The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.
A report out by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, is calling on the government for more help to protect UK dairy farmers from volatile milk prices. Anna Hill speaks to the chair of the committee, MP Anne McIntosh.
Although thousands of farmers will gather at the UK's largest farm machinery and equipment show this week, there is a shortage of UK agricultural engineers in the industry. This is according to a survey carried out the Landbased Engineering Training and Education Committee. Farming Today asks why and whether the situation will improve in coming years.
And as the lambing season has started for some farmers, dog owners are being reminded to act responsibly. For outdoor flocks, the pregnant ewes are out in the fields and can be vulnerable victims.
Michael Palin presents the New Zealand Kakapo, high on the ferny slopes of its island fortress off the coast of New Zealand. Kakapos are flightless and the heaviest parrots in the world. They're also called owl-parrots from their nocturnal habits and open owlish expressions. Like owls their plumage is richly mottled although no owl shares their beautiful moss-green tones.
Kakapos also have a curious mating strategy. The males gather at traditional "leks" or display areas to attract mates. At the top of a wooded ridge, the male digs one or more a bowl- like depressions in the ground which function as an amplifier. He then takes a deep breath, swells his throat-pouch like a balloon then releases the air with a soft booming call which can carry up to five kilometres.
This sound can now only be heard on a handful of offshore islands. The kakapo story is tragically familiar. Flightless and ground-nesting, it was helpless in the face of settlers who logged its forests and introduced cats and rats which slaughtered the birds. Between 1987 and 1992 the last surviving kakapos were relocated to predator-free islands. Now following intensive care and a national conservation strategy, there are about 130 kakapos in the wild.
Including from 0830 a special Democracy Day edition of BBC Radio 4's Public Philosopher in which Professor Michael Sandel goes inside the Palace of Westminster to explore the nature and limits of democracy, challenging an audience of MPs, Peers and the public to apply some critical thinking to what democracy really means.
Is our democracy working? Today there's a real sense of our traditional democratic system fracturing - but is this because it's failing, or is it because it's doing exactly what we want it to?
In 'Can Democracy Work?' The BBC's Political Editor Nick Robinson questions top politicians, those seeking power around the UK and direct action campaigners, as well as testing public opinion, to find out what we really want from our democracy and whether it can deliver.
In episode two, Nick asks if vested interests dominate our democracy and explores why so many in Britain now feel ignored and alienated from politics.
In the second of three editions of One to One, broadcaster Adrian Goldberg - who is married to a British Asian woman - explores the topic of mixed marriage. Today Adrian meets Rosalind Birtwistle, a Christian woman who married a Jewish man in the 1970s.
The death of author Will's father brings a long-held family secret out into the open.
Jamie Parker continues reading from Will Boast's moving account of loss and coming to terms with the past.
A special Democracy Day edition. The Lord Speaker Baroness D'Souza discusses her role and the significance of the House of Lords. Archivist Mari Takayanagi looks at the history of women trying to get in to parliament. Helen Pankhurst, the great-granddaughter of Emmeline, and her daughter Laura discuss their family heritage and the political battles women are still facing. Kuwaiti artist and activist Shurooq Amin and Nan Sloane, Director of the Centre for Women & Democracy, explore what democracy means for women in the UK and internationally. Girl Guides explain why they were keen to pilot a new badge introduced to show girls how they can have a voice and be politically aware.
Dramatisation of Jonathan Franzen's darkly comic 2001 novel about the tribulations of a dysfunctional Midwestern family, starring Richard Schiff (The West Wing), Maggie Steed, Colin Stinton and Richard Laing. Dramatised by Marcy Kahan.
Episode 12: Alfred and Enid have recovered from the traumatic events of their north Atlantic cruise, and now Enid's hopes for a Christmas family reunion in St Jude will not be dampened.
The Corrections was awarded the National Book Award in 2001, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2002. It was included in TIME magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.
Jonathan Franzen is the author of four novels (Freedom, The Corrections, Strong Motion, and The Twenty-Seventh City), two collections of essays (Farther Away, How to Be Alone), a personal history (The Discomfort Zone).
Marcy Kahan is a playwright and radio dramatist. Recent radio work includes two series of Lunch for BBC Radio 4 (starring Claire Skinner and Stephen Mangan) and Mr Bridger's Orphan. Theatre work includes 20 Cigarettes (Soho Theatre) and the stage version of When Harry Met Sally (Theatre Royal Haymarket).
In the final programme of the series a panel of experts from different disciplines choose an object they feel represents our relationship with nature. Recorded in the Natural History Museum in London in front of an audience Monty Don explores how our connection to nature has changed through time and what we may need to do to ensure we live on a vibrant planet in the future. The four guests from different areas of expertise from archaeology to conservation science to oceanography choose one thing that tells a big story. Monty Don explores how each object shows how our view of nature has changed since our time as hunter gatherers. Over the thousands of years we have lived on earth we have become increasingly divorced from the nitty gritty of the natural world. Where are we heading and what do we need to do to enable all of life to share this one planet? As population increases and stress on resources gets more intense there has never been a more important time to assess our impact on planet earth.
