Arts & Ideas

Colm Toibin is one of Ireland's finest writers, whose books explore issues such as Catholicism, immigration and homosexuality. This month he has published Nora Webster - a novel set in Ireland in the late 1960s which features a cameo appearance from one of his characters in Brooklyn. In 2012 he published a re-imagining of the life of the Virgin Mary - The Testament of Mary. As booking opens this week for this year's Free Thinking Festival at Sage Gateshead, hear the conversation he recorded with Philip Dodd at the 2012 festival. First broadcast on 6th December 2012.

At a time when the special relationship between the UK and the US is under particular scrutiny, Anne McElvoy talks to the American Ambassador to Britain, Matthew Barzun, about the politics of power and takes a look with Matt Wolf at sexual politics in Hollywood in the new Anglo-American production of David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow, starring Lindsay Lohan and Richard Schiff.

Rana Mitter has a first-night review of Electra with Kristin Scott Thomas from Professor Edith Hall and Susannah Clapp; historian Andrew Roberts talks about his new biography of Napoleon and Katie Hill discusses the most extensive to date UK exhibition of Ai Weiwei's artworks just opening at Blenheim Palace.

Matthew Sweet examines our contradictory attitudes to China and it's culture with the film historian Sir Christopher Frayling and the Chinese ceramics expert Stacey Pierson, who has been to see the British Museum's new exhibition about Ming. Padraig Reidy who writes for Index on Censorship and Rob Gifford of the Economist discuss the merits of Tim Berners Lee's Magna Carta for the web. And novelist Neel Mukherjee talks about his Man Booker Prize nominated book The Lives of Others.

As the Schaubühne Berlin's production of Henrik Ibsen's 'An Enemy of the People' opens at The Barbican, Anne McElvoy speaks to the play's director Thomas Ostermeier. American novelist Joseph O'Neill discusses his new book 'The Dog' and, continuing the series meeting this year's shortlisted authors for the Man Booker Prize, Ali Smith explains the connected stories which comprise her novel 'How to Be Both'.

Fukuyama and Howard Jacobson are interviewed by Philip Dodd. In 1989, Francis Fukuyama published an essay which he titled “The End of History?" He's just published Political Order and Political Decay: From the Industrial Revolution to the Globalization of Democracy. Howard Jacobson won the Man Booker prize in 210 for his comic novel The Finkler Question. His new book J is a dystopian love story.

Steven Pinker's research at Harvard is into language and cognition. His new book The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century explores the links between syntax and ideas. Will Self experiments with language and literary form. Will Self's new book Shark links an incident in World War II with an American resident in a therapeutic community in London overseen by psychiatrist Zack Busner. They join Matthew Sweet for a Free Thinking programme about language.

Scientist Susan Greenfield, painter Fiona Rae, poet Paul Farley and artist and TV presenter Matt Collings discuss abstract art past and present. The event recorded in front of an audience at the Starr Auditorium at Tate Modern is chaired by Anne McElvoy. Part of a series of broadcasts tying into BBC 4 Goes Abstract

Martin Amis talks to Philip Dodd about his reputation for courting controversy and his 14th novel The Zone of Interest. Recorded in front of an audience as part of the BBC Proms.

Rudy's Rare Records stars Lenny Henry as the son who works alongside his father in a record shop. The Radio 4 comedy has been adapted for stage and is being performed with live music at Birmingham Rep and the Hackney Empire. In a conversation recorded in front of an audience at The Studio at Birmingham Rep, Lenny Henry talks to Matthew Sweet about performing on radio, stage and screen and his campaign for better Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) representation.

Peter Watkins' film Culloden is 50, and in front of an audience at the Edinburgh Festival, Matthew Sweet discusses its influence on portrayals of Scotland's Highland identity in book and film with Diana Gabaldon, author of the best-selling Outlander series, historian Tom Devine and media expert John Cook.

The poet Daljit Nagra and Radio 3 presenter Ian McMillan introduce the winning entries in this year's Proms Poetry Competition - and welcome some of the winners on stage to read them. In association with the Poetry Society. Recorded in front of an audience at the Royal College of Music.

In 1914 the American poet Robert Frost published his collection 'North of Boston'. It was hailed as 'one of the most revolutionary books of modern times' by the English poet Edward Thomas. Matthew Hollis, who has written about the friendship between the two writers, is joined by Frost's biographer Jay Parini to discuss the poet. This programme presented by Matthew Sweet, was recorded in front of an audience at The Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms.

Poets Andrew Motion and Kate Clanchy discuss the writing of Philip Larkin and his collection, 'Whitsun Weddings', which was first published 50 years ago in 1964. This programme presented by Matthew Sweet, was recorded in front of an audience at The Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms.

