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Free Thinking Episodes

  1.

    Playing God

    Patrick Barlow on his play The Messiah, and Daisy Black on a new medieval mystery play.

  2. Enchantment, Witches and Woodlands

    Marie Darrieussecq, Lisa Mullen and Dafydd Daniel on magic and dystopias.

  3. Francis Fukuyama, Olga Tokarczuk, Alev Scott, Michael Talbot.

    Rana Mitter explores identity, forest landscapes and the long impact of the Ottoman empire

  4. Re-writing C20th British Philosophy.

    Shahidha Bari with news of the Man Booker Prize and a discussion about female philosophers

  5. Discrimination.

    The lawyer Helena Kennedy joins Shahidha Bari to discuss how British justice fails women.

  6. Greed and Landownership Past, Present, Future

    Economist Paul Collier, Scottish historian Tom Devine and Colombian novelist Hector Abad

  7. Drugs and Consciousness

    Does LSD open the doors of perception or just mess with your head?

  8. The Frieze Debate: Museums in the 21st Century.

    Michael Govan, Sabine Haag & Hartwig Fischer at the Royal Institution, London.

  9. Sarah Perry, Spookiness and Fear.

    The author of The Essex Serpent talks to Matthew Sweet about re-imagining the Melmoth myth

  10. Rethinking India's connections with the wider world.

    Gandhi's power, portable citizenship, Mehrotra's poetry. Rana Mitter with Amit Chaudhuri.

  11. Loss, Grief and Anger

    Lisa Appignanesi on public and private loss and how to face its concomitant, anger.

  12. Slavoj Zizek, Camille Paglia, Flemming Rose

    Philip Dodd and guests explore the value of causing offence.

  13. The Goodies

    Matthew Sweet meets the trio behind the '70s and early '80s TV comedy show.

  14. What Nietzsche teaches us

    Biographer Sue Prideaux and others discuss Nietzsche's relevance today

  15. What Camus and Claude Levi-Strauss teach us

    Rana Mitter talks to Ben Okri about Camus and debates the 'untamed mind' of Levi-Strauss.

  16. What St Augustine teaches us

    Anne McEvoy and guests explore ideas of tyranny, martyrdom, sin and grace.

  17. Sebastian Faulks

    The author of Birdsong in conversation with Anne McElvoy about his new novel, Paris Echo.

  18. Women Finding a Voice.

    Deborah Frances-White host of podcast The Guilty Feminist, Natalie Haynes, Michele Roberts

  19. Design

    Including a report from the London Design Biennale and film historian Peter Biskind.

  20. Howard Jacobson

    Writer Howard Jacobson delivers a keynote lecture on why we need the novel.

  21. Helaine Blumenfeld, Dale Harding, Stella Tillyard

    Anne McElvoy with sculptor Helaine Blumenfeld, artist Dale Harding, writer Stella Tillyard

  22. Philosophical tennis, Hidden beaches and Eleanor Marx

    Matthew Sweet takes a walk around Eleanor Marx's old neighbourhood.

  23. From 18th-century automata to superheroes and digital living

    Matthew Sweet visits the Marvellous Mechanical Museum at Compton Verney.

  24. Renzo Piano

    The Italian architect talks to Philip Dodd about his career from the Pompidou to the Shard

  25. What do you call a stranger? - The Caine Prize - NHS ideals.

    Nandini Das and John Gallagher look at words for strangers in Tudor and Stuart England.

  26. Olivia Laing, Fun 蜜芽传媒

    Alison Bechdel's memoir on stage, a novel inspired by Kathy Acker, Oscar Wilde in the USA.

  27. The body, past and present

    Beauty from the Renaissance to the present.

  28. The Working Lunch and Food in History

    How the Victorians changed lunch. Elsa Richardson and Chris Kissane join Rana Mitter.

  29. Oliver Rackham and Wildwood Ideas

    The man who loved our trees and woods and his ideas about what they might become.

  30. Windrush, Forests in Art, South African Jazz

    Colin Grant, Hannah Lowe and Jay Bernard discuss writing about Windrush with Shahidha Bari

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