Stevenson's swashbuckling Jacobite set novel has been translated into a play which is touring Scotland. Tartan and its history are on show at V&A Dundee, including a piece of tartan found in a peat bog in Glen Affric around forty years ago newly dated to circa 1500-1600 AD, making it the oldest known surviving specimen of true tartan in Scotland. The Highland Book prize has announced its shortlist. Anne McElvoy is joined by New Generation Thinker and poet Peter Mackay, fashion historian Jona...
Apr 19, 2023•45 min
John Lyly's play Galatea, first recorded in 1588, inspired Shakespeare to write As You Like It and A Midsummer Night's Dream. In Brighton, Emma Frankland is directing a rare professional revival of it, so she and the academic advisor on the project Andy Kesson join Globe Theatre head of research Will Tosh and New Generation Thinker Emma Whipday for a conversation about cross-dressing in Elizabethan dramas and about the plays gathered together in Shakespeare's First Folio. Shahidha Bari hosts. Em...
Apr 18, 2023•46 min
The singers Enrico Caruso and Elsie Houston, a new opera at ENO and links between musical and artistic traditions in Latin America, Europe and New York are explored by the academics Ditlev Rindom and New Generation Thinker Adjoa Osei. Plus the baritone Peter Brathwaite has an exhibition of lockdown photographs in which he recreates the poses of black people portrayed in paintings from the last 800 years opening in Bristol (the photographs have also been published in a book) and has a musical wor...
Apr 13, 2023•45 min
From nature as "a living whole" in the ideas of Goethe and Alexander von Humboldt to the "Blood and Soil" ideas of Nazi Germany: New Generation Thinker Jim Scown, from Cardiff University, traces the links between ideas about the order of nature to more troubling views about links with the land that led organic pioneer Jorian Jenks to refer to "alien hands" tilling "British soil". Producer: Torquil MacLeod
Apr 13, 2023•14 min
‘Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did but backwards and in high heels’ said cartoonist Bob Thaves. Matthew Sweet is joined by Lucy Bolton, Pamela Hutchinson, David Benedict and Miles Eady to look at her life (1911-1995) and a film career that stretched far beyond the 10 movies she made with Astaire, including an Oscar winning performance in Kitty Foyle. Producer: Torquil MacLeod The BFI season runs to the end of April Many of Ginger Rogers' RKO films are available to watch on iPlayer, i...
Apr 12, 2023•45 min
An ancient Japanese Buddhist ritual which involves a red baby bib, a small statue and water, has been taken up by women wanting to have some way of marking a miscarriage and the life not lived. New Generation Thinker Sabina Dosani is a psychiatrist and writer doing research at the University of East Anglia. Her essay looks at the language we use for unborn children who die and at what we can learn about mourning rituals from the work of the nineteenth century French sociologist Emile Durkheim, t...
Apr 11, 2023•14 min
From the Pirates of Penzance and Captain Hook, to Ottoman corsairs, Henry Avery, Mary Read and Lady Killigrew: Anne McElvoy is joined by New Generation Thinkers Michael Talbot and Joan Passey, and by Robert Blyth, Senior Curator of World and Maritime History, Royal Museums Greenwich, who is also one of the co-curators of Pirates at the National Maritime Museum Cornwall. Producer: Harry Parker Pirates runs at the National Maritime Museum Cornwall from April to December and then moves in 2025 to R...
Apr 11, 2023•45 min
"Cancel culture" is used to describe debates which touch on freedom of expression today but what can we learn if we look back at events after the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen? Clare Siviter, who lectures on the French Revolution and theatre at the University of Bristol, takes us through the experiences of playwrights and authors, Marie-Joseph Chénier, Olympe de Gouges, Jean-Baptiste-Antoine Suard and Destutt de Tracy, who wrote about how ideas spread. Producer: Torquil MacLe...
Apr 07, 2023•14 min
The trial of sisters begging on the streets of South London led to donations sent in by Victorian newspaper readers and an investigation by the Mendicity Society. New Generation Thinker Oskar Jensen, from Newcastle University, unearthed this story of the Avery girls in the archives and his essay explores the way attitudes to former slaves and to the reform of criminals affected the sisters' sentencing. Producer: Ruth Watts
Apr 06, 2023•14 min
Nicholas Spencer, Emily Qureshi-Hurst and Philip Ball join Christopher Harding for a conversation about the nature of reality – as science reveals it, as religion reveals it, and how the world might look if we treat science and religion not as competitors but as collaborators; a cosmic dynamic duo. Magesteria: The Entangled Histories of Science and Religion by Nicholas Spencer is out now. Producer: Ruth Watts
Apr 06, 2023•45 min
An 8 year old who condemns his own mother to execution in 1582: New Generation Thinker Emma Whipday, who researches Renaissance literature at Newcastle University, has been reading witch trial records from Elizabethan and Jacobean England to explore how they depict single mothers. And she finds chilling echoes of their language in newspaper articles in our own times. Producer: Ruth Watts
Apr 05, 2023•14 min
Customs officers raided the London bookshop Gay’s the Word on April 10th 1984 and seized 144 titles. A campaign was mounted after the directors were charged with conspiracy to import indecent books. Dr Sarah Pyke tells Diarmuid Hester about an oral history project which aims to raise awareness of Operation Tiger and how it ties into wider work on a history of queer reading. Dr Ina Linge has been looking at the way LGBTQ+ people used autobiographical writing to critically engage with the science ...