Laura Barton pieces together the true story of Abner Jay, a most unusual musical talent.
Abner Jay was an itinerant musician - a modern-day minstrel. He was a one-man band, a songster, a storehouse of history and an off-colour raconteur; he was a direct line to a different era.
He said that his instruments were centuries old, passed down through his family. That his father and grandfather had been slaves. He claimed to have fathered 16 children, that daily doses of water from the Suwannee River kept him young and that he was 25 years younger than you think.
What is certainly true is that he travelled the Southern states of the US with a converted mobile home which he opened out into a makeshift stage. And he was possibly the last performer of the 'bones' - a musical tradition that involved playing rhythms on cow and chicken bones dried in the sun.
The writer Laura Barton talks to those who knew him and those who love his music in an effort to dig beneath the myth and misdirection and reveal the true story of Abner Jay.
Featuring Sherry Sherrod Dupree, William Ferris, Jay Martin, Jack Teague and Brandie Watson.
Simon Schaffer is interested in the human species in general and one member of it in particular. Carl Linnaeus was a Swedish botanist and zoologist who set out the basic structure of how we name and understand life on earth. In doing so he broached the thorny question of where humans should sit among the species of the earth. A hundred years before Darwin he correctly placed us among the apes. Simon examines that relationship to see the things that mark our similarities and our differences. Simon comes face to face with 'Jock', an adult Gorilla at Bristol Zoo and talks to Prof. Robert Foley about human evolution. He also sees how Linnaeus' ideas were used to support racial science. After all if humans were more like apes perhaps some humans were more like apes than others.
Call You & Yours is asking how comfortable are you with the level of inequality in Britain today?
As world leaders meet in the Swiss resort of Davos for the World Economic Forum, Oxfam has called on governments to adopt a plan to tackle inequality. The charity says governments need to clampdown on tax evasion, and ensure a living wage is paid to all workers. The UK is the only G7 nation where levels of inequality have risen over the past four year, and according to The Equality Trust the top fifth of the UK population have 42% of the country's income, and 60% of the wealth, while the bottom fifth have 8% of the income, and 1% of the wealth.
So we are asking, has it gone too far? Or is some inequality inevitable and good for the economy?
Email the programme with your experiences - have you noticed the rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer? Are you living closer to the bread line? What difference have the super-rich made to you?
Winston Churchill was revered by millions as the saviour of Britain in the Second World War, but he wasn't just a great war leader - he wrote millions of words of journalism, he painted, he built brick walls, he owned racehorses, he gambled in Monte Carlo casinos and even wrote screenplays. Yet his personality was mercurial; bouts of hyper-activity were interspersed with black days of depression. While he had a loving marriage, he spent long periods apart from his wife and children, some of whom caused him deep anxiety and distress.
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of his death, celebrated historian Sir David Cannadine, author of In Churchill's Shadow, examines the life and career of Winston Churchill by looking at ten different themes that are less well known, but which are crucial to a fuller understanding of one of the most extraordinary individuals ever to occupy No. 10 Downing Street.
Winston Churchill is known to have drunk copious quantities of alcohol. But was he an alcoholic? He developed a taste for Havana cigars while visiting Cuba, but did he actually smoke all those cigars? Churchill was so keen on his food that, during the Second World War, the constraints of rationing were unknown to him. In the second programme of 'Churchill's Other Lives', Sir David Cannadine enjoys Winston Churchill's prodigious appetite for food, drink and cigars.
Crime drama based on the characters from the best selling novel by the multi-award winning writer, GF Newman. This second series runs from 1961 to 1970.
Spanning six decades, the saga plots the course of one family against the back-drop of a revolution in crime as the underworld extends its influence to the very heart of the establishment, in an uncomfortable relationship of shared values.
At the start of the 1960s, Joey Oldman acquires crafty Arnold Goodman as his solicitor, and buys shares in the civil engineering firm owned by the corrupt Minister of Transport, Ernest Marples.
Prospering with the help of venal bankers, and growing more devious, he and his wife Cath join Macmillan's Conservative Party. They strive without success to keep their son Brian free of the influence of Jack Braden (Cath's brother) as he takes their 'firm' from running illicit clubs, where they entertain politicians and judges, to armed robbery. All the while, Jack and Brian struggle to keep free of the police and further entanglements with the law, the Kray twins and the Richardsons.
Joey borrows a lot of money to invest in the Minister of Transport's road-building company.
The Human Zoo is a place to learn about the one subject that never fails to fascinate - ourselves. Are people led by the head or by the heart? How rational are we? And how do we perceive the world?
There's a curious blend of intriguing experiments to discover our biases and judgements, explorations and examples taken from what's in the news to what we do in the kitchen, and it's all driven by a large slice of curiosity.
Michael Blastland presents. Nick Chater, Professor of Behavioural Science at Warwick University, is the experimenter-in-chief, and Timandra Harkness the resident reporter.
In this programme hindsight bias - the "I knew it all along" effect - comes under the microscope.
