Archive on 4

Brilliant stories told using archive from the BBC and beyond.

Radio 4,700 episodes

Episodes

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The Real Summer of Love
Historian and writer Dominic Sandbrook looks beyond the flower power, 50 years on.
15 Jul 2017,60 mins
Apocalypse Nigh
Broadcaster Robin Ince explores our longstanding obsession with the end of days.
08 Jul 2017,57 mins
The Thirty Year Itch
Phil Tinline explores what the turmoil of the 1970s tells us about British politics today.
01 Jul 2017,58 mins
999 - Which Service Do You Require?
Ian Sansom dials up the story of the 999 service, launched in 1937.
24 Jun 2017,60 mins
Father's Day
Mark Thomas peels off the labels of fatherhood - from breadwinner to stay-at-home dad.
17 Jun 2017,60 mins
Dictators on the Couch
For decades, the CIA profiled the minds of foreign leaders. Daniel Pick investigates.
10 Jun 2017,60 mins
Femmes Fatales
Screen siren Kathleen Turner celebrates the film noir femme fatale's enduring mystique.
27 May 2017,57 mins
Blinded by War
Adam Scourfield interviews three British veterans blinded in conflict.
13 May 2017,58 mins
Roots and Holocaust: When TV Taught Us a History Lesson
Gary Younge and Jonathan Freedland reflect on the impact of two landmark TV series.
06 May 2017,57 mins
A New Life in Europe Revisited
A family of Syrian migrants relive their perilous journey to seek a new life in Europe.
29 Apr 2017,58 mins
Long Road to Change
Zoe Williams asks what protests movements need to do to achieve long-term success.
08 Apr 2017,57 mins
Reporting Terror: 50 Years Behind the Headlines
Peter Taylor reflects on his 50-year career reporting terrorism.
01 Apr 2017,58 mins
Seventy Years in the Planning
Will Self walks the London green belt in search of the 1947 Town and Country Planning Act.
25 Mar 2017,60 mins
Torrey Canyon and the Toxic Tides
50 years after the Torrey Canyon, the story of Britain's worst environmental disaster.
18 Mar 2017,58 mins
The Mind in the Media
How stories of mental illness are told in fiction and news.
11 Mar 2017,57 mins
The Shape of Things That Came
Professor Sean Street uses audio archives to explore the future history novel by HG Wells.
04 Mar 2017,57 mins
1917: Eyewitness in Petrograd
Emily Dicks visits St Petersburg to trace her grandfather's memories of 1917's revolutions
25 Feb 2017,58 mins
A Brief History of Lust
American satirist Joe Queenan presents a new history of lust.
18 Feb 2017,60 mins
A Brief History of Failure
Joe Queenan on the romance of failure, or the dreaded 'failure chic'.
11 Feb 2017,57 mins
Ovid in Changing Times
Tom Holland explores Ovid's approach to change.
04 Feb 2017,57 mins
How Marx Made the Right
Tim Stanley argues that the Right's debt to Marx is nearly as great as the Left's.
21 Jan 2017,58 mins
The Politician and the Judge
Geoffrey Robertson QC on the changing relationship between the courts and the government.
14 Jan 2017,58 mins
Asa Briggs: The Last Victorian Improver
Tristram Hunt tracks the life's work of the historian and university founder Asa Briggs.
07 Jan 2017,57 mins
The Bathrooms Are Coming: An Internal History of Corporate Comms
In-house journals and industrial musicals, how firms have communicated to their workers.
31 Dec 2016,57 mins
Instant History
University of Hertfordshire students create an oral history archive - in a weekend.
17 Dec 2016,57 mins
Lloyd George's Revolution
Peter Hennessy tells how Lloyd George galvanised Britain as war leader a century ago.
03 Dec 2016,60 mins
Logan's Run and Intergenerational War
Ed Howker looks at the world depicted in the science fiction novel Logan's Run.
26 Nov 2016,57 mins
Being Bored: The Importance Of Doing Nothing
Phill Jupitus explores the importance of being bored.
19 Nov 2016,58 mins
No Platform
Andrew Hussey on the history of the 'no platform' debates raging on university campuses.
12 Nov 2016,60 mins
Speaking in Public: Archive on 4 Goes Live!
David Bramwell sets out to prove that anyone can be a good public speaker.
05 Nov 2016,58 mins