The History Podcast – The Fort: Introducing Rory Stewart: The Long History of Heroism

BBC Radio 4 | September 22, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode inaugurates Rory Stewart’s series, The Long History of Heroism, with a wide-ranging and provocative exploration of how the idea of the hero has shaped—and been shaped by—Western history, literature, and society. Stewart and an array of historians and scholars trace the evolution of heroism, from the archetypes of Achilles and Alexander the Great, through the transformation brought by Christianity, to the contradictory figure of the medieval knight. Throughout, Stewart poses challenging questions about what makes a hero, why societies need them, and whether their example is relevant—or even possible—today.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Childhood Fascination with Heroes and The Core Question

• Rory Stewart confesses his youthful obsession with heroic ideals (Alexander the Great) and his later experiences that complicated this view.

  "I wanted to match myself against dead heroes to achieve magnificent things ... and I told myself I even wanted to die sacrificing my life for a noble cause before I was 30." (01:21)

• Sets up the series by asking: What is a hero, and why do we remain fascinated by them?
• The cultural fixation with heroism, especially among young men.

2. Achilles and the Classical Hero

• Western heroism begins with Achilles—“warrior, statesman, and the inspiration for others.”
• Stewart defines five qualities of a hero:
  • Takes on existential risk
  • Acts for a noble cause
  • Achieves transcendent benefit
  • Expands human possibility
  • Leaves a permanent, inspiring example (03:13)
• From the beginning, however, even Achilles' heroism is under question—he bears the expectations and doubts of others.
• Patrick Mackie highlights duality:

  “It’s extraordinary drama of extreme action … but there's also an extraordinary song of mourning and lament.” (04:16)

Tension between life and death, courage and foolhardiness:

• Achilles chooses short life and glory over comfort and obscurity (05:13):

  “Fate has two urns. I choose the short life, everlasting glory.” (09:15, voiced by Asma Khalid)

• Emphasis on mortality: only mortals can be truly heroic; glory means facing the possibility of total loss.
  Silvia Montiglio:

  “Glory and mortality are tied together, and I think Achilles embodies that to an extreme.” (05:44)

Critiques of Achilles’ Cause:

• Edward Skidelsky (via Tristan Redman):

  "Aristotle says, a man who undergoes a lot of risk to see his mistress is not courageous ... it has to be principled in some way." (06:29)

• Paul Cartlidge:

  “Achilles was a brute… It wasn’t the cause of anything social. His particular cause was to avenge the death of his best mate, Patroclus. So it was deeply personal.” (06:55)

• Modern discomfort: is this narcissism, rage, self-absorption, or heroism?

3. Heroism as Both Glorious and Terrifying

• Tom Holland:

  "Heroes are figures who are essentially midway between the mortal and the divine... but it also makes them terrifying." (09:39)

• Achilles and similar figures both inspire emulation and evoke fear; they possess charisma but also can be destructive or unstable.

4. Imitation: Achilles, Alexander the Great

• Alexander the Great modeled himself on Achilles, literally sleeping with a copy of the Iliad (11:21).
• Desires not just military prowess but beauty, nobility, and courage beyond comparison.
  Paul Cartlidge:

  “Alexander was wounded innumerable times, once within an inch of his death. And he proudly displayed the wounds … all on the front of his body, none on the back.” (11:30)

Stewart’s Personal Connection:

• Stewart recounts retracing Alexander’s footsteps across Iran and describes Alexander’s character in nuanced detail—including moments of trust, friendship, and cultural creation (12:52, 16:20).

  "The thing I loved about him wasn’t really these conquests, it was the tiny details of his character." (12:52)

• Mary Beard reflects on ancient 'culture of me' — heroism requires public acknowledgement and glory.

  “You cannot be a hero without being seen to be one. We've got in the ancient world a culture of me which is much more external, much more visible.” (14:48)

• Paul Cartlidge: classifies Alexander as an “event-making hero” who reshaped history (15:41).

5. The Political Question: Heroes and the State

• Contrasts Alexander with the ideals of Athenian democracy and later, republican Rome.

• Tom Holland:

  “[Alexander] is cosplaying … he is living in a society that can integrate someone who wants to play at Achilles. It would be impossible for Alexander to be integrated into the fabric of the Athenian democracy.” (17:33)

• Julius Caesar seen as the next iteration of the classical hero in Rome, breaking boundaries and undermining the state: Mary Beard:

  “What's Caesar doing? Well, he's breaking the bounds of what is normal for people ... going outside the usual constraints of humanity, symbolized by quasi divine worship, symbolized by having his living head on the Roman coins.” (18:46–18:52)

• Stewart’s own discomfort with Caesar as he matured, drawn instead to the republican ideal: hero as statesman instead of warrior.

