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 ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Radio 4. Presented by Matthew Sweet, Shahidha Bari and Anne McElvoy.
Episodes to download
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Prom Plus: Gypsy, Roma & Traveller Culture
Thu 23 Aug 2018
Writers Louise Doughty and Damian Le Bas discuss Gypsy, Roma & Traveller culture.
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Landmark Jaws: Sharks and Whales
Mon 20 Aug 2018
Matthew Sweet talks Jaws with shark expert Gareth Fraser and novelist Will Self.
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Proms Plus: Sinking of the Lusitania
Wed 15 Aug 2018
Historians Laura Rowe and Saul David on the controversial torpedoing of an ocean liner
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Proms Plus: Ecstatic States
Tue 14 Aug 2018
Christopher Harding, philosopher Mark Vernon & Hetta Howes discuss ecstatic states.
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Proms Plus: The Weeping Prophet and Visions of Chaos
Mon 13 Aug 2018
With the novelist Salley Vickers and literary historian Joe Moshenska
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Proms Plus: Re-working a Classic in Poetry
Mon 6 Aug 2018
Faithful but dull or unfaithful and interesting that is the question
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Proms Plus: Folklore of Britain and Ireland
Mon 6 Aug 2018
Poets Gillian Clarke and Peter Mackay discuss the folktales of the islands of the UK
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Proms Plus: London in Fact & Fiction
Tue 31 Jul 2018
Novelists John Lanchester & Diana Evans discuss depicting London in their fiction.
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Proms Plus: Mountains
Mon 30 Jul 2018
Abbie Garrington, Dan Richards discuss how mountains & wild landscapes inspire creativity
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Proms Plus: Funny Fiction
Sat 28 Jul 2018
Inspired by Beethoven's musical jokes, Meg Rosoff selects an array of comic fiction
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Proms Plus: British Countryside real & imagined
Fri 27 Jul 2018
Writer Melissa Harrison, archaeologist Francis Pryor on British countryside & rural life
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Proms Plus: Birds and Humans
Fri 27 Jul 2018
Tim Birkhead and Helen Macdonald on humanity's long relationship with birds
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Proms Plus: The Wanderer
Wed 25 Jul 2018
Lauren Elkin & Seán Williams discuss why walking is an inspiration for writers.
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Proms Plus – exploring the narrative voice in literature
Sat 21 Jul 2018
Sarah Dillon and novelist Richard Beard on narrative voices in literature
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Proms Plus: Daphnis & Chloe
Tue 17 Jul 2018
Prof. Tim Whitmarsh & dance critic Judith Mackrell discuss Longus's Daphnis & Chloe.
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Howard Jacobson
Thu 12 Jul 2018
Writer Howard Jacobson with a keynote lecture on why we need the novel.
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Helaine Blumenfeld, Dale Harding; Stella Tillyard
Thu 12 Jul 2018
Anne McElvoy and sculptor Helaine Blumenfeld, artist Dale Harding, writer Stella Tillyard
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Philosophical tennis, hidden beaches and Eleanor Marx.
Tue 10 Jul 2018
Matthew Sweet takes a walk around Eleanor Marx's old neighborhood.
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From C18 automata to Superheroes and Digital Living
Fri 6 Jul 2018
Matthew Sweet visits The Marvellous Mechanical Museum at Compton Verney.
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Renzo Piano
Wed 4 Jul 2018
The Italian architect talks to Philip Dodd about his career from the Pompidou to the Shard
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What do you call a stranger? The Caine Prize. NHS ideals.
Wed 4 Jul 2018
Nandini Das and John Gallagher look at words for strangers in Tudor and Stuart England.
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Fun ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½, Olivia Laing, Oscar Wilde, The Deer Hunter
Thu 28 Jun 2018
Alison Bechdel's memoir on stage, a novel inspired by Kathy Acker, Oscar Wilde in the USA
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The body, past and present
Thu 28 Jun 2018
Beauty - Renaissance to the present. Chantal Joffe & Heather Widdows with Anne McElvoy
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The Working Lunch and Food in History
Wed 27 Jun 2018
How the Victorians changed lunch, Elsa Richardson and Chris Kissane join Rana Mitter.
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Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Woman’s Rights
Fri 22 Jun 2018
Joanna Cohen looks back at the manifesto which remodelled the Declaration of Independence
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John Gower, the Forgotten Medieval Poet
Fri 22 Jun 2018
Curing lovesickness or learning alchemy's secrets. Seb Falk on Chaucer's friend John Gower
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Sarah Scott and the Dream of a Female Utopia
Fri 22 Jun 2018
Lucy Powell tells the story of a radical community of women set up in 1760s rural England
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The Forgotten German Princess
Fri 22 Jun 2018
The tale of Mary Moders, a C17 bigamist and media sensation, is retold by John Gallagher.
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Rehabilitating the Rev John Trusler
Fri 22 Jun 2018
Sophie Coulombeau on the life of a C18 cleric and entrepreneur & the idea of failure