Authored documentary

An authored documentary is a television documentary series that presents the subjective view of its author on the topic of the documentary. The format, expanding upon the presenter/author's thesis over a number of episodes was popularised with Kenneth Clark's landmark BBC 2 series Civilisation.

The success of this series led to other authored documentaries being produced, including The Ascent of Man, Jacob Bronowski's partial refutation of Kenneth Clark's thesis that the major driving force of cultural evolution was the arts, not the sciences.

The genre also includes documentary series like David Attenborough's Life on Earth, Carl Sagan's Cosmos, and Simon Schama's A History of Britain.

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