Michael Rosen examines the use of language analysis to judge asylum seekers' country of origin, when they've arrived in the UK with no documentation. Linguists can then be used to try and verify which country the person comes from, as they apply for refugee status. With linguists Laura Wright and Peter Patrick, and Lars-Johan Lundberg of Verified, the Swedish company that the Government uses to carry out the analysis.
Former newspaper editor and writer Eve Pollard tells Matthew Parris why Nora Ephron, the screenwriter of hit films such as 'When Harry Met Sally', 'Heartburn', and 'Sleepless in Seattle', is a Great Life.
They are joined by Dr Jennifer Smyth, an historian whose teaching includes women in Hollywood at the University of Warwick.
Marcus Brigstocke persuades his reluctant guest to try new experiences: things they really ought to have done by now. Some experiences are loved, some are loathed, in this show all about embracing the new.
This week, Gyles Brandreth is persuaded to spend a day doing absolutely nothing, and writes his first ever pop song.
Ed has spoken to the TFA. He has to apply for a relief of forfeiture. Totting everything up, Ed reckons he owes £5k to get back on track. He'll never get hold of that sort of money. Eddie tells Ed he needs to sell four of his cows. Ed panics at the idea, but realizes it's his only option.
Kate is buzzing after her day at Uni. Phoebe reluctantly joins Kate for dinner in Borchester, enduring Kate going on about her favourite course module and the cool young friends she's made. She takes a call from one of them, Steph, inviting her for more drinks this evening.
Over a glass of wine, Lilian lies to Jennifer about Matt, saying he's on a business trip. She changes the subject to the Valentine's dance.
Phoebe arrives home alone - Kate has stayed out for drinks. Weary Phoebe goes up to her room, where Jennifer joins her to check what's wrong. Phoebe's had an awful day. She got a bad mark on an essay and her friend made her feel terrible. Kate didn't bother to ask about her day. Jennifer comforts Phoebe, who then gets a text from Kate with a 'selfie' of Kate with her new friends and wearing pussycat ears. It's all so sad and embarrassing.
Ex Machina is the new film written and directed by Alex Garland, writer of The Beach and 28 Days Later, about the quest for the perfect AI robot. Briony Hanson, Director of Film at the British Council, reviews the film that stars Alicia Vikander, Domhnall Gleeson and Oscar Isaac.
Samira Ahmed talks to theatre director Jamie Lloyd, well-known for re-imagining great plays and finding in them contemporary relevance. His latest production is The Ruling Class, Peter Barnes's 1968 satire of those in power and how they get away with murder, starring James McAvoy as the 14th Earl of Gurney, who thinks he is the Messiah.
Max Brooks discusses his new book The Harlem Hellfighters, a graphic novel which focuses on the real-life 369th Infantry Regiment in the First World War, composed entirely of African American soldiers who despite achieving enormous success in war faced tremendous discrimination on their return from Europe in 1919.
And Costa First Novel winner Emma Healey discusses her book Elizabeth Is Missing.
Benefit sanctions are supposed to be part of a system helping people back to work. But critics say they penalise the vulnerable and are among the reasons for the growing use of food banks. So how fair is the Government's system of withholding state payments for those who don't comply with welfare rules? Allan Urry hears from whistleblowers who allege some JobCentrePlus staff are setting claimants up to fail in order to meet internal performance targets. Why did a recovering amputee lose his benefits because he didn't answer the phone?
Coming up to the 2015 general election, a number of organisations and charities are launching campaigns and lobbying government to increase voter participation by visually impaired people. The Political and Constitutional Reform Parliamentary subcommittee have heard evidence from the Royal National Institute of Blind People and other organisations, about the experience of visually impaired people when voting. We hear some listeners' experiences, as well as find out what reforms might be possible.
Molly Watt is twenty years old, has written a children's book and has Usher Syndrome. Molly talks frankly about her experience of having two sensory impairments and describes how she deals with both hearing and vision loss.
Mutant Flu, Weight-Loss Surgery, Young Men and Body Image, CVID, Dental Check-ups, Doctors' Example, Dry January Findings
Just a month after NICE calls for more weight loss operations to be done, there are proposals to slash the amount hospitals are paid to do the procedures - a move that could see many hospitals stop offering the operation.
Six packs and big guns - there is growing concern about steroid abuse by young men on a quest for the perfect body.
And Dry January - Mark looks at the science behind going on the wagon for a month.
British man who faked his own death fighting in Syria so he could secretly return to the UK has admitted terrorism offences.
On a sultry afternoon in the summer of 1936, a woman accidentally interrupts an attempted murder in a London hotel room. Nina Land, a West End actress, faces a dilemma. She's not supposed to be at the hotel in the first place, and certainly not with a married man - the celebrated portrait artist, Stephen Wyley - but once it becomes apparent that she may have seen the face of the man dubbed 'the Tie-Pin Killer' she realises that another woman's life could be at stake.
