Episode description

"Cooking is like therapy to us. I grew up where my big extended family would come together in summer under the walnut tree. The adults would drink and we’d eat, stories would be told and we'd break into song. It was a healing process."

In the first of a new series, the cookbook author Olia Hercules tells us why she's picked the Ukrainian artist and activist Alla Horska as her Great Life. A member of the Sixtiers, Alla was a part of the Ukrainian dissident movement of writers, artists and cultural figures who stood against the destruction of Ukrainian identity and rallied for greater freedoms.

Growing up in Ukraine, Olia says she was taught so much about Russian culture, and so little about Ukrainian culture, that she wanted to fix that. Now in a time of war, Olia discovers how parts of Alla's life mirror her own. Joining her in studio is Tetyana Filevska, creative director of the Ukrainian Institute. Tetyana moved to London to escape the war in Ukraine.

Future guests in the series include writer Olivia Laing on Christopher Lloyd, Bob Harris on Sir Matt Busby, and Noddy Holder on Chuck Berry.

Produced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Caitlin Hobbs