Chris Anderson, an entrepreneur with a unique background as the son of missionaries and now the head of the TED organization, advocates for the power of Infectious Generosity as the ultimate idea worth spreading. Jane Cholmeley, once a feminist bookseller and now an author, shares her journey of running Europe's largest women's bookstore amidst challenges of homophobia and misogyny. Daisy Goodwin, a prolific television producer, screenwriter, and bestselling novelist, known for bringing iconic s...
Feb 24, 2024•58 min
Today - our guests inhabit very different worlds... One exists in kindness, James Timpson, the businessman and philanthropist - whose new book The Happy Index - puts happiness at the top of his business plans. Marianna Spring on the other hand, spends much of her life in a world filled with nastiness and trolls, and asks Why Do You Hate Me? in her new podcast. And Callum Scott Howells inhabits and interprets other people’s lives for our pleasure, currently starring in A View from the Bridge on t...
Feb 17, 2024•59 min
National sweetheart, and very silly boy, Joe Lycett adds some pizazz to proceedings...as he talks art, Queen's Heath and his special brand of public service vigilantism as he sets his sights on the water companies. The writer, producer and creator behind landmark TV series; Queer as Folk, It’s A Sin, Years and Doctor Who, Russell T Davies, looks back on a ground-breaking career. So much has happened in the life of Alison Lapper since that beautiful Mark Quinn sculpture, ‘Alison Lapper Pregnant’,...
Feb 10, 2024•58 min
Bringing his trademark droll humour and a bit of poetry to proceedings…the actor and comedian Tim Key discusses his new collection and reveals the story behind one of the most remarkable acts kindness he received from a stranger. He loves dogs, he loves sport and he’s one of the best in the world at commentating on both…we welcome the voice of a thousand sports Andrew Cotter. Bringing us emotional repair through wool…Samantha Moore, the BAFTA nominated director of Visible Mending talks about the...
Feb 03, 2024•59 min
Tom Odell, the Ivor Novello Award winning musician discusses his new album 'Black Friday' and reveals why freshly baked cakes helped with his piano lessons. Zoë Colville, aka The Chief Shepherdess, went from the madness of hairdressing in a trendy Soho salon in London, to the ‘relative’ tranquillity of tending sheep on a farm in Kent. Boxer Nathan Heaney describes his journey from fighting with grief to being the underdog and now British Middleweight Champion. Plus, we have the Inheritance Track...
Jan 27, 2024•1 hr
Extending our knowledge of Imperial frontiers - journalist, author and Empire educator Sathnam Sanghera’s reveals why tea is the best medium to discuss the British Empire. Crossing the final frontier with Libby Jackson - she boldly explores where none of us are likely to as The Head of Space Exploration at the UK Space Agency. And the record-breaking Darren Edwards keeps crossing endurance frontiers after announcing his next challenge is to become the first disabled adventurer to complete the lo...
Jan 20, 2024•1 hr
Bestselling writer, self-experimenter and host of Just One Thing, Michael Mosley is a man so keen on giving the nation ‘just one thing’ to do to improve our lives, that we’re soon going to run out of hours in the day to incorporate them all. If the very thought of handmade chocolates makes you salivate, prepare to drool, because the master chocolatier behind the new Wonka film, Gabriella Cugno reveals how useful a chocolate teacup actually is. And Julie Felix, Britain’s first professional Black ...
Jan 13, 2024•1 hr 1 min
Ed Byrne, the stand-up comedian, describes how he turned to comedy as a way of coping with the loss of his younger brother in 2023.
Jan 08, 2024•59 min
With 2024 just around the corner, we’re celebrating the lovely achievements of our guests from the year past and some of yours too... Artist Gareth Reid has painted King Charles, Graham Norton, and recently won Portrait Artist of the Decade with his interpretation of Dame Judi Dench. Rogue Jones, the married singer-songwriters Ynyr Ifan and Bethan Mai, won the coveted Welsh Music Prize 2023 for their charming second album Dos Bebés Plus the Inheritance Tracks of this year’s Masterchef Celebrity ...
Dec 30, 2023•58 min
The creative polymath Mark Gatiss; actor, writer, director, producer, funny man and excellent purveyor of Christmas ghost stories - shares his love for the macabre. By car, train, bus and...canoe - .The Hebridean Baker, Coinneach MacLeod, reveals the festive traditions of the Isle of Lewis. And illustrator Lucy Claire who came to fame by honouring the likes of The Queen and Matthew Perry with art drawn from behind - shares her joy for craft and creativity at this time of year. Plus the Inheritan...