6. Cato the Younger: The Anti-Heroic Hero

• Cato is portrayed as the republican counter-hero, defending constitution and principle—awkward, geeky, but absolutely committed.
• Died by suicide rather than live in a Rome with Caesar’s tyranny; act of principle or pointless self-destruction?
  Mary Beard:

  "Cato takes his own life … by pulling out his own bowels. There’s something about heroism which means going beyond. It is verging on the superhuman.” (20:50)

• Raises persistent question—does such “heroic” sacrifice change anything?

7. Christianity: Radical Transformation of Heroism

• Tom Holland on Christ as anti-heroic hero:

  "Christianity is radically, deliberately subversive of those [heroic] notions... Christ famously, is not an earthly king... he submits to death." (22:24)

• Christ’s death turns defeat into victory, weakness into strength, and refocuses heroism on suffering and service rather than conquest (23:17).
• Christianity celebrates victims and martyrs, not warriors—new “heroic” ideal is aggressive passivity (24:52):

  “Martyrs do not fight, they do not rage, they do not attack monsters or slay multitudes of the enemy. They submit to death with a kind of aggressive passivity.”

8. The Medieval Knight: Blending Violence and Virtue

• After Rome, new models arise with chivalry and knighthood—warriors shaped by both Christian and classical ideals.
• Patrick Mackie:

  “The knight becomes a figure who’s fundamentally about violence, but about violence in a way that pulls towards peace, that pulls towards service, that pulls towards humility.” (26:07)

• William Marshal cited by Stewart as the epitome of the medieval hero—warrior, political champion, Christian, and man of honor (26:19–26:37).
• Yet even the knightly ideal becomes obsolete as the world modernizes:

  “Suddenly, knights like William Marshal begin to seem a little bit more like Don Quixote, shambling around on an old nag with a barber's basin on your head, tilting at windmills.” (27:39)

Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• Rory Stewart:

  "As a child, I grew up wanting to be Alexander the Great. ... It was only later experiences in the Middle east and in politics that finally began to weaken my fantasy of heroes." (01:20)

• Silvia Montiglio:

  "If we were immortal, there would be no need to do anything heroic. So glory and mortality are tied together, and I think Achilles embodies that to an extreme." (05:44)

• Tom Holland:

  "Achilles, I suppose, is terrifying and is glorious and charismatic ... These are figures who are very, very frightening." (09:39)

• Mary Beard:

  “You cannot be a hero without being seen to be [one]. ... In the ancient world, a culture of me which is much more external, much more visible.” (14:48)

• Paul Cartlidge:

  “Alexander's one who ... shape[s] the world around [him], they don't just receive it ... he actually, by his deeds, changed the entire course of the ancient world's history.” (15:41)

• Tom Holland (on Christianity):

  “It ranks ... as the most revolutionary transformation in the history of the Mediterranean and perhaps of the world beyond.” (23:07)

• Rory Stewart (on knights and the end of an era):

  "Knights like William Marshal begin to seem a little bit more like Don Quixote ... tilting at windmills." (27:39)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 01:20 – Rory Stewart on childhood hero-worship and the ‘noble death’
• 03:11 – The five qualities that define a hero (Achilles)
• 04:16 – Patrick Mackie on the duality of heroism in the Iliad
• 05:44 – Silvia Montiglio on mortality and Homeric heroism
• 06:25 – Modern skepticism: what is the value of Achilles’ cause?
• 06:55 – Paul Cartlidge: Achilles as a personal, not social hero
• 09:39 – Tom Holland: Heroes as terrifying figures, not just models
• 11:21 – Alexander the Great and the emulation of Achilles
• 14:48 – Mary Beard on narcissism and the necessity of being seen
• 15:41 – Paul Cartlidge on "event-making" heroes
• 18:46 – The Roman Republic's suspicion of heroes (Mary Beard)
• 20:50 – The anti-heroic hero: Cato the Younger (Mary Beard)
• 22:24 – Christianity’s radical redefinition of heroism (Tom Holland)
• 26:07 – The medieval knight as a fusion of violence and virtue (Patrick Mackie)
• 26:19–26:37 – William Marshal: the ‘warrior saint’ and his legacy
• 27:39 – The obsolescence of the knightly ideal

Conclusion

This episode sets out the central questions and dilemmas of heroism in Western thought: the shifting, often self-contradictory demands of what it means to be a hero; the uneasy combination of glory and trauma, selflessness and ego. Through a sweeping journey from Achilles to the medieval knight, Rory Stewart demonstrates not only why heroes have mattered, but also why their legacy continues to haunt and challenge us.

Next episode: Stewart promises to examine how the idea of heroism endures—or unravels—in the modern age, from the French Revolution through to today.

This summary provides a rich, clear guide to the episode’s major themes, arguments, and memorable moments, preserving the tone and highlighting the expert contributors throughout.