Jimmy Erskine is the raffish doyen of theatre critics who fears that his star is fading. Age and drink are catching up with him and, in his late-night escapades with young men, he walks a tightrope that may snap at any moment. He has depended for years on his loyal and longsuffering secretary Tom, who has a secret of his own to protect. Tom's chance encounter with Madeleine Farewell, a lonely young woman haunted by premonitions of catastrophe, closes the circle - it was Madeleine who narrowly escaped the killer's stranglehold that afternoon and now she walks the streets in terror of him finding her again.
Curtain Call is a poignant comedy of manners, and a tragedy of mistaken intentions. From the glittering murk of Soho's demi-monde to the grease paint and ghost-lights of theatreland, the story plunges on through smoky clubrooms, street corners where thuggish Blackshirts linger and tawdry rooming houses.
Susan Hulme and Sean Curran mark the 750th anniversary of the first English parliament with reports from Westminster and assemblies and parliaments at home and around the world.
From arguments over Trident at Westminster to events at Holyrood, Cardiff Bay, and Stormont.
The programme also hears from BBC correspondents in Washington and Moscow and reports on the proceedings at the European Parliament.
And Mark D'Arcy investigates the hidden hearings and debates that go on all the time within the Palace of Westminster.
WEDNESDAY 21 JANUARY 2015
WED 00:00 Midnight News (b04y6vgv)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.
WED 00:30 Book of the Week (b04yftkr)
[Repeat of broadcast at
09:45 on Tuesday]
WED 00:48 Shipping Forecast (b04y6vgx)
The latest shipping forecast.
WED 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (b04y6vgz)
BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service.
WED 05:20 Shipping Forecast (b04y6vh1)
The latest shipping forecast.
WED 05:30 News Briefing (b04y6vh3)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4.
WED 05:43 Prayer for the Day (b04ykbjc)
With Andrew Graystone.
WED 05:45 Farming Today (b04ykbjf)
Rural Community Councils, Farmland Bird Count and Mangoes
There are fears for the future of services in rural communities, after ACRE (Action with Communities in Rural England) was warned that its government funding could be withdrawn. The ACRE network is made up of thirty-eight Rural Community Councils across England. They help provide services in rural areas, including transport, housing, and support for village halls. Anna Hill asks what cuts to funding would mean for rural communities.
Tens of thousands of people are expected at the East of England Showground in Peterborough today for LAMMA, the UK's largest farm machinery and equipment show. Continuing a week looking at developments in agricultural machinery, Farming Today hears from a farmer from Iowa who talks about a new kind of seed planter which uses the very latest in smart technology.
The Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust's "Big Farmland Bird Count" for 2015 gets underway in February. Anna Hill joins farmers in Norfolk as they learn how to identify different species of bird on their farms.
Presented by Anna Hill and produced by Emma Campbell.
WED 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b04t0skg)
Horned Screamer
Michael Palin presents the Venezuelan horned screamer. Soundling as if someone is using a giant plunger in the Venezuelan marshes, these are the mating calls of the Horned Screamer. They're sounds that only another Horned Screamer could love, but then screamers are very odd birds. Over the years ornithologists have struggled to classify them, modern thinking puts their closest living relatives as the primitive Australian Magpie Goose.
Protruding from its head is a long wiry horn made of cartilage, which could rightfully earn it the title of "unicorn of the bird world" Usually seen as pairs or, outside the breeding season in small groups in the marshes and savannas of the northern half of South America, as you'd expect from their name , they are very vocal and these primeval bellows which sound more cow like than bird like and can be heard up to 3 kilometers away.
WED 06:00 Today (b04ykbjh)
Morning news and current affairs. Including Sports Desk, Yesterday in Parliament, Weather and Thought for the Day.
WED 09:00 Midweek (b04ykbjk)
Barbara Winton, Lord Alf Dubs, Anne Reid, Dr John C Taylor, Lottie Muir
Libby Purves meets Barbara Winton, daughter of Sir Nicholas Winton who orchestrated the Kindertransport rescue mission; Lord Alf Dubs who was one of the rescued children; actor Anne Reid; inventor Dr John C Taylor and horticulturalist and mixologist Lottie Muir.
Dr John C Taylor OBE is an inventor, businessman and collector. He recently designed a new chronophage clock featuring a dragon that waves its tail and swallows a single pearl at the top of every hour. He holds 400 patents and an estimated two billion appliances use his designs including the cordless kettle. The Dragon Chronophage will be showcased at Design Shanghai.
Barbara Winton is the daughter of Sir Nicholas Winton who orchestrated the Kindertransport, a rescue mission in which 669 children were evacuated from Czechoslovakia in 1938 and 1939. Barbara's biography tells the story of her father's daring plan to transport mainly Jewish children to be placed with foster parents in the UK. One of the children was six-year-old Alf Dubs, now Lord Alf Dubs. Sir Winton has received several honours including a knighthood and the Czech Republic's highest civilian honour - the Order of the White Lion. If it's not Impossible - The Life of Sir Nicholas Winton is published by Matador.
Anne Reid MBE is a film, television and theatre actor. She stars in the BBC One series Last Tango In Halifax, a one-off production of A Little Night Music and will soon reprise her role in the cabaret show Just in Time. After graduating from RADA, she played Valerie Barlow in Coronation Street for over a decade. She received a BAFTA nomination for her role in the film The Mother opposite Daniel Craig. A Little Night Music is at the Palace Theatre, London and Just in Time is at Crazy Coqs, London.