Apr 05, 2023•43 min
What is that people hate about the Pre-Raphaelites? From the 19th century to the present day their detractors have been remarkably consistent in the language that they have used to the describe their visceral dislike of these artists and their works. Dinah Roe, Greg Tate and Lynda Nead join Matthew Sweet to examine what makes Dante Gabriel Rossetti and his gang such a polarising force in art history. They also delve into the powerful and sensual poetry of Christina Rossetti and Walter Pater's sc...
Apr 05, 2023•45 min
From lessons in civility learnt playing French board game to the value of babbling by babies in speech development, a history of central heating to the neglected industrial landscapes of the A13, Anti-Asian tropes in AI, Quaker needlework to Viking burial practices, 70’s women’s art collectives, the history of Ireland’s Magdalen laundries to the first philosophy book by a woman to be published in C17 century Germany: Chris Harding hears about the research topics of ten early career academics cho...
Apr 04, 2023•53 min
The noisy Victorian world annoyed the mathematician, philosopher and inventor Charles Babbage, who came up with the idea of a programmable computer. He wrote letters complaining about it and a pamphlet which explored ideas about whether the sea could record its own sound, had a memory and could broadcast sound. New Generation Thinker Joan Passey, from the University of Bristol, sets these ideas alongside the work done by engineers cabling the sea-bed to allow communication via telegraph and Rudy...
Apr 04, 2023•14 min
Composer Alex Ho, novelist Xiaolu Guo, curator George Young and director Anthony Lau join Rana Mitter to discuss a Cinderella story Ye Xian which has inspired a new music theatre piece, a new Manchester gallery display of Chinese life and history, a Brecht play set in China which looks at love, hospitality and goodness and a memoir which describes ideas about love and what it feels like to be based in a new city. Producer: Robyn Read George Young is Head of Exhibitions and Collections at the Man...
Mar 28, 2023•45 min
Katja Hoyer and Karen Leeder join Anne McElvoy to discuss new histories of East Germany, stories depicting life in the state which have recently been translated into English as well as a recently translated edition of Uwe Wittstock's February 1933. Plus, Emily Oliver on the history of BBC German service and Elizabeth Ward is beginning a research project on the cinema of East Germany and its involvement in International Film Festivals. Katja Hoyer's book is called Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1...
Mar 28, 2023•45 min
Lea Ypi, author of a memoir entitled Free: Coming of Age at the End of History, joins Matthew Sweet to explore the history and culture of Albania - its art, music and literature. They're joined by Adela Demetja - curator and director of the Tirana Art Lab - Centre for Contemporary Art in Albania and curator of the Albania pavilion in last year's Venice Biennale, which featured the work of Lumturi Blloshmi. Ani Kokobobo, Associate Professor and chair of Slavic Languages & Literatures at the U...
Mar 23, 2023•45 min
What ethical questions arise from new human-machine relations as we are increasingly asked, as citizens and workers, to collaborate with AI systems? And how might a feminist approach to AI design help us shape an equitable future for AI-Human relations? Research Associate, Kerry McInerney, discusses how facial recognition AI software is being deployed in job recruitment and to tackle gender based violence. Lecturer, Kendra Briken describes her work on the integration of the human labour force wi...
Mar 23, 2023•47 min
Billy Waters became a celebrity in early 19th century London as a talented street performer. New Generation Thinker Oskar Jensen and Mary L. Shannon join Rana Mitter to tell Billy's story and those of other musicians performing on the streets of London at the time. Charlie Taverner has written a history of Street Food. We also hear from Marigold Hughes about the latest production from Streetwise Opera, an organisation that devises opera productions with people who are or have been homeless. Vaga...