Dec 23, 2023•59 min
Steven Moffat, the BAFTA and Emmy award winning TV writer and producer, famous for Doctor Who and Sherlock has made his debut as a playwright with The Unfriend returning to London’s West End. Kelda Wood is the former GB Para-Canoeist, first adaptive-rower to row the Atlantic unsupported, and a charity founder, whose world turned upside down by not one...by two lifechanging incidents. And the animator and illustrator Robin Shaw, the International Emmy Award winning director of The Tiger Who Came ...
Dec 16, 2023•1 hr
From an animal loving Billericay boy to international supermodel turned designer - David Gandy has been the face of some of the worlds biggest brands. The Scottish actor Sam Heughan is internationally famous for playing Highland warrior Jamie Fraser in Outlander but is also an award-winning businessman and bestselling author. And the Queen of Harps, Catrin Finch, not only a classical harp virtuoso, she’s also a collaborator who exemplifies musical freedom and knows a thing or two about music’s h...
Dec 09, 2023•59 min
Author Katherine Rundell, winner of Waterstones’ Book of the Year 2023 for her fantastical and mythical ‘Impossible Creatures’, had a childhood filled with travel; from Kent, to Zimbabwe and Belgium - to an adult life filled with playfulness. Steve Greenwood, one of the directors of Planet Earth III, has spent his life tracking-down impossible creatures and even discovered a new species of rat. Trekking through jungles, racing through deserts, being chase by Rhinos, the natural history producer ...
Dec 02, 2023•58 min
Dan Snow, history conduit, broadcaster, podcaster and bestselling author grew up with two posters on his bedroom wall...one was of Kylie Minogue - the other was of the Duke of Wellington defeating Napoleon at Waterloo. Corporal Rob Bugden is a former RAF parachute instructor whose career ended in an aerial collision which left him with life changing injuries. He now teaches the importance of resilience. Psychiatrist, psychotherapist and gardener Marchelle Farrell has moved from the beaches and e...
Nov 25, 2023•59 min
Italian chef, restaurateur, writer and buongustaio Aldo Zilli, learned to cook at his mother’s knee and started dreaming of his own Italian restaurants in 1970’s Soho, under the watchful eyes of the mafia, and at a time when you could only buy olive oil in a chemist. Levy Rozman – the international chess master with millions of subscribers - who’s moving the game into the digital age after retiring from the game for the sake of his mental health. Historian Phillipa Langley, not content with find...
Nov 18, 2023•1 hr 1 min
Professor Hannah Fry, whose job involves demystifying data and exploring how science and tech will shape our futures, personally though, she’s realised that ‘Life isn’t a problem to be solved, it’s an experience to be had’. From body-building online star to social media sceptic. Oenone Forbat tell us how her life as a digital celebrity isn’t quite as glamorous as the filters might have us believe And the legendary hair stylist Sam McKnight, reveals how a boy form a small Scottish mining town wen...
Nov 11, 2023•1 hr
Ross Kemp who, after leaving EastEnders, found his métier making BAFTA award winning documentaries and writing bestselling books…and he’s just written a memoir... From Grant Mitchell to Cary Grant - Hollywood’s ultimate leading man - his daughter and producer of new ITV series Archie, Jennifer Grant, joins us. Hari Budha Magar is a Gurkha veteran who lost both legs in Afghanistan and earlier this year made mountaineering history as the first double above the knee amputee to summit Everest. Plus....
Nov 04, 2023•1 hr
If you’re feeling adventurous this weekend, we have just the guest to inspire you. The world’s greatest living explorer, Sir Ranulph Fiennes joins us – but who inspires him? Multi-award-winning author of The Other Boleyn Girl - Philippa Gregory is here to cast a light on the unsung women of history. The Man....The Voice....The Ostrich-farmer. Opera-singer Russell Watson has ditched his bow-tie to tell us why he’s now just as happy in his overalls. Plus...we have the Inheritance Tracks of rock an...
Oct 28, 2023•59 min
Dr Adam Rutherford is a geneticist, a broadcaster and science populariser and his latest book, aimed at young people, examines evolution, what race really is, and what makes us human. Broadcaster and author Kate Humble will be sharing the inspiration behind her new book which sees her on a quest to define what makes a house a home. And Peeps Nicol - who after being diagnosed with MS and then being widowed - wanted to find a new hobby. Peeps recently became a powerlifter and now at 71 years of ag...
Oct 25, 2023•59 min
Rory Bremner stand-up chameleon, actor and impressionist, who’s currently on tour as Chris Tarrant in the play Quiz, about the Millionaire cougher-case. He also reveals the shared passion for comedy he and his dad had, especially with the late Mike Yarwood, and how he is embracing his newly diagnosed ADHD. The Gardeners World presenter Sue Kent, whose career has taken her from sports masseuse at the 2012 Olympics to award-winning garden designer, has lived with the physical consequences of the d...
