Alice Loxton

speaker

770 appearances 11 recordings 7 series first heard Jun 2026 last heard 3 Sep

Alice Loxton’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 11 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 4.

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You're Dead to Me · Why do British people love tea? (from Here For The History) · 19 Jun 2026 podcast

OK, so as the Opium Wars and tea espionage are playing out in the Far East, what's happening back in Britain?

Well, the Industrial Revolution is well underway and this is playing quite a big part in the demand for tea.

Can you tell me a bit about the Industrial Revolution, Ben?

I know it's your great favourite topic.

I can't imagine what that possibly could be.

So Charles Dickens, the great 19th century novelist, paints quite a vivid picture of the Industrial Revolution in many of his books, but also mentions tea quite a lot within that.

And what's interesting is it was used across classes at this point.

And it's really seen as this regular, homely drink.

It's part of this comforting ritual.

And actually tea is seen as a rejuvenating drink in the way that you might think about coffee today.

So I've got a few bits from Dickens that I thought we could have a look at.

One of the mentions is in Great Expectations and we follow the character Pip.

Mr Pumblechook and I breakfasted at eight o'clock in the parlour behind the shop where the shopman took his mug of tea and hunch of bread and butter on a sack of peas in the front premises.

I think he's sitting on a sack of peas.

Weird habits of the past.

But there we go.

So he's having bread and butter and a mug of tea, which seems, you know, I'd be up for that.

And so there's lots of mentions of tea throughout Dickens's books.

And it's basically accepted among historians that in this industrial period, tea is broadened out to be not just something for the elite, these kind of lovely, delicate types of tea, but actually it's for the masses too.

And it becomes increasingly important for industrial workers.

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