Garibaldi!

Think Garibaldi and you probably know two things. Well, there aren't any biscuits in Mike Maran's show about him, but there are red shirts.

This telling of the facts behind the fight for the unification of Italy is told by Maran in his customary, slightly rambling but utterly gripping style.

It opens with the sound of the bagpipes approaching through the audience and David Vernon climbing onto the stage. He not only provides the live accordion music, he also has a lovely deadpan delivery for his occasional deflating asides, notably the oft repeated phrase 'That was a stroke of luck'.

Before we get to the story proper there's a description of the geographical and political set-up in Italy which is hilariously illustrated on a map of Scotland. The unlikely invasion of Italy by Italy is entertainingly narrated by Maran, even the entirely fictional figure of a tailor from Leith, whose deep adoration of Garibaldi brought sharp intakes of breath from a gent in the front row.

As with all revolutions, the people who hoped to benefit didn't, those who knew they would get richer did, and the man most responsible for its success had much of his thunder stolen by people who did nothing.

This is probably a show for Radio 4 listeners, but it tells its story very entertainingly and you do learn an awful lot of Italian history.