Lottie Muir is a horticulturalist and mixologist who is known as the Cocktail Gardener. She runs workshops demonstrating how to make botanical cocktails from foraged ingredients. She created a community garden on the rooftop of the Brunel Museum where she now runs the Midnight Apothecary cocktail bar. The next Wild Drinks Workshop with the Cocktail Gardener is at the Queen of Hoxton Rooftop Terrace in Shoreditch, London.
Producer: Paula McGinley.
WED 09:45 Book of the Week (b04ykbjm)
Epilogue: A Memoir
Stranger
Will is apprehensive about meeting his half-brother for the first time.
Jamie Parker continues reading from Will Boast's moving account of loss and coming to terms with the past.
Abridged by Miranda Emmerson.
Producer: Gemma Jenkins
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015.
WED 10:00 Woman's Hour (b04ykbjp)
Marine Le Pen, Sexism in the Restaurant Trade and Unexpectedly Pregnant
In the aftermath of the recent terrorist attacks in Paris, what will Marine Le Pen do now? Sally Peck and Heidi Hasbrouck discuss sexism in the restaurant trade. The 45th World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos starts today, why are only 17% of the representatives female? Unexpectedly pregnant and in a new relationship, two women share their experiences. And Philippa Helme, Principal Clerk of the Table Office in Parliament talks about 31 years working in the House of Commons.
WED 10:40 15 Minute Drama (b04ykbjr)
The Corrections
The Good Daughter
Dramatisation of Jonathan Franzen's darkly comic 2001 novel about the tribulations of a dysfunctional Midwestern family, starring Richard Schiff (The West Wing), Maggie Steed, Colin Stinton and Julian Roslyn Hill. Dramatised by Marcy Kahan.
Episode 13: The Good Daughter - Denise's arrival for a St Jude family Christmas stirs some uncomfortable truths.
Directed by Emma Harding
The Corrections was awarded the National Book Award in 2001, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2002. It was included in TIME magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.
Jonathan Franzen is the author of four novels (Freedom, The Corrections, Strong Motion, and The Twenty-Seventh City), two collections of essays (Farther Away, How to Be Alone), a personal history (The Discomfort Zone).
Marcy Kahan is a playwright and radio dramatist. Recent radio work includes two series of Lunch for BBC Radio 4 (starring Claire Skinner and Stephen Mangan) and Mr Bridger's Orphan. Theatre work includes 20 Cigarettes (Soho Theatre) and the stage version of When Harry Met Sally (Theatre Royal Haymarket).
WED 10:55 The Listening Project (b04ykbjt)
Valerie and Brian - Never Too Late to Say Sorry
Fi Glover introduces a conversation about the serious head injury that meant Brian lost his career and his family. Although separated, he and his wife have re-built a relationship.
The Listening Project is a Radio 4 initiative that offers a snapshot of contemporary Britain in which people across the UK volunteer to have a conversation with someone close to them about a subject they've never discussed intimately before. The conversations are being gathered across the UK by teams of producers from local and national radio stations who facilitate each encounter. Every conversation - they're not BBC interviews, and that's an important difference - lasts up to an hour, and is then edited to extract the key moment of connection between the participants. Most of the unedited conversations are being archived by the British Library and used to build up a collection of voices capturing a unique portrait of the UK in the second decade of the millennium. You can learn more about The Listening Project by visiting bbc.co.uk/listeningproject
Producer: Marya Burgess.
WED 11:00 A Gripping Yarn (b0418p75)
In A Gripping Yarn, Jane Garvey explores the world of knitting. It's a lot more exciting and dynamic than the simple 'knit one, purl one' sweater would have you believe!
Tracing its popularity from the American revolution through to modern "guerilla" knitters, Jane comes across composer such as Hafdís Bjarnadótti, who designs music to represent knitting patterns, and jailbirds who earn remission through knitting.
Utilised by therapists, developed by social media and discovered by Reality TV, its image is now a million miles away from the knitting granny.
Introducing Jane to this hitherto hidden world are fashion historian Dr Joanne Turney, Christine Kingdom of the UK Hand Knitting Association and Rachel Matthews, owner of an Aladdin's cave of different Yarns of all colours and textures in East London.
Producer: Joanne Watson
An Alfi production first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2014.
WED 11:30 The Rivals (b04ykbjw)
Series 3
The Moabite Cipher
Based on a short story by R. Austin Freeman
Dramatised by Chris Harrald
Inspector Lestrade was made to look a fool in the Sherlock Holmes stories. Now he is writing his memoirs and has a chance to get his own back, with tales of Holmes' rivals. He continues with Dr James Thorndike as they try to protect Pastor Wayne Kaplan after he receives death threats, despite Lestrade's and James' aversions to Kaplan's charismatic preaching and healing.
Directed by Liz Webb
Episode by Chris Harrald inspired by the short story 'The Moabite Cipher' by R. Austin Freeman: http://www.online-literature.com/r-freeman/john-thorndykes-cases/6/.
