Arts & Ideas

"My lady's corselet" was developed by a pioneer of free verse on the frontlines of feminism, the poet Mina Loy. Celebrated in the 1910s as the quintessential New Woman, her love of freedom was shadowed by a darker quest to perfect the female body, as her unusual designs for a figure-correcting corset show. Sophie Oliver asks how she fits into a history of body-correcting garments and cosmetic surgery, feminism and fashion. Working on both sides of the Atlantic writing poetry and designing bonkers body-altering garments: like a bracelet for office workers with a built-in ink blotter, or her ‘corselet’ to correct curvature of the spine in women - in the end Mina Loy couldn’t stop time, and her late-life poetry is full of old clothes and outcast people from the Bowery, as she reckons with – and celebrates – the fact that she has become unfashionable.Producer: Torquil MacLeod Sophie Oliver teaches English Literature at the University of Liverpool and is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council which turns academic research into radio programmes. You can find a collection of essays, discussions and features with New Generation Thinkers on the Free Thinking programme website under the playlist Ten Years of New Generation Thinkers https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08zhs35

An artist murdered in his studio - the blackmailer thinks he knows who removed vital clues. This plot from Charles Bennett premiered in London's West End in 1928 and was subsequently turned into an early sound film by Alfred Hitchcock. Now playwright Mark Ravenhill has written a new version. He joins Matthew Sweet to discuss blackmail and our changing ideas about shame. New Generation Thinker and medieval historian Hetta Howes looks at ideas of shame in the middle ages, with critic and literary scholar Kaye Mitchell tracing those ideas today. Plus criminologist Paul Bleakley, who's researched the history of blackmail.Blackmail, a new version written by Mark Ravenhill and directed by Anthony Banks, runs at Mercury Theatre, Colchester in Essex from March 4th - 19thProducer: Luke Mulhall

Sex strikes suggested by Suffragettes, a theatre company devoted to exploring the experiences of women in the UK prison system and the campaign to make women's rights at the heart of human rights and its links with socialist Eastern Europe: Naomi Paxton finds out about new research into women's history.Her guests are:Tania Shew specialises in the history of feminist thought. She's currently a Scouloudi Fellow at the Institute of Historical Research working on sex strikes and birth strikes as tactics in the British and American women’s suffrage movements, 1890-1920.Dr Celia Donert is Associate Professor in Central European History at the University of Cambridge. She is writing a book exploring How Women's Rights became Human Rights: Gender, Socialism, and Postsocialism in Global History, 1917-2017.Caoimhe Mcavinchey is Professor of Socially Engaged and Contemporary Performance at Queen Mary University London. She has been working on a project Clean Break: Women, Theatre Organisation and the Criminal Justice SystemChloë Moss is a playwright who has worked with Clean Break on a number of projects.You can see a film of Chloë's drama Sweatbox on the website https://www.cleanbreak.org.uk/This New Thinking episode of the Arts and Ideas podcast was made in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research council – part of UKRI. Presenter: Naomi Paxton Producer: Paula McFarlane

Sex strikes suggested by Suffragettes, a theatre company devoted to exploring the experiences of women in the UK prison system and the campaign to make women's rights at the heart of human rights and its links with socialist Eastern Europe: Naomi Paxton finds out about new research into women's history.Her guests are:Tania Shew specialises in the history of feminist thought. She's currently a Scouloudi Fellow at the Institute of Historical Research working on sex strikes and birth strikes as tactics in the British and American women’s suffrage movements, 1890-1920.Dr Celia Donert is Associate Professor in Central European History at the University of Cambridge. She is writing a book exploring How Women's Rights became Human Rights: Gender, Socialism, and Postsocialism in Global History, 1917-2017.Caoimhe Mcavinchey is Professor of Socially Engaged and Contemporary Performance at Queen Mary University London. She has been working on a project Clean Break: Women, Theatre Organisation and the Criminal Justice System. Chloë Moss is a playwright who has worked with Clean Break on a number of projects.You can see a film of Chloë's drama Sweatbox on the website https://www.cleanbreak.org.uk/Presenter: Naomi Paxton Producer: Paula McFarlane

The Unthank sisters, writers Lucy Holland and Oyinkan Braithwaite and historian and feminist activist Sally Alexander join Shahidha Bari for a conversation about what it means to be a sister on International Women's Day 2022. You could make a family from recent novels depicting sisterhood from Oyinkan Braithwaite's My Sister the Serial Killer, to Daisy Johnson's Sisters and Brit Bennett's The Vanishing Half but literary sisterhood goes back via Jane Austen and the Brontës to Chekhov, King Lear's daughters, Cinderella and Greek myths about the seven sisters who formed the Pleiades, or Antigone and Ismene. And if you're looking at feminist history the idea of the sisterhood has been a cornerstone of political action. Is it right that sisters will have a particular bond and sound if they perform music together? All of this and more in tonight's Free Thinking conversation. The Unthank sisters will be on tour with their latest album Sorrows Away visiting a range of venues from Norwich, Poole, Northampton, Middlesborough, Belfast, Edinburgh, Dublin and a range of places in between starting on March 13th in Lincoln Lucy Holland has written Sistersong set in Anglo-Saxon Britannia. She also presents Breaking the Glass Slipper, a podcast celebrating women in genre. You can hear a reading of Oyinkan's novel My Sister the Serial Killer by Weruche Opia on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/series/p08q6q19 Sally Alexander, Professor Emerita at Goldsmiths, is founding editor of the History Workshop Journal and is working on a history of psycho-analysis.Producer: Kevin CoreYou might also be interested in the most recent episode of Radio 3's Words and Music on Sisters, with its curated playlist of readings and music of all kinds ranging from Wordsworth, Jane Austen, Brit Bennet and Arifa Akbar to Fanny Mendelssohn, Errollyn Wallen, Hildegard of Bingen and the Labeque Sisters performing Ravel. And tomorrow's programme explores new research into women's history. And there's a playlist on the Free Thinking programme website called Women in the World https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p084ttwp

Before Them, We is a photographic project by Ruth Sutoyé and also the title of an anthology of poems in which a group of poets of African descent reflect upon the lives of their grandparents and elders and the inter-generational relationships in the families they went on to establish. Ruth and co-editor and poet Jacob Sam-La Rose talk to Matthew Sweet alongside Booker prize winning author Howard Jacobson - the great-grandson of Lithuanian and Russian immigrants - who has just published a memoir exploring his early life in a working-class family in 1940s Manchester where he was raised by his mother, grandmother and aunt Joyce before becoming a writer.Mother's Boy by Howard Jacobson is out now You can find photographs from Before Them, We on https://www.ruthsutoye.com/ and the poetry anthology is published by Flipped Eye.Producer: Torquil MacLeod

Leading artists, writers, thinkers discuss the ideas shaping our lives.

Leading artists, writers, thinkers discuss the ideas shaping our lives.

