episode archive at teacherluke.co.uk (search for episodes 338, 339, 425, 426, 612, 613, 614)
Peter Carlson emailed me once and said he was OK for me to do more of his games on the podcast. Nice one Peter 👍
COVID-19 is real (but this game isn’t)
We’re going to try to survive a zombie apocalypse
but there’s a real pandemic happening outside (have you noticed?)
So – wash your hands! Wear your mask! Be careful, good luck!
We will get through this.
The COVID-19 pandemic is serious, but we still have to have fun.
Listen to Luke and James talking about various topics as we answer questions from the book “Emergency Questions” by comedian Richard Herring. Text video and full transcript available.
Guest host Oli Thompson interviews Luke using a classic format from BBC Radio. Luke is going to be marooned on a desert island but he is allowed to bring 8 pieces of music, one book and a luxury item. For episode 700 this is a chance to get to know Luke and his musical choices a little better. (Transcript and text video versions available)
Paul Taylor joins me for some random questions and challenges, including various little discussion points, accents, citizenship test questions, idioms, jokes and more.
Talking to my wife about the latest season of the Netflix TV drama The Crown, which follows the life and times of Queen Elizabeth II and her family. We talk about Charles & Diana, Margaret Thatcher, The Queen’s accent, Prince Andrew’s BBC interview and more.
Hello listeners, How are you today? I hope you are doing well. Here’s a new episode of the podcast.
Several things before we start.
WISBOLEP
The voting is over in the WISBOLEP competition. Yep, the voting closed on Sunday 6 December at midnight. I will be announcing the results in an episode of the podcast soon. So, stay tuned for that.
LEP Premium – www.teacherluke.co.uk/premiuminfo
Premium LEPsters – hello. I just want to let you know that I have uploaded several premium episodes covering language from my conversation with Lucy in the last episode. I went through the conversation again and picked out over 50 words and phrases that you might have missed, or that I think are worth highlighting and then I presented them to you with explanations, examples, a memory test and pronunciation drills. That’s P28 parts 1 and 2 and it’s in the premium section now. Also, Premium series 27 is underway and I recently uploaded parts 1 and 2 of that to the premium section – they contain some grammar and vocabulary language tips and practice, with pronunciation drills too. Parts 3-8 will be coming up in the next couple of weeks. If you want to know more about LEP Premium including how to get the episodes, and how they can really help your English in various ways – go to www.teacherluke.co.uk/premiuminfo
— JINGLE —
694. The Crown / The Royal Family (A Royal Ramble with My Wife)
In this episode I am returning once again to the topic of the UK’s Royal Family. This time I’m talking to my lovely wife about the royals because we’ve recently been watching season 4 of The Crown and so royal stuff is definitely on our minds at the moment.
Just in case you don’t know, The Crown is a Netflix TV series about the British Royal family. I expect many of you will be aware of it too and maybe you’ve also been binge-watching season 4 recently, like us. Here’s an episode all about it.
My wife, who is French, is particularly fascinated by the bizarre lives of my country’s monarchs and we often talk about the show and the real events it is based on, so we thought it might be interesting to share some of our thoughts with you in an episode of the podcast.
If you haven’t seen The Crown yet, and you’re worried about spoilers in this conversation, I don’t really think it is possible to spoil this show as it’s all based on real events which most people know about. In fact, listening to this before you watch the show, could even help you understand it and enjoy it a bit more. Also, if you have no plans to watch The Crown, I think that you can still enjoy listening to this. It’s not just for people watching the show.
I know what some of you will be thinking. You’ll be thinking – “Do you recommend this as a good show for learning English?”
Yes, as long as you genuinely enjoy it. I think most people agree that The Crown is good and that it’s interesting – high drama, beautiful to look at, great actors, an interesting topic.
You should also be aware that the characters speak in a very posh accent, which is not how most people speak. It’s not massively different to, let’s say, “normal English” but you should be aware that they do sound very posh and have a posh accent. It’s important to hear a wide variety of accents in English, because this is the nature of the language. It’s a diverse language and you need to take that into account when learning it. You should be able to understand the various accents and hopefully be able to identify them to some extent anyway.
So, overall – yes, I think it’s a good show to watch and can definitely be useful for your English.
To get more specific tips about how to use TV shows like this to improve your English, listen to episode 660 of my podcast.
The Crown is currently in its 4th season, which deals with the period in which Maragaret Thatcher was the Prime Minister, and when Prince Charles married Lady Diana Spencer – later to be known as Princess Diana. So this is the late seventies, the eighties and the early nineties.
In this conversation you will hear us talking in the usual rambling fashion about things like:
What we think of the show, including descriptions of how it looks and the production in general
The performances by some of the actors
Accents you can hear in the show, especially the high RP which is spoken by the Queen and other royals.
