The emperor, the concubine and the general who defied a dynasty
An episode of Barbarians at the Gate
Having syndicated four recent episodes of the show’s revival (subscribe for new episodes on iTunes here), we’re going back to the origins of Barbarians at the Gate and running another four from its original run back in 2016, when the focus was more squarely on barbarians and uprisings. The inaugural episode – cohosted by Jeremiah Jenne and James Palmer – looks at An Lushan, the Göktürk general who charmed his way into the court of the Tang Dynasty in the 8th century, then almost succeeded in bringing down the empire from 755-763. It’s a story made for imperial slash fiction: the aging emperor Xuanzong, his concubine Yang Guifei, and the outsider who came between them. The audio quality is not so crisp, but the sharp insights make up for it:
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