After Iraq and Afghanistan, solider Harry Parker turned author and has written a study of the way robotics, computing and AI might be about to irrevocably alter our understanding of what it means to be human. Scientist and Radio 4 presenter Adam Rutherford's new book traces ideas about the perfect body and eugenics from the Spartans and Plato to present day politics and the pandemic. In her new book, philosopher and professor Clare Chambers argues that the unmodified body is a key principle of equality. While defending the right of anyone to change their bodies, she traces the way that the social pressure to modify send a powerful message: you are not good enough. They join Matthew Sweet alongside New Generation Thinker and academic at UCL, Xine YaoHybrid Humans: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Man and Machine by Harry Parker is out now.Control: The Dark History and Troubling Present of Eugenics by Adam Rutherford is out now. You can hear him discussing Genes, racism, ageing and evidence with guests including Daniel Levitin in a previous episode of Free Thinking https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000fpj2Intact: A Defence of the Unmodified Body by Clare Chambers is out now.Xine Yao is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to turn research into radio. You can find an essay about The Inscrutable Writing of Sui Sin Far on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000v9gl and a discussion about Darwin's The Descent of Man (1871) https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000s31zProducer: Luke Mulhall

Project Fizzyo promotes better breathing in teenagers with cystic fibrosis by merging their daily physiotherapy exercise routine with a computer game. Emma Raywood, PHD student and Lead Investigator on Project Fizzyo explains how it works.And vets are using a VR headset to help them oversee the health of cows in a project exploring the benefits of computer game technology for use in other working environments. Prof Ruth Falconer from Abertay University heads the SmARtview project. It’s a world away from 1972 when pong was developed by Allan Alcorn. New Generation Thinker Christopher Harding finds out more.Project Fizzyo: https://scottishgames.net/2021/03/03/case-study-konglomerate-games/SmARtview project: https://www.innovationforgames.com/ingame-projects/smartview/Today’s conversation was a New Thinking episode of the Arts and Ideas podcast made in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research council which is part of UKRI. Link to playlist New Research on the Free Thinking programme website on BBC Radio 3 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zws90 Presenter: Christopher Harding Producer: Paula McFarlane

Pankaj Mishra's Run and Hide tells a story of modern Indian times, as the hidden pasts of wealthy, Gatsby-style tech entrepreneurs must be reckoned with.And to help put this modern India in context, Dr Pragya Dhital will consider the resonances of the tumultuous period of "The Emergency", the response of the Indian government to a period of "internal disturbance" in the 1970s. She discusses the homemade or samizdat style leaflets which journalists like Ram Dutt Tripathi used to great effect.The cuisine of India is a national symbol around the world, but Dr Sharanya Murali explores how this most traditional artform, cookery, can become iconoclastic when utilised in performance art by the likes of Pushpamala N and Raj Goody.And Dr Vikram Visana will consider populism in India, telling us how differing parties are vying to answer questions of national identity which seem increasingly ill-suited to the challenges facing this modern democracy - and one of the key figures he discusses is KM Munshi.Asked for their key cultural figures of India the panel made some eclectic choices. Seek out the short stories of Ismat Chughtai who endured an obscenity trial for her works, and VS Naipaul was viewed as a great chronicler of a crisis in the Hindu struggle with the modern world. Bilkis Dadi was the most recognisable face of the Shaheen Bagh protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the music of Mehdi Hassan was remembered as a culturally unifying force between India and Pakistan.Read more at: https://www.shethepeople.tv/news/shaheen-baghs-bilkis-dadi-on-bbcs-100-women-of-2020-list/Presented by Rana Mitter Produced by Kevin CoreIf you want more programmes exploring South Asian culture and history you can find Rana looking at the film Pather Panchali made by Satyajit Ray and the writing of Sunjeev Sahota https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b060zmjs Maha Rafi Atal, Anindita Ghosh, Jahnavi Phalkey and Yasmin Khan share their research in an episode called Everything You Never Knew About Indian history https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b069yb6k O What a Lovely Savas explores India's First World War experiences https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b047zvbj Tariq Ali on the 50th anniversary of 1968 uprisings https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05x9zq2 Rana explores Pakistan politics and water supplies https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000s9cg Amitav Gosh on weaving the ancient legend about the goddess of snakes, Manasa Devi into a journey between America, the Sundarbans and Venice https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00066px Arundhati Roy https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08slx9t

The red-haired Joanna Hiffernan was James McNeill Whistler's Woman in White. An exhibition curated by Margaret MacDonald for the Royal Academy of Arts, London and the National Gallery of Art, Washington uncovers the role she played in his career. An instagram account about the women painted by Viennese artist Egon Schiele has amassed over 100,000 followers. Now Sophie Haydock is publishing a novel called The Flames, which imagines the story of Schiele's wife and three other women who modelled for him. Ilona Sagar has been working for over 2 years in social care services and community settings in the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham to make art reflecting the consequences of asbestos exposure involving social workers, carers, organisers and residents. Shahidha Bari hosts a conversation about famous artists and their sometimes less famous models.Whistler’s Woman in White: Joanna Hiffernan runs at the Royal Academy in London from 26 February — 22 May 2022 https://www.ilonasagar.com/ https://www.serpentinegalleries.org/whats-on/radio-ballads/ On view at Serpentine (31 March – 29 May) and Barking Town Hall and Learning Centre (2-17 April), Radio Ballads presents new film commissions alongside paintings, drawings and contextual materials that share each project’s collaborative research process. The original documentary series Radio Ballads produced by musicians Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger, working with radio producer Charlie Parker, were broadcast by the BBC from 1957–64. Sophie Haydock's novel The Flames is published in March 2022.Producer: Torquil MacLeodYou can find a playlist on the Free Thinking website exploring Art, Architecture, Photography and Museums with discussions on colour, trompe l'oeil, world's fairs, and guests including Veronica Ryan, Jennifer Higgie, Eric Parry and Alison Brooks, the directors of museums in London, Paris, Singapore, Los Angeles, Washington https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p026wnjl

Travelling in Woody Guthrie's footsteps inspired a new history of hitchhiking written by Jonathan Purkis. He joins Matthew Sweet for a conversation which ranges across hitchhiking in the UK and in Eastern Europe, where Poland operated a kind of voucher system. We look at the influence of film depictions from the Nevada desert depicted in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and the hippie vibe of Easy Rider to the horror of The Hitcher and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the female focus of Je Tu Il Elle by Chantal Akerman. Has the idea of hitchhiking now had its day? Joining Matthew to assess the idea of risk and our perception of thumbing a lift is Timandra Harkness, film critic Adam Scovell, plus Sally J Morgan, winner of the Portico prize for her book Toto Among the Murderers, based on her experience of being offered a lift by Fred and Rosemary WestJonathan Purkis's book Driving with Strangers is published in February and you can find more here https://www.jonathanpurkis.co.uk/ Sally J Morgan's book Toto Among the Murderers is out now. Timandra Harkness is the author of Big Data: does size matter? has performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe with a show called Take a Risk and contributes to and presents programmes on BBC Radio 4. Adam Scovell writes about film for Sight and Sound magazine and is a published novelist. His latest book was called How Pale The Winter Has Made Us and his new book Nettles is out in April 2022.Producer: Jessica TreenWe've a whole playlist of discussions exploring The Way We Live Now with topics ranging from Breakfast, to Gloves, Toys to Punk, Rationality and Tradition. Find them on the Free Thinking programme website and available to download as Arts and Ideas podcasts https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p072637b

The bombing of Chongqing, Freud’s collection of ancient Chinese artefacts, the boom in science fiction amongst Chinese readers and an increasingly influential generation of educated tech-savvy millennials. We look at how Chinese culture and history looks different, when we look at it through the eyes of Chinese readers and writers, its innovators and its consumers.Freud and China is curated by Craig Clunas, Professor Emeritus of the History of Art at the University of Oxford and it runs at the Freud Museum in London from 12th February to 26th June 2022.Melissa Fu’s novel Peach Blossom Spring is available from 17th March 2022.The Subplot: What China Is Reading and Why It Matters by Megan Walsh is published in paperback on February 24thProducer: Ruth WattsCultural recommendations: Novels: Tang Jia San Shao, Master of Demonic Cultivation; Liu Cixin, The Three Body Problem; Yan Ge, Strange Beasts of China TV (all available on YouTube): Nothing But Thirty; Da Ming Feng Hua; and, In The Name Of The PeopleThere’s plenty more about China in the Free Thinking archives. You can find Xue Xinran exploring China's recent history through the lives and relationships of one family: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0002h89 Is the Shadow of Mao still hanging over China? https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000bmty Frank Dikott considers Mao in a programme looking at ideas about leadership and dictators https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0009bf3 – including a discussion of how Cantonese poetry has fuelled Hong Kong’s democracy movement.Image: Readers perusing books at Zhonshuge bookstore in Shanghai. Image credit: Costfoto/Barcroft Media via Getty Images