What the show makes us think about specific members of the family, their stories, their relationships with each other and how they are represented in the show
What the show makes us think about the institution of the monarchy itself, including some of the pros and cons of having a royal family – for the country as a whole, but also for the individual members of the family itself who enjoy the luxuries of their privilege but are bound by the duties that they have to the crown
We also assess the reign of Elizabeth II, and talk about “Operation London Bridge is Down”, which is the codename that refers to the official plan for what will happen in the days after the death of Queen Elizabeth II, when that inevitably happens. It’s actually quite extraordinary and makes you realise how significant The Queen is to the nation.
We also end up talking about the recent scandal involving Prince Andrew, who is one of The Queen’s four children – he’s the third one in fact. I don’t know if you are aware of this scandal, but it was big news in the UK. It is actually a disturbing and shocking story, but it’s also fascinating. I am referring to Andrew’s association with Jeffrey Epstein, who was convicted of the trafficking and prostitution of underage girls. Epstein died in prison in pretty suspicious circumstances. The official story is that he committed suicide but plenty of people believe that he was killed in order to prevent the truth from coming out. Anyway, Andrew was allegedly one of Epstein’s friends or “associates” let’s say and in fact one girl who was a victim of Epstein’s has made claims against Andrew specifically. In response to those claims, Andrew chose to conduct an interview with the BBC in 2018 . He wanted to deny all the claims against him, but the interview did not go very well and it was a bit of a PR disaster for Andrew. I find it absolutely fascinating as well as disturbing and I’ve been wondering for ages whether I should discuss it on the podcast. Keep listening to find out more about this whole story.
The Royal Family Tree
Before we start properly I think it will really help if I remind you of the basic family tree in the Royal Family.
So there’s The Queen of course. Queen Elizabeth II. She has been Queen since 1952 and that’s the longest reign of a UK monarch in history. Her husband is known as Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh. In season 4 of the show The Queen is played by Olivia Coleman and Philip is played by Tobias Menzies.
The Queen’s mother was also called Elizabeth but she was commonly known as The Queen Mother. She died in 2002.
The Queen had a sister, called Margaret, known as Princess Margaret, played in the show by Helena Bonham Carter. Margaret also died in 2002, less than 2 months before The Queen Mother, in fact.
Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip had 4 children. The oldest is Charles, the Prince of Wales and the heir to the throne. Charles married Lady Diana Spencer in 1981 and she became Princess Diana of course. They had two children. The first is William, now the Duke of Cambridge and married to Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge. They have three children. The oldest is George and he is third in line to the throne after Charles and William.
Charles and Diana’s second child is Harry who is now married to Meghan Markle. Harry and Meghan are to some extent cut off from the royal family as they chose to leave their public duties fairly recently, and they were quite heavily criticised for that. William, Kate, Harry and Meghan don’t actually feature in the show, but they do come up in this conversation.
Charles and Diana’s marriage ended in divorce in 1992. Diana of course died tragically in a car crash in Paris in 1997.
Charles later married Camilla Parker-Bowles, who he had been romantically involved with since before he married Diana. Charles and Camilla are now known as the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall.
The Queen’s other children are Princess Anne, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward.
That’s probably enough information about the family tree there, but I decided it was probably a good idea to remind you of their names and their positions in the family, just so you definitely know who we are talking about.
Anyway, I won’t go on much longer here in the introduction, except to say that my wife enjoys being on the podcast from time to time and she loves talking about this topic, but she’s a little bit self-conscious about speaking English in front of my entire audience like this. But I assured her that my audience are all lovely and non-judgemental and that she has nothing to worry about – so, listeners, don’t let me down. OK?
Right then, I hope you now can enjoy sharing some time with us in our living room, having quite a long and rambling conversation about The Crown and all things Royal and here we go…
—–
Video Clips
That moment when Charles said “Whatever love means anyway…”
When The Queen met Michael Fagan after he broke into her bedroom
There’s nothing more for me to add here except this:
What do you think about all of this? I mean about the royal family and all that stuff. Do you feel sympathy for the individual members of the family? Have you seen The Crown? What do you think of it?
We didn’t talk much about Margaret Thatcher, played in this series by Gillian Anderson who first became known for playing Scully in The X Files. We are fans of hers, and my wife thinks her performance in the show was great. I’m not so sure. I partially agree. Anyway, we couldn’t cover everything in this conversation.
Finally, what do you think – should I do an episode all about the Prince Andrew interview on the BBC?
Thank you for listening.
Reminders
Premium LEPsters – check out the app and the website for the latest premium episodes. If you’d like to sign up go to www.teacherluke.co.uk/premiuminfo
WISBOLEP – I’ll be revealing the results and talking about what happens next in a forthcoming episode, soon.
Right, so I will speak to you again soon, but for now – goodbye!
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