WED 12:00 News Summary (b04y6vh5)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.
WED 12:04 A History of Ideas (b04ykbjy)
Catharine Edwards on Seneca and facing death.
Catharine Edwards wants to introduce you to the Roman Philosopher Seneca. But he's dying. Towards the end of his life Seneca became interested in the idea that only human beings had foreknowledge of their own death. Animals didn't know and Gods didn't die. This singular piece of knowledge gives human life its meaning as well as its burden. Seneca argued that to liberate yourself from the fear of death was a vital part of life. But did his own famous death live up to his beliefs?
WED 12:15 You and Yours (b04ykbk0)
Social Care Crisis, Work Rotas and Celebrity Biographies
Care budgets for the elderly have declined by more than a billion pounds says Age UK who claim our care system is in swift and calamitous decline.
Living with unemployment and disability - the first report in our Cost of Living series.
Can a good rota really help companies and workers by delivering more money and more useful time off.
Is the shine coming off the celebrity biography?
Insurance companies warn motorists against using key safes in or on their vehicles.
Treatment of whistleblowers is 'a stain on the NHS', say MPs.
Producer: Kevin Mousley
Presenter: Winifred Robinson.
WED 12:57 Weather (b04y6vh7)
The latest weather forecast.
WED 13:00 World at One (b04ykbk2)
Analysis of current affairs reports, presented by Martha Kearney.
WED 13:45 Churchill's Other Lives (b00zft2t)
Journalist
Winston Churchill was revered by millions as the saviour of Britain in the Second World War, but he wasn't just a great war leader - he wrote millions of words of journalism, he painted, he built brick walls, he owned racehorses, he gambled in Monte Carlo casinos and even wrote screenplays. Yet his personality was mercurial; bouts of hyper-activity were interspersed with black days of depression. While he had a loving marriage, he spent long periods apart from his wife and children, some of whom caused him deep anxiety and distress.
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of his death, celebrated historian Sir David Cannadine, author of In Churchill's Shadow, examines the life and career of Winston Churchill by looking at ten different themes that are less well known, but which are crucial to a fuller understanding of one of the most extraordinary individuals ever to occupy No. 10 Downing Street.
As a young man, Winston Churchill discovered his love for words and decided to make a living out of them, initially as a war correspondent. Indeed he became a writer so prolific and unstoppable that when he was hit by a car in a New York street, he dictated a thousand words about the experience from his hospital bed. Sir David Cannadine explores Winston Churchill's first career as a journalist. With extracts from Churchill's forgotten early dispatches.
Featuring Roger Allam as Winston Churchill.
Producer: Melissa FitzGerald
A Blakeway production for BBC Radio 4.
WED 14:00 The Archers (b04yk55g)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 on Tuesday]
WED 14:15 GF Newman's The Corrupted (b04ykd72)
Series 2
Episode 3
Crime drama based on the characters from the best selling novel by the multi-award winning writer, GF Newman. This second series runs from 1961 to 1970.
Spanning six decades, the saga plots the course of one family against the back-drop of a revolution in crime as the underworld extends its influence to the very heart of the establishment, in an uncomfortable relationship of shared values.
At the start of the 1960s, Joey Oldman acquires crafty Arnold Goodman as his solicitor, and buys shares in the civil engineering firm owned by the corrupt Minister of Transport, Ernest Marples.
Prospering with the help of venal bankers, and growing more devious, he and his wife Cath join Macmillan's Conservative Party. They strive without success to keep their son Brian free of the influence of Jack Braden (Cath's brother) as he takes their 'firm' from running illicit clubs, where they entertain politicians and judges, to armed robbery. All the while, Jack and Brian struggle to keep free of the police and further entanglements with the law, the Kray twins and the Richardsons.
Episode 3:
Jack goes to prison with a lot of help from Joey and Cath, who plant Brian's gun at his flat.
Written by GF Newman
Produced and Directed by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4.
WED 15:00 Money Box Live (b04ykd74)
Insurance
Insurance Questions? Need help with premiums, policies or claims? Call 03700 100 444 from
1pm to
3.30pm on Wednesday or e-mail moneybox@bbc.co.uk
Motor insurance premiums are rising for the first time since 2011, according to the latest AA Insurance Premium Index. Average quotes rose by 4.2% to £891 in the third quarter of 2014 but there is better news for drivers aged 17-22 whose costs are falling due to 'pay how you drive' policies.
Home insurance premiums are falling, with average annual buildings cover costing £1
12.56 and contents cover dropping to £
61.64. But don't fall into the trap of allowing your insurance to renew automatically or you won't benefit from the drop in prices.
If you want to ask about finding a cheaper policy, while making sure your valuables our covered, why not talk to our team on Wednesday?
Maybe you need help understanding the jargon?
If you're making a claim, is it going smoothly?
Perhaps you want the latest news on plans for flood insurance?
Or advice about a specialist policy?
Whatever your question, why not ask our panel for their view? Joining presenter Lesley Curwen will be:
Anne-Marie Flexman, Gocompare.