The Nebra Sky Disc, a blue-green bronze dish around 30 cm in diameter, is thought to feature the oldest description of the cosmos on its surface. It's one of the exhibits in a new exhibition at the British Museum. Anne McElvoy looks at culture and travel between Britain and Europe from 4000 to 1000 BC, what we understand about the building of Stonehenge and other sites of that period in Scotland and Wales. Her guests are three archaeologists: Mike Pitts, Susan Greaney and Seren Griffiths. and the British museum exhibition curator Neil Wilkin.The World of Stonehenge runs at the British Museum in London from February 17th to July 17th 2022. Mike Pitts is the author of How to Build Stonehenge. Susan Greaney works for English Heritage at Stonehenge as a Senior Properties Historian and is studying for a PhD at Cardiff University. She's a New Generation Thinker, on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to turn academic research into radio - and on the Radio 3 website and BBC Sounds you can find an Essay by her, and a short Sunday feature based on her trip to explore connections between the Neolithic peoples of Britain and the ancient Jomon civilisation of Japan https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000hgqx Seren Griffiths is also a New Generation Thinker. She teaches at Manchester Metropolitan University and has co-curated exhibitions and projects at Oriel Môn Museum Anglesey and written an Essay for Radio 3 about world war one battlefield finds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000vgvbProducer: Torquil MacLeod

The doomsday clock stands at less than two minutes to midnight, but how alarmed should we be and how can art respond to humanity's apparent vulnerability? Shahidha Bari is joined by author Sheila Heti, theatre director Omar Elerian and New Generation Thinker SJ Beard.Sheila Heti's new novel Pure Colour, a kind of fable about end times, is published on 15th February. You can find her discussing a previous novel exploring motherhood in the Free Thinking archives https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b3fjvgThe Chairs (Les Chaises) by Eugene Ionesco, translated and directed by Omar Elerian, runs at the Almeida Theatre, London until 5th March. First staged in post-war Paris in 1952, it features two characters, Old Man and Old Woman, who spend the play preparing chairs for a series of invisible guests coming to hear a revelation which could be the meaning of life, or could be about the end of the world.SJ Beard is Academic Programme Manager at the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk and a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to share academic research on the radio. You can find their Essay about AI and what we learn from Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09vz70dProducer: Torquil MacLeod

The first underwater film, the making of Moby Dick in Fishguard, Wales, the poetry of Marianne Moore and the secret world of whale scavengers are conjured by Rana Mitter's guests:In a new book, Strandings, Peter Riley, Associate Professor in Poetry and Poetics at the University of Durham, loses himself in the secretive world of whale-scavengers who descend on coastlines to claim trophies from washed-up carcasses.Author and artist Philip Hoare has written extensively about whales, encountering them often in his daily swims in the sea. His most recent book, Albert and the Whale, explores the life of Albrecht Dürer. You can hear him talking more about this link in another Free Thinking episode called Dürer, Rhinos and Whales https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001212cRachel Murray is a Leverhulme Fellow at the University of Sheffield whose current project examines the presence of marine life, particularly invertebrates, in contemporary and modern literature and both she and Philip Hoare look at the poetry of Marianne Moore. You can hear her presenting a Radio 4 feature Lady Chatterley's Bed Bugs https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000qwtxEdward Sugden, Senior Lecturer in American Studies at King’s College, is undertaking a biography of Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, which turns the novel itself into a character and tracks its turbulent history from near-obscurity to becoming one of the most enduring novels of all time.Producer: Tim BanoYou can find a playlist exploring prose and poetry of all kinds on the Free Thinking website and a series of programmes exploring Modernist ideas and writing and there's also an episode devoted to Jaws: Sharks and Whales https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b060zryfImage: A sperm whale

The first under-water film, the making of Moby Dick in Fishguard, Wales, the poetry of Marianne Moore and the secret world of whale scavengers are conjured by Rana Mitter's guests: In a new book, Strandings, Peter Riley, Associate Professor in Poetry and Poetics at the University of Durham, loses himself in the secretive world of whale-scavengers who descend on coastlines to claim trophies from washed-up carcasses.Author and artist Philip Hoare has written extensively about whales, encountering them often in his daily swims in the sea. His most recent book, Albert and the Whale, explores the life of Albrecht Dürer. You can hear him talking more about this link in another Free Thinking episode called Dürer, Rhinos and Whales https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001212cRachel Murray is a Leverhulme Fellow at the University of Sheffield whose current project examines the presence of marine life, particularly invertebrates, in contemporary and modern literature and both she and Philip Hoare look at the poetry of Marianne Moore. You can hear her presenting a Radio 4 feature Lady Chatterley's Bed Bugs https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000qwtxEdward Sugden, Senior Lecturer in American Studies at King’s College, is undertaking a biography of Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, which turns the novel itself into a character and tracks its turbulent history from near-obscurity to becoming one of the most enduring novels of all time.Producer: Tim BanoYou can find a playlist exploring prose and poetry of all kinds on the Free Thinking website and a series of programmes exploring Modernist ideas and writing and there's also an episode devoted to Jaws: Sharks and Whales https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b060zryf

New Generation Thinker Christienna Fryar is joined by four scholars whose work on composers has fed into concerts being recorded by BBC Philharmonic.Musicologist and pianist Dr Samantha Ege from the University of Oxford, is working on the American composer and pianist Margaret Bonds (1913 – 1972)Dwight Pile-Gray, who is studying at the London College of Music at the University of West London, is researching the Canadian American composer, organist, pianist, choir director and music professor Robert Nathaniel Dett (1882 – 1943)The ethnomusicologist and instrumentalist Ahmed Abdul Rahman, doing his PhD at Bath Spa University is investigating the music of Sudanese composer Ali Osman (1958 – 2017)Musicologist and pianist Dr Phil Alexander is a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Edinburgh working on the Scottish Jewish composer Isaac Hirshow (1883 – 1956)You can find a previous episode of Arts and Ideas looking at three more composers: Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, Kikuko Kanai and Julia Perry.Produced by Amelia ParkerIf you want more information about the Diverse Composers project you can find that on the website of UK Research and Innovation https://www.ukri.org/news/celebrating-classical-composers-from-diverse-ethnic-backgrounds-2/If you enjoyed this – there’s a playlist called New Research on the Free Thinking website where you can find discussions about everything from conserving fashion and putting it on display in museums to recording the accents found around Manchester, so do dip in. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zws90

"The beauty of speed. Time and Space died yesterday. We already live in the absolute, because we have created the eternal, omnipresent speed." Part of the 1909 manifesto drawn up by Italian poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti that declared the aims of the groundbreaking futurist branch of modernism. Their rejection of the past included embracing the march of machinery, the power of youth and of violence so how do we view this now ? Matthew Sweet is joined by Steven Connor, Selena Daly, Rosalind McKever, and Nathan Waddell.Producer: Luke Mulhall

