Arts & Ideas Podcast
Leading thinkers discuss the ideas shaping our lives – looking back at the news and making links between past and present. Broadcast as Free Thinking, Fridays at 9pm on ѿý Radio 4. Presented by Matthew Sweet, Shahidha Bari and Anne McElvoy.
Episodes to download
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Green Thinking: Soil
Thu 23 Sep 2021
Do we need to change the way we think about soil to make it sustainable?
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Hannah Arendt's exploration of Totalitarianism
Tue 21 Sep 2021
Why do Hannah Arendt's ideas continue to fire the imaginations of artists and thinkers?
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Belonging
Thu 16 Sep 2021
A teacher's view, a Frankenstein-inspired ballet, outside status and circus paintings
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Glitches
Wed 15 Sep 2021
Novelist Tom McCarthy joins Matthew Sweet to explore glitches and what they tell us
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Dante's visions
Tue 14 Sep 2021
Art historian Martin Kemp, painter Emma Safe, parallels with Proust and a Dante website
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Saint John Henry Newman
Thu 29 Jul 2021
Kate Kennedy, Tim Stanley, Catherine Pepinster, Dafydd Mills Daniel on Newman's thought
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Revisit Shoes
Wed 28 Jul 2021
From Roman sandals to trainers and stilettos, Shahidha Bari looks at the shoe trade
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Revisit The influence of the British black arts movement
Tue 27 Jul 2021
Sonia Boyce, Harold Offeh, Isaac Julien and Eddie Chambers talk to Anne McElvoy
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Revisit: Tokyo Idols and Urban Life
Fri 23 Jul 2021
The weird world of teenage girls seeking fame, plus the city in fiction and photography.
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Revisit Rashōmon
Thu 22 Jul 2021
David Peace, Natasha Pulley, Jasper Sharp & Yuna Tasaka on the film + the book behind it
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Bette Davis
Tue 20 Jul 2021
As the BFI prepares a season of films, Matthew Sweet and guests discuss the Hollywood star
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Connecting with nature
Mon 19 Jul 2021
Music from thunder, art inspired by a dog walk,essays about a rural wood and a city field
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Alain Robbe-Grillet
Wed 14 Jul 2021
Tom McCarthy and others join Matthew Sweet to discuss the French 'new novel'
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Green Thinking: Weather
Wed 14 Jul 2021
What can we learn from how people responded to extreme weather events in the past?
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Breathe
Tue 13 Jul 2021
Soweto Kinch, James Nestor, and Imani Jacqueline Brown of Forensic Architecture
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Green Thinking: Festivals
Fri 9 Jul 2021
Des Fitzgerald hears how festivals can reduce their ecological footprint
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Mining, Coal and DH Lawrence
Thu 8 Jul 2021
Matthew Sweet looks at the connections between mining, the arts, and culture
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Epic Iran, lost cities and Proust
Wed 7 Jul 2021
Rana Mitter and guests explore the art and culture of Iran + why people abandon cities.
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The English country house party
Tue 6 Jul 2021
Why does the grand country house party hold such power over the English imagination?
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Filming Sunday Bloody Sunday
Thu 1 Jul 2021
Glenda Jackson talks to Matthew Sweet about John Schlesinger's 1971 love triangle drama
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New Thinking:The Innovative Shape of Poems
Wed 30 Jun 2021
Sandeep Parmar talks to poets Kayo Chingonyi, Paisley Rekdal and Nasser Hussain
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Green Thinking: Sustainable Cities
Tue 29 Jun 2021
Earthscrapers and subterranean transport - do greener cities need to go underground?
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Cornwall and the Coastal Gothic
Tue 29 Jun 2021
Laurence Scott investigates what's lurking in the rock pools
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Green Thinking: Climate Change and Heritage
Fri 25 Jun 2021
How do we stop climate change destroying historic landmarks or is it time to say goodbye?
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World's Fairs and the future
Thu 24 Jun 2021
Visions of the future shaped by empire, politics and unfaltering faith in progress
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Green Thinking: Climate Change and Literature
Thu 24 Jun 2021
What can creative writing add to the conversation about climate change?