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
-
![]()
Testosterone. The grey zone. Indian science.
Wed 20 Sep 2017
Jahnavi Phalkey, Matt Kimberley, Richard Fortey, Adrian Owen & Cordelia Fine.
-
![]()
Diplomacy: Sir John Jenkins, Gabrielle Rifkind, Michael Burleigh, Dr Beyza Unal.
Wed 20 Sep 2017
Philip Dodd and guests explore the art of negotiation and discuss JT Rogers' play Oslo.
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Russian Nationalism. Scythians. Hull and Port Talbot on stage.
Fri 15 Sep 2017
Anne McElvoy talks to Anne Applebaum about Russian and Ukrainian history.
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Social Conservatism, Kathe Kollwitz and John Ashbery
Thu 14 Sep 2017
Art and irony - Philip Dodd and Joanna Kavenna on the Käthe Kollwitz show in Birmingham
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Washing in public. Sir Peter Hall (1930 - 2017)
Tue 12 Sep 2017
Public pools, the "steamie" and the Turkish bath are explored by Matthew Sweet and guests.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Alan Hollinghurst
Mon 4 Sep 2017
Booker Prize winner, Alan Hollinghurst, discusses his new book, The Sparsholt Affair.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Lenin
Fri 1 Sep 2017
Anne McElvoy discusses Lenin with historians Helen Rappaport and Victor Sebestyen.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address
Tue 29 Aug 2017
Rana Mitter is joined by Kathleen Burk & Joanna Cohen to discuss the Gettysburg Address.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Ancient Rome
Tue 29 Aug 2017
Matthew Sweet talks to Natalie Haynes about the glory that was Rome.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Unfinished Art and Literature
Wed 23 Aug 2017
Ian McMillan on the appeal and arts of the Unfinished
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Djinn
Fri 18 Aug 2017
Elif Shafak and Shahidha Bari tell Ian McMillan why humans need the genie
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Sleep and Insomnia
Wed 16 Aug 2017
Sports sleep coach Nick Littlehales & novelist A. L. Kennedy discuss sleep & insomnia.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Cuneiform 07082017
Tue 8 Aug 2017
Irving Finkel and Shahidha Bari on Mesopotamian writing, jokes and boat building specs
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Ella Fitzgerald
Mon 7 Aug 2017
Kevin LeGendre and Claire Martin discuss Ella Fitzgerald
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Sentimentality
Thu 3 Aug 2017
Anne McElvoy, Dr. Seán Williams & writer Rachel Hewitt discuss sentimentality.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Happiness
Wed 2 Aug 2017
Literature & unhappy people with Will Abberley, Charlotte Mendelson & Claudia Hammond.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Sea Journeys and Voyages
Tue 1 Aug 2017
Rana Mitter considers epic sea journeys in history with Barry Cunliffe & Edith Hall.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Europe in Writing
Tue 1 Aug 2017
Nandini Das & novelist Lawrence Norfolk discuss European writers & the idea of ‘Europe’.
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Opium and Creativity in the 19th c.
Mon 24 Jul 2017
Matthew Sweet, Daisy Hay, Richard Davenport-Hines at Imperial College, London
-
![]()
Proms Extra: Music and Moods
Tue 18 Jul 2017
Thomas Dixon and musicologist Wiebke Thormählen discuss music, literature and emotion.
-
![]()
Proms Extra - Deep Time
Mon 17 Jul 2017
Geologist Iain Stewart and geographer Nicholas Crane consider the concept of "Deep Time"
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Landmark: Matthew Arnold's Culture and Anarchy
Thu 13 Jul 2017
Simon Heffer and Tiffany Jenkins join Matthew Sweet and an audience at Sussex University.
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Art in the Age of Black Power; History of Racist Ideas in US
Wed 12 Jul 2017
Rana Mitter and Linton Kwesi Johnson and Ibram X Kendi
-
![]()
Free Thinking - Queer Icons: Plato's Symposium. Part of Gay Britannia.
Tue 11 Jul 2017
Shahidha Bari discusses LGBTQ in the history of philosophy + the Caine Prize winner
-
![]()
Free Thinking – Writing Love: Jonathan Dollimore, Heer Ranjha. Queer Icons: Sappho. Part of Gay Britannia
Thu 6 Jul 2017
The Punjabi "Romeo and Juliet"; and founding the Centre for the Study of Sexual Dissidence
-
![]()
Free Thinking – Philip Hoare and Elizabeth Jane Burnett on wild swimming. Jake Arnott on Joe Orton
Wed 5 Jul 2017
Philip Hoare and Elizabeth Jane Burnett swim in the literary and poetic power of the sea
-
![]()
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Canada 150: Sydney Newman and British TV; Vahni Capildeo; Shubbak Festival 2017
Thu 29 Jun 2017
Matthew Sweet investigates the Canadian dynamo who transformed British TV drama
-
![]()
Free Thinking: Canada 150: Identity Robbie Richardson, Alison MacLeod, Deborah Pearson + Rupi Kaur and Kevan Funk.
Thu 29 Jun 2017
New Generation Thinkers Shahidha Bari & Laurence Scott look at Canada in TV, poems + art
-
![]()
Free Thinking - Canada 150: Robert Lepage, Katherine Ryan.
Tue 27 Jun 2017
The French Canadian playwright/performer and the stand up comedian talk to Philip Dodd