Murals which aimed to synthesise the history and culture of Mexico, Japanese novels exploring urban alienation, an exhibition of Bauhaus paintings from Germany which inspired a generation of Indian artists. Presenter Rana Mitter is joined by Jade Munslow Ong, Christopher Harding, Maria Blanco, and Devika Singh.Amongst the Modernist writers and artists mentioned are: Chilean poet Vicente Huidobro Mexican artist Diego Rivera, and poet Manuel Maples Arce Brazilian artist Tarsila do Amaral Cuban novelist Alejo Carpentier, and painter Wifredo Lam Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges Indian writer and artist Rabindranath Tagore, and artist Amrita Sher-Gil South African writers Olive Schreiner, Roy Campbell, Solomon Plaatje, Rolfes Dhlomo Japanese theorist Okakura Kakuzō, and writers Edogawa Ranpo, and Ryūnosuke AkutagawaProducer: Luke MulhallImage: the Indian polymath and modernist Rabindranath Tagore Image credit: Keystone France/Getty ImagesPart of the Modernism season running across BBC Radio 3 and 4 with programmes marking the publication in 1922 of Ulysses by James Joyce, a reading of Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, a Words and Music playlist of readings from key works published in 1922 and a Sunday Feature on Radio 3 looking at the "all in a day" artwork.Show less

From paper bullets to Tibetan rituals, early printing presses to present day recycling: Laurence Scott explores the cultural and social history of paper, from the Chinese Han Dynasty in 105 AD to the 20th-century workplace. His guests are:Adam Smyth, a Professor of English Literature and the History of the Book at the University of Oxford. His books include Material Texts in Early Modern England; Book Destruction from the Medieval to the Contemporary (co-edited with Dennis Duncan) and Book Parts: A collection of essays on the history of parts of a book; Therese Weber, an artist who has made paintings out of pulp, paper tearing and dipping and is the author of The Language of Paper: A History of 2000 Years; Nicholas Basbanes, a writer and journalist, whose books include On Paper: The Everything of its Two Thousand Year History and Emily Cockayne, an Associate Professor in Early Modern History at the University of East Anglia and author of Rummage: A History of the Things We Have Reused, Recycled and Refused to Let Go. Laurence Scott is the author of books about digital life including The Four-Dimensional Human and Picnic Comma Lightning.How did such a mundane substance revolutionise modern warfare, enable Imperialism and transform art? Can there ever be a blank page? Is recycling the answer to waste?The conversation ranges across the relationship between paper and religious history in the printing of the Quran and Tibetan rituals for the dead; to C17 Swedish paper bullets; Dickens’ Bleak House - in which a pile of paper leads to a fatal fire; the Bristol company who specialised in papier-mâché – a material used for elaborate decorations in C18 homes – and then used by artists like Jean Dubuffet in the 1940s and 50s and a scrap of paper, which survived 9/11 and told a widow, about her husband's final moments.Producer: Jayne Egerton

A "house on chicken legs” in Moscow designed by Viktor Andreyev, Virginia Woolf’s novel Jacob’s Room first published on 26 October 1922, Coal Cart Blues sung by Louis Armstrong drawing on his own experiences of pulling one round the streets of New Orleans where he started his teenage years living in a Home for Waifs; Duchamp’s 1912 painting Nude Descending a Staircase, No 2 are picked out as novelist Will Self, art historian and literary critic Alexandra Harris, jazz and music expert Kevin Le Gendre and architecture writer Owen Hatherley try to nail down the elements that make something modernist; looking at the importance of rhythm, the depiction of everyday life and new inventions, psychology and how you describe the self and utopian ideas about communal living. The presenter is New Generation Thinker and essayist Laurence Scott.Producer: Luke MulhallImage: Will Self in BBC Broadcasting House, LondonPart of the modernism season running across BBC Radio 3 and 4 with programmes marking the publication in 1922 of Ulysses by James Joyce, a reading of Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, a Words and Music playlist of readings from key works published in 1922 and a Sunday Feature on Radio 3 looking at the "all in a day" artwork.

Censored by the US, Europe's greatest early film star played leading roles in love triangle melodramas, comedies, stories of women trapped by tragic circumstances, and she took the role of Hamlet: Asta Nielsen (11 September 1881 – 24 May 1972) is the focus of a BFI season in February and March. To discuss the life and work of the silent movie pioneer, Matthew Sweet is joined by:Historian and film critic Pamela Hutchinson, curator of the BFI season; Emma Smith, Professor of Shakespeare Studies at the University of Oxford; Dr Erica Carter, Professor of German and Film at King's College London, who looks at Nielsen’s time in Germany in the 20s and 30s; and Lone Britt Christensen, Denmark’s Cultural Attaché.In the Eyes of a Silent Star: The Films of Asta Nielsen runs at the BFI Southbank, London from 03 February to 15 March 2022: www.bfi.org.uk/whatsonEmma Smith is the author of This is Shakespeare: How to Read the World's Greatest PlaywrightErica Carter is co-editor of The German Cinema BookIn the Free Thinking archives you can find a series of programmes exploring silent film, star actors including Jean-Paul Belmondo, Marlene Dietrich, Dirk Bogarde, and classics of cinema around the world.Producer: Tim BanoImage: Asta Nielsen in Black Dreams. Image credit: BFI Southbank.

A tour guide at Polish holocaust sites is at the centre of a new novel by Yishai Sarid. The author talks to Anne McElvoy about his own trips to Poland as a teenager and then as a father and the questions they made him ask about how that history is taught and commemorated. Plus three researchers share insights from their studies. Roland Clark has co-curated an exhibition at The Wiener Holocaust Library which explores the wider role of European fascist movements in genocide. Joseph Cronin has been looking at how Jewish refugees come to end up in colonial India. And, Allis Moss asks how anti-Semitism in nineteenth century France might have led to the murder of Emile Zola, and what we can learn about that murder from the art and cartoons of the time.The Memory Monster by Yishai Sarid translated into English by Yardenne Greenspan is out now.This Fascist Life: Radical Right Movements in Interwar Europe runs at The Wiener Holocaust Library until 15 February 2022. You can hear more from Roland about his research in a previous episode of Free Thinking called Remembering Auschwitz https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000dq00 If you want recommendations of Romanian writing including books exploring Jewish history Anne McElvoy talked to Mircea Cărtărescu, Philippe Sands and Georgina Harding https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0011rwxProducer: Ruth WattsHolocaust Memorial Day will be marked on January 27th 2022. You can find Free Thinking conversations from previous years in a playlist looking at War and Conflict https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06kgbyb