Novelist Martin Amis discusses 'The Zone of Interest', his 14th novel, in which he revisits the Holocaust for the first time since his controversial book, 'Time's Arrow'. This programme presented by Philip Dodd, was recorded in front of an audience at The Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms.

From HG Wells and Margaret Atwood to Battlestar Galactica, science fiction texts and tv series have long used birth control as a metaphor for the limits on individual freedom. New Generation Thinker Sarah Dillon, from the University of St Andrews, looks at the roles for women which science fiction has imagined and asks is sci-fi sexist? Recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival.

The audience at a rock concert adoring the star; a Pentecostalist congregation praising God; an athlete reaching the pitch of performance known as "the zone" - these can all be described as feelings of "ecstasy". Jules Evans, from Queen Mary, University of London, examines rationalist arguments about elation being a form of madness and asks whether it is beneficial or dangerous to feel ecstatic. Recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival.

Defenders of traditional English language and grammar often present themselves as purists but New Generation Thinker John Gallagher, from Cambridge University, argues that we have always borrowed words and adapted phrases. His essay outlines the impact C16th and C17th global exploration and trade had on our native tongue. Recorded on Sunday 27th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival.

What do recent debates among medical ethicists and lawyers over male infant circumcision reveal about the different ways we view male and female bodies? Rebecca Steinfeld, from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, looks at changing attitudes to religious traditions involving genital cutting. Recorded on Sunday 27th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival.

Annie Besant promoted contraceptive advice to the Victorian working classes. In 1877 she was prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act. New Generation Thinker Fern Riddell, from King's Collge London, outlines Besant's arguments and explores the ensuing debates about respectability and sexual behaviour in 19th-century England. Recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival.

What is the place of food and body image in contemporary culture? Lionel Shriver is the author of novels including We Need To Talk About Kevin and Big Brother, which depicts the impact of food obsession on family relationships. Dr Val Curtis from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine is the author of Don't Look, Don't Touch: The Science Behind Revulsion. Recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival, chaired by Samira Ahmed.

As the Iceland Symphony Orchestra appear at the Proms, Radio 3's New Generation Thinker and expert in Nordic sagas Eleanor Rosamond Barraclough joins novelist Joanna Kavenna to discuss Icelandic culture with Ian Macmillan. This programme was recorded in front of an audience at The Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms.

Wilfred Owen is one of the greatest First World War writers. The poets Fred d'Aguiar and Michael Longley discuss the work of the poet whose poetry inspired Britten's War Requiem. This programme, is presented by Ian McMillan and was recorded in front of an audience at the Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms

Professor Sugata Mitra's pioneering experiments gave children in India access to computers to teach themselves and inspired the novel which became the film Slumdog Millionaire. He is now using retired volunteers in the UK to share their knowledge and guide children across the other side of the world. At the Free Thinking Festival he outlines the way he plans to use the $1 million 2013 Ted Prize to further his vision of "schools in the cloud". Presented by philip Dodd and recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead.

Can a map reveal too much? How do they direct our thinking? From ancient atlases to satnav and Google, maps continue to be a key planning tool, but how much are they now instruments of control? To discuss what the very word ‘mapping’ now means Rana Mitter is joined by Vanessa Lawrence CB, head of the Ordnance Survey and Professor Jerry Brotton, Professor of Renaissance Studies in the Department of English, Queen Mary, University of London. Recorded on Sunday 27th October 2013 in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead as part of Radio 3's Free Thinking festival.

Melbourne prides itself on being the 'cultural and sporting capital of Australia'. It's a UNESCO City of Literature. As the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra perform at tonight's Prom concert the publisher Carmen Callil, founder of Virago Press, and novelist Helen Fitzgerald discuss Melbourne. The programme is presented by Rana Mitter and was recorded in front of an audience at the Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms

Increasing resistance to antibiotics is a threat to Britain which could be as dangerous as terrorism. That's the argument put by Professor Dame Sally Davies in her Free Thinking lecture at Sage Gateshead. She is joined on stage by Professor Hugh Pennnington and Dr Andrew Sails to talk about strategies for combatting infection and improving the nation’s health. Recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in an event hosted by Anne McElvoy in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead.

Award-winning novelist and poet Helen Dunmore and the writer Simon Heffer discuss the myths and realities behind the idea of the Lost Generation of World War 1. This programme, is presented by Rana Mitter and was recorded in front of an audience at the Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms

Nature writers Miriam Darlington and Horatio Clare join Rana Mitter to discuss the Scottish author of Ring of Bright Water Gavin Maxwell on his centenary. Readings by Scott Handy. This programme is presented by Rana Mitter and was recorded in front of an audience at the Royal College of Music as part of the BBC Proms. To find out further information about the events which are free to attended go to bbc.co.uk/proms