Oct 21, 2023•59 min
She wanders, rambles, saunters and strolls…and has made a career out of walking in the great outdoors…broadcaster and writer Julia Bradbury’s new book Walk Yourself Happy discusses the power of nature in the light of her cancer battle. Fresh from the depths of the ocean this years Wildlife Photographer of the Year Laurent Ballesta, who dives to incredible places to bring us images never-before-seen, describes the lengths he went to to capture the winning image. Comedian and novelist Mark Watson ...
Oct 14, 2023•57 min
The England rugby star Danny Cipriani, who became just as famous off the pitch as on it, is regularly described as one of the most talented rugby players of his generation. He shares an insight in to his life on and off the pitch. Podcaster Paige Lewin talks about her aim of creating a better world for afro and curly hair communities. Dr Allison Angell is the UK’s first person to have four organ transplants and who is now a GP. And finally actor Alan Fletcher – who most famously played the role ...
Sep 30, 2023•1 hr 1 min
Colin Jackson has spent his life hurdling one thing or another, be it breaking world records, or down barriers, the Olympian turned broadcaster continues to inspire the next generation of athletes. He’s written for The Kumars at No. 42, and Goodness Gracious Me, now Suk Pannu reveals how his 'Asian aunties' inspired his new book 'Mrs Sidhu: Dead and Scone' and why cosy culinary crime may be the next big thing. She's traversed the famous Lands’ End to John O' Groats route, climbed Kilimanjaro, an...
Sep 23, 2023•59 min
He’s started but nowhere near finished, the master mind of BBC News presenter, Italian road-tripper and writer Clive Myrie. Having just released his memoir 'Everything is Everything', Clive reveals the paper round that inspired him to become a journalist and what it takes to find the humanity to report from the frontlines of a warzone. From Port Talbot to Glyndebourne, Adele Thomas is and opera director famed for her dynamic, intensely physical productions. But once told she would never fit into...
Sep 16, 2023•59 min
The sparkling, South African, ‘Strictly’ star-dancer Johannes Radebe, one half of the history-making same sex male couple to dance on the show, reveals a life of bullying and how his Auntie is responsible for his carrer in new memoir 'Jojo: Finally Home'. Louise Boyce, best known by her social-media handle “Mama Still Got It”, has vlogged her journey from model...to mum...to influencer...to bestselling author. She’s describes why she returned to an industry that told her having children would en...
Sep 09, 2023•59 min
From the day he was found in a Harrods bag as a baby on the steps of Guy's Hospital in London, author Andy McNab has carpe'd the diem out of life. As a member of the SAS he was at the centre of covert operations for nine years on five continents. Now he’s one of the world’s best-selling authors. An astonishing achievement given he had the reading age of an eleven-year-old when he joined the army and read his first book by his seventeenth birthday. Ten years ago, Briony May Williams became so unw...
Sep 02, 2023•59 min
Radio 4's Saturday morning show brings you extraordinary stories and remarkable people.
Aug 26, 2023•1 hr
Angela Barnes was brought up on comedy. She and her dad Derek would go to stand-up shows together and when they listened to comedians on the radio he would say “Why don’t you have a go at that?, Angela. Why don’t you give comedy a try?”. For a long time, she felt she couldn’t. But when Derek died suddenly at the age of 60 Angela remembered his words and today she appears on the very shows she used to listen to with her dad. The National Poet of Wales, Hanan Issa, has that wonderful advantage of ...
Aug 19, 2023•58 min
Suzi Quatro grew up in Detroit in a very musical family. It was, at the age of six, after seeing Elvis perform on television that made Suzi decide music was to be her life. She’s also an actor, poet, has a new album called 'Face to Face' with KT Tunstall, is on tour...and she once broke Alice Cooper’s nose. Shortly after they got married, the best-selling author Amy McCulloch and her new husband headed to South America for a six-month backpacking adventure. Then, one night, Amy heard that a cabi...
Aug 12, 2023•59 min
Jon Culshaw's big break came when convincing the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, in a prank phone call that HE was the then Conservative leader William Hague - an infamous moment in his life for which he was called an imposter. Since then, he’s built up a repertoire of 350 celebrity voices, starred in 23 series of Dead Ringers and joins us live from the Edinburgh Festival where he’s starring in his new show, Imposter Syndrome. Tommy Jessop is an actor, a campaigner and has just had his first bo...
Aug 05, 2023•59 min