Widening the repertoire of classical music comes under the spotlight in today's Free Thinking conversation as New Generation Thinker Christienna Fryar speaks to researchers uncovering music that has been left out of the canon. Ahead of concerts featuring their work, she hears about the stories of three composers: the 18th-century French polymath Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, the Japanese trailblazer Kikuko Kanai and the prolific African-American composer Julia Perry.Christopher Dingle, a Professor of Music at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, is studying the music of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges (1745-1799). Born in Guadeloupe to an enslaved mother and a French plantation owner father, Boulogne lived an extraordinary life – as well as being one of the first black colonels in the French Army, he was a master fencer, celebrated violinist and conductor, whose concertos rival his contemporary Mozart in their fiendish virtuosity.Mai Kawabata, from the Royal College of Music, is a musicologist and violinist. She shares the story of Kikuko Kanai (1906-1986), the first female composer in Japan to write a symphony. Kanai made waves in the musical establishment by fusing Japanese melodies with Western-classical influences –her “life mission” was to popularise the folk music of her native Okinawa.Michael Harper, a vocal tutor from the Royal Northern College of Music, is championing the work of Julia Perry (1924-1979). Perry occupied a unique place as a black American composer – female and upper-middle class, she won Guggenheim fellowships to train in Europe. Despite a life cut short by paralysis and illness, her works include 12 symphonies and 3 operas.This research, done in collaboration with the AHRC and Radio 3, will result in special recordings and a concert performed by the BBC Philharmonic broadcasting works by Nathaniel Dett, Margaret Bonds and Joseph Bologne in Afternoon Concert on BBC Radio 3 on Wednesday 2nd February at 2pm and then on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001414g And listen out for another episode of the Arts & Ideas podcast featuring the research being done into the classical musicians: Nathaniel Dett, Margaret Bonds, Ali Osman and Isaac Hershow and a further concert.Produced by Amelia ParkerIf you want more information about the Diverse Composers project you can find that on the website of UK Research and Innovation https://www.ukri.org/news/celebrating-classical-composers-from-diverse-ethnic-backgrounds-2/If you enjoyed this – there’s a playlist called New Research on the Free Thinking website where you can find discussions about everything from conserving fashion and putting it on display in museums to recording the accents found around Manchester, so do dip in. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zws90

A motorbike adorned with a zebu skull is one of the central images of Djibril Diop Mambéty's classic 1973 film, whose title translates as The Journey of the Hyena. Listed as one of the 100 greatest films of all time in the Sight and Sound magazine poll, it mixes West African oral traditions with influences from the French New Wave and Soviet cinema. Mory and Anta are two young people growing up in a newly independent Senegal who fantasise about leaving Dakar for a new life in France, but how can they realise those dreams and do they really want to leave? Matthew Sweet is joined by New Generation Thinker Sarah Jilani, Estrella Sendra Fernandez and Ashley Clark.Sarah Jilani is a lecturer in English at City, University of London and has written on neocolonialism in Francophone West African cinema. Estrella Sendra Fernandez lectures in film and screen studies at SOAS, University of London. She directed the award-winning documentary film Témoignages de l’autre côté about migration in Senegal. Ashley Clark is curatorial director at the Criterion Collection. He is the author of the book Facing Blackness: Media and Minstrelsy in Spike Lee’s “Bamboozled”Producer: Torquil MacLeodImage: Mareme Niang (Right), and Magaye Niang in a still from the film Touki Bouki Le Voyage de la Hyène, 1973 Senegal. Director : Djibril Diop Mambéty. Image credit: AlamyIn the Free Thinking archives you can find a series of programmes exploring silent film, star actors including Jean-Paul Belmondo, Marlene Dietrich, Dirk Bogarde, and classics of cinema around the world including Kurosawa's Rashomon, Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali, the films of Jacques Tati and Charlie Chaplin.

Drama and gaming are being used in a pair of projects exploring adolescent mental health. Dr Daisy Fancourt finds out why this meeting of the arts and science might unlock new ideas for treatments and discovers the different ways in which young people are participating in the projects. Professor Eunice Ma is the Provost of Falmouth University and is co-leading a new project called ATTUNE. This will look at the way adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can affect adolescents' mental health with the aim of developing new approaches to prevention and care. Edmund Sonuga-Barke is Professor of Developmental Psychology, Psychiatry and Neuroscience at King’s College London and is leading a new project called RE-STAR which aims to help young people with neuroatypicalities such as Attention Deficit/Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). You can find information about the projects on this link https://www.ukri.org/news/24-million-investment-into-adolescent-mental-health/ The podcast is made in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UKRI. You can find a playlist called New Research on the website for Radio 3's Free Thinking programme and all the episodes are available as Arts & Ideas podcasts. Producer: Phoebe McFarlane

Love during a lockdown is at the centre of Sarah Hall's latest book Burntcoat. Monica Ali's new novel is called Love Marriage and looks at love across two cultures and different ideas about feminism, family and careers. Adam Mars-Jones' Box Hill is a darkly affecting love story between men set in 1975. The authors join Shahidha Bari for a conversation exploring writing about relationships.Burntcoat by Sarah Hall and Box Hill by Adam Mars-Jones are both out now. Monica Ali's novel Love Marriage is published in February 2022.Producer: Jessica TreenYou can find other conversations about writing in the Free Thinking Prose and Poetry playlist https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p047v6vh

From Aldous Huxley to cat pictures by Louis Wain: altered states of consciousness can be induced by taking drugs, but they also include dreams, tiredness, grief, and various states of mental illness. Matthew Sweet is joined by Turner Prize winning artist Tai Shani, whose recent work Neon Hieroglyphs explores the history and culture of the hallucinogenic fungus ergot; Sarah Shin, editor of an anthology Altered States; Gary Lachman, historian of the occult whose most recent book Dreaming Ahead of Time explores precognitive dreams; and David Luck, archivist at the Bethlem Museum of the Mind, currently staging an exhibition of Louis Wain's cat pictures which are often described as being psychedelic.Producer: Luke MulhallYou can find Tai Shani's artwork online at the Serpentine Gallery https://www.serpentinegalleries.org/whats-on/tai-shani-untitled-hieroglyphs/Animal Therapy: The Cats of Louis Wain runs at the Bethlem Museum of the Mind until April 14th and there's also an online version https://museumofthemind.org.uk/whats-on/exhibitions/animal-therapy-the-cats-of-louis-wainAltered States edited by Sarah Shin and Dreaming Ahead of Time by Gary Lachman are out now.In the Free Thinking archives you can find Matthew Sweet discussing Drugs and Consciousness with guests including David Nutt https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0000nllAnd David Nutt shared his musical choices with Michael Berkley on Radio 3's Private Passions https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006tnv3Image: Louis Wain's painting Kaleidoscope Cats. Image credit: By permission of Bethlem Museum of the Mind

The legend of Mélusine emerges in French literature of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries in the texts of Jean d’Arras and Coudrette. A beautiful young woman, the progeny of the union between a king and a fairy, is condemned to spend every Saturday with her body below the waist transformed into the tail of serpent. She agrees to marry only on the condition that her husband should never seek to see her on that day every week. Shahidha Bari explores the emergence of the hybrid mermaid-woman, her historical significance and the legacy of the medieval myth of Mélusine.Olivia Colquitt is an AHRC funded doctoral candidate at the University of Liverpool whose research focuses upon the socio-cultural significance of the late Middle English translations of the French prose romance Mélusine and its verse counterpart, Le Roman de Parthenay.Hetta Howes is Senior Lecturer in Medieval and Early Modern Literature at City, University of London and is a BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker. She is the author of Transformative Waters in Medieval Literature.Lydia Zeldenrust is an Associate Lecturer in Medieval Literature, where she currently holds a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship. She is the author of The Melusine Romance in Medieval Europe.Producer: Ruth Watts

Do we underappreciate comic writing ? It’s 400 years since the birth of France’s great satirical playwright, Jean-Baptiste Pocquelin, better known by his pen-name Molière. Stendhal described him as “the great painter of man as he is” and his works have continued to be translated and performed on both the French and British stage with recent adaptations by Christopher Hampton, Anil Gupta and the Scottish poet and playwright, Liz Lochhead. She joins Anne McElvoy to help consider what we make of Molière now and how well his plays work in translation, alongside Clare Finburgh-Delijani, Professor of European Theatre at Goldsmiths, University of London and Suzanne Jones, a Junior Research Fellow in French at St Anne’s College Oxford. Their discussion looks at various adaptations of Tartuffe, Moliere’s play translated as The Hypocrite or The Imposter, which was first performed in 1664.Listen out for a Words and Music episode which picks out key speeches from plays including The Miser, the Imaginary Invalid, The School for Wives and the Misanthrope. You can hear that on BBC Radio 3 at 5.30pm Sunday 16th - followed by a new adaptation of The Miser scripted by Barunka O’Shaughnessy. You can also find out about the court music of Lully in Composer of the Week and there's a special edition of Radio 3's Early Music Show.Producer: Ruth Watts

