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 BBC Radio 4. Presented by Matthew Sweet, Shahidha Bari and Anne McElvoy.
Episodes to download
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Mike Leigh
Wed 24 Oct 2018
The film director talks to Matthew Sweet as his historical epic Peterloo opens in cinemas
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Playing God
Tue 23 Oct 2018
Patrick Barlow on his play The Messiah, Daisy Black on Stoke's new medieval mystery play
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Enchantment, Witches and Woodlands
Thu 18 Oct 2018
Marie Darrieussecq, Lisa Mullen, Dafydd Daniel on magic and dystopias with Matthew Sweet.
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Francis Fukuyama, Olga Tokarczuk, Alev Scott, Michael Talbot.
Thu 18 Oct 2018
Rana Mitter explores identity forest landscapes and the long impact of the Ottoman empire
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Re-writing C20th British Philosophy
Tue 16 Oct 2018
Shahidha Bari with news of the Man Booker Prize and discussion about female philosophers
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Sinking Your Teeth Into Vampires
Tue 16 Oct 2018
Shahidha Bari looks at new Gothic research with Nick Groom and Xavier Aldana Reyes
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Discrimination
Thu 11 Oct 2018
The lawyer Helena Kennedy joins Shahidha Bari to discuss how British justice fails women.
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Greed and Landownership Past, Present, Future
Thu 11 Oct 2018
Historian Tom Devine, Colombian novelist, Hector Abad and economist Paul Collier
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Drugs and Consciousness
Wed 10 Oct 2018
Does LSD open the doors of perception or just mess with your head?
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A Feminist Take on Medieval History
Sat 6 Oct 2018
How does Chaucer write about rape and consent ? Shahidha Bari with new academic research.
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The Frieze Debate: Museums in the 21st Century
Thu 4 Oct 2018
Michael Govan, Sabine Haag & Hartwig Fischer at the Royal Institution, London.
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Sarah Perry’s Melmoth, Spookiness and Fear.
Wed 3 Oct 2018
The Essex Serpent's author talks to Matthew Sweet about re-imagining the Melmoth myth.
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Gandhi's power, portable citizenship & Indian writing - China's missing film star
Tue 2 Oct 2018
Gandhi's power, portable citizenship & Indian writing with Rana Mitter & Amit Chaudhuri.
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Loss, Grief and Anger
Thu 27 Sep 2018
Lisa Appignanesi; Heather O'Neill; Cherie Dimaline; Pacific Arts Adviser, Jo Walsh
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Slavoj Žižek, Camille Paglia, Flemming Rose
Wed 26 Sep 2018
Philip Dodd and guests explore the value of causing offence.
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The Goodies
Tue 25 Sep 2018
Matthew Sweet meets the trio behind the '70s and early '80s TV comedy show
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What Nietzsche teaches us
Thu 20 Sep 2018
Biographer Sue Prideaux and others discuss Nietzsche's relevance today
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What Camus and Claude Lévi-Strauss teach us
Wed 19 Sep 2018
Being an outsider and learning to think like an outsider
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What St Augustine teaches us
Tue 18 Sep 2018
Anne McElvoy and guests explore ideas of tyranny, martyrdom, sin and grace
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Proms Plus: Retelling Troy
Tue 18 Sep 2018
Bettany Hughes and Alex Clark discuss feminist retellings of The Iliad.
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Sebastian Faulks
Thu 13 Sep 2018
The author of Birdsong in conversation with Anne McElvoy about his new novel Paris Echo.
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Women Finding a Voice
Wed 12 Sep 2018
Deborah Frances-White host of The Guilty Feminist pod, Natalie Haynes, Michèle Roberts
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Design
Wed 12 Sep 2018
Including a report from the London Design Biennale and film historian Peter Biskind.
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Proms Plus: Sex and Death in Literature
Mon 3 Sep 2018
Writers Belinda Bauer and Patricia Duncker discuss sex and death in literature
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Proms Plus: Northern Lights
Wed 29 Aug 2018
Physicists Nathan Case & Melanie Windridge discuss the the aurora borealis.
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Proms Plus: W. H. Auden's The Age of Anxiety
Wed 29 Aug 2018
Writers Glyn Maxwell and Polly Clark discuss Auden’s The Age of Anxiety
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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