Stuart Reid, Executive Chairman, Insurance Broker, Bluefin.
Malcolm Tarling, Association of British Insurers.
Call 03700 100 444 from
1pm to
3.30pm on Wednesday or e-mail moneybox@bbc.co.uk now. Standard geographic call charges apply.
WED 15:30 Inside Health (b04yk7hb)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 on Tuesday]
WED 16:00 Thinking Allowed (b04ykd77)
Tribute to Ulrich Beck (1944 - 2015) - Dissident Irish Republicanism
Dissident Irish Republicanism - Laurie Taylor talks to John Morrison, Senior Lecturer in Criminology at the University of East London, about his in depth study into the recent intensification of rogue paramilitary activity, Can the upsurge in dissident Republican violence be explained by the history of splits within the Movement? He charts the rise of groups including the Real IRA, Continuity IRA and the newly emerging 'New IRA.' He's joined by Henry Mcdonald, Belfast correspondent at the Observer newspaper.
Ulrich Beck - Angela McRobbie, Professor of Communications at Goldsmiths, University of London, gives a tribute to the eminent German sociologist who died earlier this month. What do his ideas about the 'risk society' tell us about current concerns relating to global terrorism?
Producer: Jayne Egerton.
WED 16:30 The Media Show (b04ykd79)
End of Page 3, Josie Cunningham's Agent, Sir Alan Moses on Press Feedom
Britain's best-selling newspaper The Sun has stopped publishing photographs of topless Page 3 models after 44 years. The paper still hasn't confirmed the move but its sister publication, The Times, reported the change has been approved by owner Rupert Murdoch. It's been hailed a victory for campaigner groups like No More Page 3, who have long said the images are sexist. However, readers can now go online to see topless pictures, and it's understood the Sun's Page 3 website has enjoyed a surge in traffic. Steve Hewlett talks to academic and columnist Roy Greenslade about where this leaves the Sun's print edition, and whether Page 3 is indeed gone for good?
The Independent Press Standards Organisation, or IPSO, which regulates the press, wants to put a 'red pencil' through rules and regulation which allow publishers to 'resist' investigations. So says its Chair Sir Alan Moses, who, at the Lords Communication Committee yesterday, said the rules are opaque and difficult to understand. Steve Hewlett asks him about the independence of the organisation, rival regulators, and his vision for the future of press self-regulation.
Josie Cunningham appeared on the front page of the Sun after having a boob job on the NHS. In 2014, she made headlines again when she announced she was considering aborting her unborn baby for the chance to appear on Big Brother. This week, Channel 4 airs, 'Josie: the most hated women in Britain?', which looks at how she has occupied the media spotlight by promoting shocking stories, including a plan to sell tickets to the birth of her baby. Steve Hewlett talks to the man behind this coverage - her agent Rob Cooper - about his controversial media strategy and how he goes about securing column inches.
Producer: Katy Takatsuki.
WED 17:00 PM (b04ykd7c)
PM at
5pm- Carolyn Quinn with interviews, context and analysis.
WED 18:00 Six O'Clock News (b04y6vh9)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.
WED 18:30 What Does the K Stand For? (b04ykd7f)
Series 2
The BFF
Best Friends Forever.
Stephen K Amos's sitcom about growing up black, gay and funny in 1980s south London.
Written by Jonathan Harvey with Stephen K Amos.
Stephen K Amos … Stephen K Amos
Young Stephen … Shaquille Ali-Yebuah
Stephanie Amos … Fatou Sohna
Virginia Amos … Ellen Thomas
Vincent Amos … Don Gilet
Miss Bliss … Michelle Butterly
Jayson Jackson … Frankie Wilson
Roy ... Ryan Watson
Producer: Colin Anderson
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015.
WED 19:00 The Archers (b04ykd7h)
Tony's triumphant on his crutches, but Pat worries when he tells her he's thinking about buying another bull. Tony understands why Pat had to send Otto to be destroyed. He remembers why he bought Otto. It's not too late to start again, surely?
Susan believes Justin Elliott's rumoured development scheme might help young people. Ed is really struggling to keep going. Carol sympathizes.
Carol asks Jill if perhaps an Archer might want to take on Mike's milk round
Susan asks Neil to pick up the children. Neil can't. He has to move some pigs at Bridge Farm. Susan's not happy
Meanwhile, Johnny helps Tom to move the pigs. As they finish, Neil arrives. Bemused Neil points out that he was on his way to do the job himself. Tom is sorry but it couldn't wait. And they're running out of pasture. Interrupting as Neil starts to suggest a plan, Tom announces his own suggestion along similar lines. Great minds think alike, trumpets Tom.
Neil grumbles to Susan that Tom seems to have forgotten who's manager. Not for the first time, Susan urges him to stand up for his rights and not be a doormat. All right, says Neil. He won't let Tom or anyone else push him around.
WED 19:15 Front Row (b04ykd7k)
Bjork's New Album, Samantha Shannon and the Head of Disney Animation
Bjork has been forced to release her new album earlier than expected due to an online leak. Musicologist Nicola Dibben, who has worked with Bjork, reviews Vulnicura, the first album from Bjork since Biophilia in 2011.