The conventional view of Neville Chamberlain's dealings with Hitler at the 1938 Munich Conference, paints him as weak and gullible - an appeaser. But why did appeasement become such a dirty word when negotiation and accommodation are such valuable diplomatic tools? Rana Mitter is joined by historian Tim Bouverie, screenwriter Alex von Tunzelmann and journalist Juliet Samuel to reassess Chamberlain's reputation and to examine how the long shadow of Munich still affects the actions of politicians in the 21st century.Tim Bouverie is the author of Appeasing Hitler: Chamberlain, Churchill and the Road to War. Alex von Tunzelmann wrote the screenplay for Jonathan Teplitzky's 2017 film Churchill. Juliet Samuel is a columnist who covers politics, economics, foreign policy and technology for The Telegraph.There's a new film adaptation of Robert Harris's best-selling novel Munich. Munich: The Edge of War is on selected release in cinemas from 7th January and available on Netflix from 21st January.Producer: Torquil MacLeodYou can find a playlist of programmes exploring War and Conflict on the Free Thinking website https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06kgbyb

From duels to hygiene and medical protection to the image of the gloved aristocrat whose hands aren’t coarsened by work: Shahidha Bari dons a pair of gloves as she finds out about tranks, fourchettes, lace, wool and glove making which is on The Heritage Craft Assosicaion's 'Red List' of Endangered crafts. The Glove maker Riina Oun creates high-fashion bespoke gloves. She has collaborated with designers such as Giles Deacon and Meadham Kirchhoff, and she also teaches the art of gloving. Technologist Tom Chatfield considers the glove as cutting edge technology, explains what haptic feedback does for us and why the hand is so important in helping us navigate virtual worlds. Anne Green's book 'Gloves: An Intimate History', has just been published, a cultural history written as disposable protective gloves took on a whole new resonance. And Rebecca Unsworth brings us stories from her work with Birmingham Museums as she considers the smells of gloves and their role as the ultimate 17th century gift.Producer: Jessica TreenYou might be interested in other conversations about fashion in the Free Thinking archives: Fashion stories in Museums hears from V&A fashion curator Claire Wilcox, Veronica Isaac and Cassandra Davies Strodder https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000s2by Fashion, Art and the Body brings together Ekow Eshun, Charlie Porter and Olivia Laing https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000wc78 Jade Halbert discusses recycling of fashion in this episode https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00061m1 The Politics of Fashion and Drag hears from Scrumbly Koldewyn, visits the Vauxhall Tavern and talks to Jenny Gilbert https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09zcjch

Matthew Sweet explores Belmondo's central role in the revolutionary cinema of 1960s France and how he became one of the most celebrated screen actors of his generation with Ginette Vincendeau, Lucy Bolton and Phuong Le.Ginette Vincendeau is Professor of Film Studies at King's College London. Lucy Bolton is Reader in Film Studies at Queen Mary University of London. Phuong Le is a film critic based in Paris.A BFI season focused on the films of Francois Truffaut runs across January and February and includes a BFI Player collection and a batch of Blu-rays being released in Spring 2022 and partner seasons at cinemas around the UK including Edinburgh Filmhouse and Ciné Lumière.Producer: Torquil MacLeod

90% are unknown still but the species which have been studied have given us penicillin, ways of breaking down plastics, food and bio fuels but they can also be dangerous. Neither animal nor vegetable, they are both amongst us and within us, shaping our lives in ways it is difficult to imagine. Merlin Sheldrake's book about fungi, Entangled Life, has won the Royal Society Science book of the year and the Wainwright Conservation prize so here's Matthew Sweet with him and others discussing the amazing life of mushrooms.Francesca Gavin curated an exhibition Mushrooms: The Art, Design and Future of the Fungi, which ran at Somerset House in London and is now available to view as an online tour. It features the work of 40 artists, musicians and designers from Cy Twombly to Beatrix Potter, John Cage to Hannah Collins. Sam Gandy is an ecologist, writer and researcher who has collaborated with the Centre for Psychedelic Research at Imperial College. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/psychedelic-research-centre/ Begoña Aguirre-Hudson is Curator and Mycologist at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. She helps look after the Kew Fungarium - the largest collection of fungi in the world. https://www.kew.org/science/our-science/people/begona-aguirre-hudsonProducer: Alex Mansfield You can find other discussions in the Free Thinking archives about food https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08wn51y Cows, farming and our view of nature https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000n0g8 Humans, animals, ecologies: conversations with Anna Tsing and Joanna Bourke https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000sjmj

Sticking in stamps and killing animals were the main achievements of King George V - according to his biographer Harold Nicholson. Now Jane Ridley has written a new book about him subtitled "Never a Dull Moment" so can dullness be a virtue. Anne McElvoy chairs the discussion, which also looks at the history and image of Roundheads and Cavaliers with New Generation Thinker Tom Charlton and the appearance of dullness in political theory with Jonathan Floyd, Associate Professor at the University of Bristol. Plus Anne talks to Colm Tóibín, the winner of the David Cohen Prize for Literature - biennial British literary award given to acknowledge a whole career.Professor Jane Ridley's biography George V: Never a Dull Moment is out now.Producer: Ruth Watts

Helping start the Women's Liberation Movement in Britain is just one of the key moments in Sheila Rowbotham's life. This year she published Daring to Hope: My Life in the 1970s and she compares then and now talking to Rana Mitter. Also a discussion of early Buddhism and new research uncovered by Sarah Shaw and Kate Crosby.The Art of Listening: A Guide to the Early Teachings of Buddhism by Sarah Shaw is out nowEsoteric Theravada is a book Kate Crosby exploring the Southeast Asian meditation traditionSheila Rowbotham's Daring to Hope: My Life in the 1970s is out now. Her other books include Dreamers of a New Day: Women Who Invented the Twentieth Century; the biography Edward Carpenter: A Life of Liberty and Love and Rebel Crossings: New Women, Free Lovers and Radicals in Britain and the United StatesProducer: Luke MulhallOn the Free Thinking programme website you can find a playlist exploring religious belief featuring a range of interviewees including Giles Fraser, Francesca Stavrakopoulou, Yaa Gyasi, Shelina Janmohamed and Haemin Sunim. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03mwxlp

From unwrapping Egyptian mummies to her theories about witch trials and the influence of her 1921 book The Witch-Cult in Western Europe on Wicca beliefs: Margaret Murray's career comes under the spotlight as Matthew Sweet is joined by guests including New Generation Thinker Elsa Richardson and historian of witchcraft Ronald Hutton. Producer: Luke Mulhall You might also be interested in the Free Thinking discussions on Magic with Kate Laity, Chris Gosden, Jessica Gossling and John Tresch https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000kvssOn Witchcraft, Werewolves and Writing the Devil with Jenni Fagan. Salena Godden, Tabitha Stanmore and Daniel Ogden https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000r5hkEnchantment, Witches and Woodlands hearing from Marie Darrieussecq, Zoe Gilbert, Lisa Mullen and Dafydd Daniel https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0000qkl

