Page "Simon Schama" Paragraph 14

The year 2000 saw Schama return to the UK, having been commissioned by the BBC to produce a series of television documentary programmes on British history as part of their Millennium celebrations, under the title A History of Britain.

Schama wrote and presented the episodes himself, in a friendly and often jocular style with his highly characteristic delivery, and was rewarded with excellent reviews and unexpectedly high ratings.

There has been, however, some irritation and criticism expressed by a group of historians about Schama's condensed recounting of the British Isles ' history on this occasion, particularly by those specialising in the pre-Anglo-Saxon history of insular Celtic civilisation.

Three series were made, totalling 15 episodes produced in total covering the complete span of British history up until 1965 ; it went on to become one of the BBC's best-selling documentary series on DVD.

Schama also wrote a trilogy of tie-in books for the show, which took the story up to the year 2000 ; there is some debate as to whether the books are the tie-in product for the TV series, or the other way around.

The series also had some popularity in the United States when it was first shown on the History Channel.