Mar 21, 2023•45 min
Cinderella is opening in a new ballet production at the Royal Opera House and Mothering Sunday is coming up so Matthew Sweet is joined by New Generation Thinkers Sabina Dosani and Emma Whipday and Marina Warner for a conversation about good and bad mothering and how images are changing. Marina Warner's many books include From the Beast to the Blonde: On Fairy Tales and Their Tellers Frederick Ashton's ballet Cinderella has been re-imagined using video design for a new production running at the R...
Mar 16, 2023•45 min
A Persian epic depicted in The Yellow Book which Aubrey Beardsley was art editor for, Iranian figures on the French operatic stage and Rudyard Kipling's links with decadent ideas: Shahidha Bari is joined by Dr Julia Hartley, Dr Alexander Bubb and Professor Jennifer Yee to discuss new research into late nineteenth century art, literature and opera and what we mean by decadence. Was it really a-political and focused on surface and ornament? And how far are ideas about art for art's sake and sex fo...
Mar 15, 2023•45 min
Debt is central to the modern economy and it has long been so. The idea of debt has long been loaded with as much morality as financial meaning. Anne McElvoy explores our ideas about debt, what it is and how it works. Decisions about borrowing or paying down debt are currently being faced the world over. They’re informed by political beliefs and a whole history of ideas behind that. So, how have our ideas changed over time and what can or should be done about it? Professor Kenneth Rogoff is Maur...
Mar 14, 2023•45 min
Body language is being studied as a way of working out new ways of learning Sign Language and if British Sign Language is to be taught as a GCSE in schools who should do the teaching? As we mark 20 years since British Sign language was acknowledged as a language in its own right (18th March 2003) and then the passing in 2022 of recognition in law that it is an indigenous language of Great Britain: Naomi Paxton talks to two researchers in the field. Doctor Kate Rowley is the Deputy Director of th...
Mar 13, 2023•43 min
Iranian women using song to protest and whose voices do we pay attention to ? On International Women's Day, Shahidha Bari hosts a conversation with the authors of books called On Being Unreasonable and Who Gets Believed, an artist and a researcher looking at Iranian women using song. Michelle Assay is an academic specialising in music who was born in Iran and had to leave the country. Dina Nayeri is an Iranian American writer now based in Scotland and Kirsty Sedgman studies the behaviour of audi...
Mar 08, 2023•45 min
Bullshit jobs, Toward an Anthropological Theory of Value, Debt: The First 5000 Years: the titles of some of David Graeber's books give a sense of his take on the world and his concerns. Matthew Sweet talks with archaeologist David Wengrow - co-author with Graeber of The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity and looks at Graeber's involvement with the Occupy movement and the influence of anarchist ideas. They are joined by historian of ideas Dr Sophie Scott-Brown, and by Kirsten Stevens-W...
Mar 07, 2023•45 min
The monk and poet Dom Sylvester Houédard (1924-92) used his Olivetti Lettera 22 typewriter to fuse art and writing in concrete poetry. Born in 1924 he worked in Army Intelligence in India, Sri Lanka and Singapore during the Second World war and in 1949 he joined the Benedictine Abbey of Prinknash, Gloucestershire. Matthew Sweet looks at his life and art with guests Nicola Simpson, Rey Conquer, Charles Verey and Greg Thomas. Charles Verey is writing a biography of Dom Sylvester Houédard and joint...
Mar 02, 2023•44 min
Muppets in Moscow is Natasha Lance Rogoff's account of launching a Russian version of the American tv series Sesame Street. If a single announcer supplies the dialogue dubbing when a foreign film is shown in Russia where do you find the technical skills you need? Should you feature exclusively ethnically Russian actors or include nationalities from former Soviet republics? What puppets from Russian folklore might be suitable and what kind of education for children are you trying to achieve? Anne...
Mar 02, 2023•45 min
How sewing machines wrecked sewing. Why people mistrusted tin cans. What the invention of stainless steel had to do with the military. New research into the impact of industrialisation on materials like tin, steel and sewing machines is shared by the academics Chris Corker from the University of York, Lindsay Middleton from the University of Glasgow, and Serena Dyer who teaches at De Montfort University. Chris Harding hosts the conversation. Producer: Tim Bano
Feb 28, 2023•45 min
Hungry Ghosts is the new novel set in colonial Trinidad by Kevin Jared Hosein. Colin Grant has written a memoir about his Jamaican family. A new art project, Windrush Portraits, is a collaboration between Mary Evans and Michael Elliott with communities in both Kingston, Jamaica, and Southampton, UK. Shahidha Bari looks at the way ghosts of history haunt these artworks. Producer: Robyn Read Hungry Ghosts by Kevin Jared Hosein is out now. Colin Grant's memoir I'm Black So You Don't Have to Be is o...
Feb 24, 2023•45 min