James Graham’s play exploring the encounters between the American political commentators Gore Vidal and William F Buckley Jr, opens at the Young Vic in London this week. We also have Germaine Greer v Norman Mailer at New York's Town Hall, April 1971 which was filmed as a documentary Town Bloody Hall. More recent Presidential debates have become part of the British political landscape during our elections - and there's the weekly politics show Question Time with viewers now on zoom and twitter. Anne McElvoy and guests look at whether debating has changed?James Graham latest play is Best of EnemiesHelen Lewis is a broadcaster and staff writer for The Atlantic. Her latest book is Difficult Women: A History of Feminism in 11 Fights.Alex Massie is a columnist for The Times and The Sunday Times and is the Scotland Editor of The Spectator.Producer: Ruth WattsBest of Enemies is at the Young Vic in London until Jan 22nd 2022 with Charles Edwards as Gore Vidal, alongside David Harewood, as William F Buckley Jr. It is inspired by Robert Gordon and Morgan Neville's 2015 American documentary film Best of Enemies, available on https://dogwoof.com/bestofenemies Town Bloody Hall a documentary made by Chris Hegedus and DA Pennebaker is available from https://www.criterion.com/films/30213-town-bloody-hall James Graham's other dramas include Quiz, Labour of Love and Ink. You can hear him discussing Dramatising Democracy in a Free Thinking discussion with Michael Dobbs, Paula Milne, and Trudi-Ann Tierney https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04yb7k6 and his play which put Screaming Lord Sutch on stage https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06zq2jl

Migration, autism, young Colombians escaping violence, Yorkshire farming and children born of war in Uganda are the topics highlighted in the winners of this year’s AHRC Researcher in Film Awards. Naomi Paxton looks at the winning entries. The Best Animated Film of the Year winner Osbert Parker is a three-time BAFTA nominated director and an animation lecturer at the National Film and TV School. His winning film Timeline was produced in collaboration with the Migration Museum for an exhibition called Departures and Matthew Plowright from the museum joins him to talk to Naomi Paxton about condensing a history of migration into a ten minute animation built around the idea of lines connecting. https://www.migrationmuseum.org/ https://vimeo.com/496398115 The Best Doctoral or Early Career Film of the Year winner was Alex Widdowson’s animated film Drawing on Autism. This forms part of his practice-based doctoral work with the Autism through Cinema project at Queen Mary, University of London. He talks to Naomi Paxton and the ethics of making a film about other people’s experiences of autism. https://www.qmul.ac.uk/sllf/film-studies/research/autism-through-cinema/ You might also be interested in this Free Thinking conversation with novelist Michelle Gallen and Dr Bonnie Evans from QMUL about representations of autism https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000r3ly The Best Research Film of the Year was won by Birte Vogel for The Art of Peace, Medellín – a documentary exploring the impact of community-led arts initiatives that work with marginalised youth, and particularly young men, in Colombia who are at risk of becoming involved in ongoing violent conflict. Joining Naomi to talk about the film is Teresa Ó Brádaigh Bean, Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Manchester and part of The Art of Peace project team. https://sites.manchester.ac.uk/the-art-of-peace/home/about/research/ The Best Climate Emergency Film of the Year was given to Newland: New Vision for a Wilder Future which hears from a pair of farmers in York shire and focuses on the tensions between farming and conservation, looking at issues including public access, heritage, and sustainability. Suzie Cross is Artistic Director of the Land Lines Research Project at the University of Leeds – she made the film with Dave Lynch https://landlinesproject.wordpress.com/ You can find two Free Thinking conversations about the Land Lines project The episodes are called Nature Writing https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000ktf4 featuring Pippa Marland and Connecting with Nature https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000xthj hearing from Pippa Marland and Anita Roy about their anthology. The Inspiration Award winner was Dheeraj Akolkar. His film The Wound is Where the Light Enters was inspired by a docu-dance performance created by fifteen young people born of war rapes in Northern Uganda. Professor Sabine Lee from the University of Birmingham is part of a research network that explores the experiences of Children born of war https://www.chibow.org/ https://research.birmingham.ac.uk/en/publications/children-born-of-war-past-present-and-future You can find out more about the awards here https://ahrc.ukri.org/innovation/research-in-film-awards/ This New Thinking episode of the Arts and Ideas podcast was made in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UKRI You can find more episodes devoted to New Research in a playlist on BBC Radio 3’s Free Thinking programme website. Producer: Paula McFarlane

The Cundill Prize and PEN Hessell-Tiltman prizes for non-fiction writing about history are announced in early December. Rana Mitter talks to Cundill judge Henrietta Harrison about why their choice this year was Blood On The River by Marjoleine Kars. And with the news tonight that Rebecca Wragg Sykes book Neanderthals has won the PEN Hessell Tiltman - we revisit the conversation Rana recorded when the book came out bringing together Priya Atwal, Joseph Henrich and Rebecca Wragg Sykes in a conversation about family ties and power networks which ranges across Sikh queens, through the ties of marriage and religion which helped shape the Western world, back to the links between Neanderthals and early man.Priya Atwal has published Royal and Rebels: The Rise and Fall of the Sikh Empire. Dr Atwal is a Teaching Fellow in Modern South Asian History at King's College London. Joseph Henrich is a Professor in the department of Human and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University and the author of The Weirdest People in the World: How the West became psychologically peculiar and particularly prosperous. Rebecca Wragg Sykes is an Honorary Fellow at University of Liverpool and Université de Bordeaux. She is the author of Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art and is one of the founders of https://trowelblazers.com/ Marjoleine Kars has won the 2021 Cundill Prize for her book Blood on the River: A Chronicle of Mutiny and Freedom on the Wild CoastYou might be interested in other Free Thinking conversations with Rutger Bregman author of Human Kind https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08d77hx Penny Spikins speaking about Neanderthal history at the 2019 Free Thinking Festival https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0003zp2 Tom Holland on his history of the impact of Christianity on Western thinking in a programme called East Meets West https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00093d1 The 2020 Cundill prize winner Camilla Townsend discussing Times of Change with Tom Holland, Emma Griffin and Jared Diamond https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000py89Producer: Robyn Read

Killer plants, a blinding meteor shower, the spread of an unknown disease: John Wyndham's 1951 novel explores ideas about the hazards of bio-engineering and what happens when society breaks down. Matthew Sweet is joined by writers Amy Binns and Tanvir Bush, broadcaster Peter White and New Generation Thinker Sarah Dillon to look at the book that spawned film, TV and radio adaptations and discuss what resonance it has today.Amy Binns has written a biography of John Wyndham - 'Hidden Wyndham: Love, Life, Letters'. Tanvir Bush is a writer and photographer whose most recent novel is 'Cull'. Peter White is the BBC's Disability Affairs Correspondent and presents You and Yours on Radio 4. He presented a documentary exploring science-fiction and blindness https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0931fvq Sarah Dillon is Professor of English at Cambridge University and a Radio 3 New Generation Thinker. Her most recent book is 'Storylistening: Narrative Evidence and Public Reasoning'.You can find other Free Thinking conversations exploring a range of films, books, artworks and TV series which are Landmarks of Culture on the website - everything from Jaws and The Quatermass Experiment to the writing of Günter Grass, Audre Lorde and Lorraine Hansberry. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01jwn44Producer: Torquill MacLeod

