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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Schiller's Mary Stuart; Günter Grass. Preti Taneja on translated fiction, Rachel Reeves.
Thu 24 Nov 2016
Anne McElvoy on Robert Icke's version of Mary Stuart and the last novel from Günter Grass
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Zadie Smith
Wed 23 Nov 2016
Zadie Smith talks dance, depicting teenage friends and US/UK differences with Philip Dodd
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Free Thinking - Beards. Listening. Masculinity.
Tue 22 Nov 2016
Alun Withey on beards, Josh Appignanesi & Devorah Baum on fatherhood, with Matthew Sweet
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Free Thinking: Being Human: What the Archives Reveal
Thu 17 Nov 2016
Matthew Sweet visits the London Survey, Kew, a cemetery and a hut used by Anzac soldiers.
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Free Thinking - Being Human: New Generation Thinkers explore Escape, Lying and Fear.
Wed 16 Nov 2016
Shahidha Bari and Laurence Scott on Vernon Lee, Harvey Matusow and wartime Senate House
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Free Thinking - Being Human Debate at FACT, Liverpool: Man and Animals
Tue 15 Nov 2016
From mermaids to robots via monkeys and men and zoos for humans and animals.
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Free Thinking - Art Spiegelman. Marina Abramovic. American Pastoral.
Thu 10 Nov 2016
Naomi Alderman reports on a version of Maus which puts music alongside the images.
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Free Thinking - Black British History.
Wed 9 Nov 2016
Bernardine Evaristo, Keith Piper, Miranda Kaufmann and Kehinde Andrews on Black Britain
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Free Thinking: Still Loving Victoriana Jokes and All
Tue 8 Nov 2016
Matthew Sweet with novelists Sarah Perry and Carol Birch and some Victorian jokes
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Free Thinking - Landmark: Sir Walter Scott's Waverley
Thu 3 Nov 2016
Rana Mitter on the first historical novel, one that invented Scotland and built Britain
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Free Thinking - Stephen Poliakoff and Linda Grant; Yuval Noah Harari.
Wed 2 Nov 2016
Post second world war Britain is discussed by the TV dramatist, novelist and Philip Dodd.
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Free Thinking - Whose Book Is It Anyway?
Tue 1 Nov 2016
Anne McElvoy discusses new research into how, when and why Britons got the reading habit.
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Free Thinking: Enoch Powell; US Supreme Court; War & Art
Thu 27 Oct 2016
Birmingham Rep stages a play about Enoch Powell; John Keane & Jananne Al-Ani on war art.
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Free Thinking- William Kentridge, Vivienne Koorland and Gavin Jantjes discuss South Africa and art.
Thu 27 Oct 2016
South Africa and art with William Kentridge, Vivienne Koorland and Gavin Jantjes .
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Free Thinking - Richard Hakluyt; Man Booker Prize; Chickens in the Anthropocene; Shirley Jackson.
Tue 25 Oct 2016
Why chickens are man's best friend, Richard Hakluyt's voyages to America & parallels now
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Free Thinking: Artes Mundi Prize. Harriet Walter. Amitav Ghosh. Edmund Richardson
Thu 20 Oct 2016
Harriet Walter prepares to play Prospero, a review of the bi-ennial art prize in Cardiff.
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Free Thinking - Paul Nash; George Szirtes; Hungary 1956 and now.
Wed 19 Oct 2016
A graphic novel inspired by Paul Nash's dreams. Religion & revolution in Hungary debated
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Free Thinking: Kevin Brownlow
Tue 18 Oct 2016
Kevin Brownlow talks to Matthew Sweet about documenting and restoring silent classics.
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Free Thinking: Caravaggio; Bob Dylan; Dario Fo; Lenin's train journey.
Thu 13 Oct 2016
Caravaggio's art explored by Letizia Treves, Joe Moshenska and Anders Lustgarten.
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Free Thinking: Sound Frontiers - Teju Cole
Wed 12 Oct 2016
From Baldwin to Black Lives Matter. Philip Dodd talks to Teju Cole
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Free Thinking: Outsiders and Colin Wilson. Norse sagas. The Vulgar.
Tue 11 Oct 2016
Gary Lachman discusses Colin Wilson's ideas about alienation with Matthew Sweet.
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Free Thinking: Sound Frontiers: Margaret Atwood and Naomi Alderman
Thu 6 Oct 2016
The authors talk electric shocks, Shakespeare and the power of women with Philip Dodd.
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Free Thinking: Wells' Women
Thu 6 Oct 2016
As the London Literature Festival opens, HG Wells: women, politics and four dimensions.
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Free Thinking - Sound Frontiers: Kamila Shamsie, Nikesh Shukla, Drugs in the German Reich. Board Games.
Wed 5 Oct 2016
Rana Mitter debates refugees, what is a good immigrant? Hitler's drug addiction and games
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Free Thinking - Sound Frontiers: Books of 1946
Thu 29 Sep 2016
Benjamin Markovits, Lara Feigel and Kevin Jackson discuss the best fiction of 1946
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Free Thinking - Sound Frontiers: Success debated by Peter Frankopan, Edith Hall, Kwame Kwei-Armah
Thu 29 Sep 2016
Anne McElvoy & guests on Success, subject for debate on the Third Programme back in 1967
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Free Thinking: Sound Frontiers: People Power
Thu 29 Sep 2016
Philip Dodd and guests discuss Clement Attlee's legacy, people power and cultural tastes.
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Free Thinking: Medieval Manuscripts. Emma Donoghue.
Thu 22 Sep 2016
Author of Room talks to Matthew Sweet about starvation and sainthood in her new novel
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Free Thinking: American Power? Suzan-Lori Parks. Gary Younge. Abstract Expressionism.
Wed 21 Sep 2016
Pulitzer prize winning American dramatist Suzan-Lori Parks. William Boyd on American art.
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Free Thinking: Shelina Janmohamed. Edward Ardizzone's Art. Jewish identity in fiction
Tue 20 Sep 2016
Shelina Janmohamed explores "Generation M". Plus Edward Ardizzone's daughter on his art.