Aubrey Williams, Horace Ové, Sonia Boyce, Lubaima Himid, Peter Doig, Chris Ofili, Hurvin Anderson, Grace Wales Bonner and Alberta Whittle have works on show at Tate Britain as part of an exploration of artists from the Caribbean who made their home in Britain, and British artists who have looked at Caribbean themes and heritage in their work. Shahidha Bari's guests include the curator David A Bailey, New Generation Thinker Sophie Oliver and academic Asha Rogers.David A Bailey is co-curator of Life Between Islands, Caribbean British Art from 1950 at Tate Britain which runs until 3 April 2022 Lubaima Himid's exhibition runs at Tate Modern until 3 July 2022. You can find a discussion about the Black British Art movement in this playlist exploring Black History on the Free Thinking website - it also includes conversations about the writing of Maryse Condé, Aimé Césaire, with Kei Miller and Colin Grant, and a discussion of sugar https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08t2qbpSophie Oliver is a BBC AHRC New Generation Thinker and Lecturer in Modernism at the University of Liverpool. You can hear her Essay on Jean Rhys's dress here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000v870Asha Rogers is Associate Professor in Contemporary Postcolonial Literature at the University of Birmingham. She is the author of State Sponsored Literature: Britain and Cultural Diversity after 1945.Producer: Ruth Watts

Dürer’s whale-chasing and images of rhinos, dogs, saints and himself come into focus, as Rana Mitter talks to Philip Hoare, author of Albert and the Whale, curator Robert Wenley and historian Helen Cowie as exhibitions open at the National Gallery and the Barber Institute in Birmingham. And Philip Hoare explains the links between the Renaissance artist and the visions of Derek Jarman which are on show in Southampton in an exhibition he has curated.Philip Hoare's books include Leviathan, or The Whale, RisingTideFallingStar, Noel Coward a biography, and his latest Albert and the Whale: Albrecht Dürer and How Art Imagines Our World. He has curated Derek Jarman's Modern Nature at the John Hansard Gallery, Southampton. It runs until Feb 26 2022 and presents Jarman alongside works by John Minton, John Piper, Graham Sutherland, and Keith Vaughan; from the surrealists, Eileen Agar and John Banting, through to Albrecht Dürer. Robert Wenley is Head of Collections, Barber Institute of Fine Arts in Birmingham where Miss Clara and the Celebrity Beast in Art 1500 - 1860 runs until 27 Feb 2022 Helen Cowie is Professor of Early Modern History at the University of York . Her books include Exhibited Animals in Nineteenth Century Britain and Llama and catalogue descriptions for the Barber exhibition. Dürer's Journeys: Travels of a Renaissance Artist runs at the National Gallery until 27 Feb 2022.Producer: Robyn ReadYou can find a playlist of discussions exploring Art, Architecture, Photography and Museums on the Free Thinking website https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p026wnjl If you want more conversations about animals we have programmes about Dogs, Rabbits and Watership Down, Cows and farming, and one asking Should We Keep Pets?

A stunt track and farting game are said to be this year's must have toys but what can we learn from the toys children played with in Argentina during the Cold War and from Beatrix Potter's anger at the production of cuddly German Peter Rabbits? And why is the idea of toys coming to life both endearing and terrifying? Matthew Sweet is joined by Jordana Blejmar, Miranda Corcoran, Filippo Yacob and Nadia Cohen.Jordana Blejmar is Lecturer in Visual Media & Cultural Studies at Liverpool University and is leading the research project Cold War Toys: Material Cultures of Childhood in Argentina. Miranda Corcoran is a lecturer in twenty-first-century literature at University College Cork. Her book Exploring the Horror of Supernatural Fiction is out now. Filippo Yacob is the CEO & Cofounder of URSOR, a browser and search engine for children, Design Director at product studio FINH, partner at Studio Playfool, and creator of the coding robot toy Cubetto. Nadia Cohen has written biographies of Enid Blyton, A.A. Milne and Roald Dahl. Her latest book The Real Beatrix Potter is out now.Producer: Torquil MacLeod.You can find a playlist on the Free Thinking website called The Way We Live Now which has a host of conversations on everything from breakfast to time, punk to breathing, accents to autism https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p072637b

Left unfinished at his death in 2011, the poet worked on his version of the Illiad for over 40 years. As a new audio book of Christopher Logue reading War Music is released, Shahidha Bari and her guests, the writers Marina Warner and Tariq Ali, and Logue's widow, the historian Rosemary Hill, examine the work. Rosemary Hill describes Logue as writing "poems to be read to jazz accompaniment, to be set to music and to be printed on posters. He wanted poetry to be part of everybody’s life." In War Music he used anachronistic imagery to link this classical war to more modern examples. In the Second World War Logue served briefly in the Black Watch, before spending sixteen months in a military prison and later becoming a member of CND.The British Library has acquired the archive of Christopher Logue, which includes 22 boxes of private papers, along with 53 files of drafts, working materials and correspondence relating to War Music, and annotated printed books and an event in December marks this.In the programme you will hear Christopher Logue – War Music The original recording read by the Author Recorded December 1995, Sound Development Studios, London Produced and directed by Liane Aukin Mastered by Simon Heyworth (P) & © 2021 Laurence Aston and Rosemary Hill Clips from War Music are not to be reproduced in any way without prior permission of the copyright holders.This programme also includes a clip from a programme Christopher Logue made on 'Minor Poets' for the Third Programme in 1957, and a clip of Christopher Logue reading part of his poem Lecture on Man at the International Poetry Incarnation at the Royal Albert Hall in 1965.Producer Luke Mulhall

The Fall of Ceaușescu in 1989 ended 42 years of Communist rule in Romania. How did the experience of living through that make its way into fiction? Georgina Harding published In Another Europe: A Journey To Romania in 1990 and followed that with a novel The Painter of Silence, set in Romania of the 1950s. Mircea Cărtărescu was born in 1956 and has published novels, poems and essays. In the novel Nostalgia published in 1989, he looks at communist Bucharist in the 80's, in a dreamlike narrative seen in part through the eyes of children and young adults. Philippe Sands has chronicled Jewish histories in Eastern Europe in his books and podcast series The Ratline. He recommends Mihail Sebastian's book For Two Thousand Years.Producer: Ruth WattsYou can find a playlist called Prose and Poetry on the Free Thinking website which contains other conversations organised in partnership with the Royal Society of Literature. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p047v6vh

A rainbow monument in Warsaw which has now been destroyed. The response of residents in Belfast to an exhibition commemorating the Somme and the Easter Rising. Dr Martin Zebracki works on the Queer Memorials project which looks at memorials in Amsterdam, Warsaw and New York. Professor Keith Lilley is a geographer who has worked on a series of mapping projects linked to the anniversary of the First World War. New Generation Thinker and researcher of suffragette history, Dr Naomi Paxton, hosts the conversation.

The dining room at Windsor Castle holds one of Grinling Gibbons's carvings, others are found at churches including St Paul's Cathedral and the sculptor developed a kind of signature including peapods in many of his works. As an exhibition at Compton Verney explores his career: Matthew Sweet is joined by the curator Hannah Phillip, the artist and film-maker Alison Jackson who is known for working with lookalike performers. We also hear from artist Lucy McKenzie who has over 80 works on show at Tate Liverpool and Curator and New Generation Thinker Danielle Thom who has been collecting craft for the Museum of London.Grinling Gibbons: Centuries in the Making runs at Compton Verney until January 30th 2022.https://www.alison-jackson.co.uk/Lucy McKenzie's work is on show at Tate Liverpool until 13 March 2022 comprising 80 works dating from 1997 to the present which include large-scale architectural paintings, illusionistic trompe l’oeil works, as well as fashion and design.https://daniellethom.com/bioProducer: Sofie Vilcins