Andrew Millstein, head of the Walt Disney Animation Studios in California with its 800-strong workforce, reflects on the company's performance over the last few years, in particular the unexpected success of the animated hit Frozen, and looks ahead to its Tokyo-inspired new release Big Hero 6.
Author Samantha Shannon was touted as the next JK Rowling when she secured a six figure deal for her series of fantasy novels about a clairvoyant living in a dark dystopian future. Shannon wrote the first novel, The Bone Season, when she was still at university. She discusses whether she felt pressure to produce a thrilling sequel.
Costa Poetry Prize winner Jonathan Edwards discusses his collection, My Family and Other Superheroes, which he wrote while working as an English teacher.
Presenter: Kirsty Lang
Producer: Olivia Skinner.
WED 19:45 15 Minute Drama (b04ykbjr)
[Repeat of broadcast at
10:40 today]
WED 20:00 Unreliable Evidence (b04ykd7m)
Human Rights at the Crossroads?
Clive Anderson and guests get behind the political rhetoric to debate the potential impact on the rights of British citizens if the Government carries out a proposal to scrap the Human Rights Act and replace it with a "more British" Bill of Rights.
Barrister Martin Howe QC, who was a member of the Coalition Government's recent commission on human rights, defends the proposals and argues that British citizens and Parliament should not be subject to decisions made by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
But the proposals are challenged by the other guests - barrister Tom de la Mare QC, legal academic Dr Alison Young and retired Appeal Court judge Sir Stanley Burnton. Sir Stanley totally rejects the suggestion that he and his fellow judges are being dictated to by a foreign court.
The panel also discusses the Government's threat to withdraw from the European Convention of Human Rights unless Parliament is allowed to veto judgments from the European Court. Would it be possible for one member country to have special status, or would such a move threaten British membership of the EU itself?
Producer: Brian King
An Above The Title production for BBC Radio 4.
WED 20:45 David Baddiel Tries to Understand (b04ykd7p)
Series 1
Derivatives
Continuing his quest for understanding, David Baddiel explores derivatives. What are they and how do they work?
David begins by meeting journalist Janice Turner, who initially suggested the subject, and she explains why she believes we should all try to understand derivatives.
Then David visits the London Metals Exchange, the last place with open outcry trading in London, where he discusses the history of derivatives with financial historian D'Maris Coffman. And on a trading floor at Canary Wharf he hears how the market works today.
At the end, he returns to try to explain to Janice what he's learned, with D'Maris ready to pass judgement on his understanding.
Producer: Giles Edwards.
WED 21:00 Becoming Myself: Gender Identity (b04v5pg6)
Trans Women
A revealing series which goes inside the Charing Cross Gender Identity Clinic in Hammersmith, London - the largest and oldest in the world - to explore the condition of gender dysphoria - a sense of distress caused by a disjunction between biological sex and gender identity.
With growing mainstream discussion prompted by high-profile transgender people like boxing promoter Frank Maloney, WikiLeaks source Chelsea Manning and model Andrej Pejic, gender dysphoria is fast becoming more visible. Indeed there has been a steady rise in the numbers of referrals to Gender Identity Clinics across the country and patient numbers at Charing Cross have doubled in the last five years.
This series follows a group of transgender patients pursuing treatment for gender dysphoria in order to 'become themselves'. In the first programme we meet Freddie, Mitchell and Blade, who were raised female and are seeking treatment as trans men. The second programme centres on trans women Bethany, Emma and Tanya, who are making the opposite journey.
We also hear from the psychiatrists, endocrinologists and surgeons as they meet and assess the patients on a day-to-day basis. Their treatment decisions have the potential to transform the lives of their patients, but these irrevocable changes are not made lightly.
Narrator: Adjoa Andoh
Produced by Melissa FitzGerald
A Blakeway production for BBC Radio 4.
WED 21:30 Midweek (b04ykbjk)
[Repeat of broadcast at
09:00 today]
WED 22:00 The World Tonight (b04ykdyd)
Ukraine and Russia try to negotiate a ceasefire to end the fighting in eastern Ukraine
Violence has flared between Ukrainian troops and separatist rebels in past week
WED 22:45 Book at Bedtime (b04ykdyg)
Curtain Call
Episode 8
On a sultry afternoon in the summer of 1936, a woman accidentally interrupts an attempted murder in a London hotel room. Nina Land, a West End actress, faces a dilemma. She's not supposed to be at the hotel in the first place, and certainly not with a married man - the celebrated portrait artist, Stephen Wyley - but once it becomes apparent that she may have seen the face of the man dubbed 'the Tie-Pin Killer' she realises that another woman's life could be at stake.
Jimmy Erskine is the raffish doyen of theatre critics who fears that his star is fading. Age and drink are catching up with him and, in his late-night escapades with young men, he walks a tightrope that may snap at any moment. He has depended for years on his loyal and longsuffering secretary Tom, who has a secret of his own to protect. Tom's chance encounter with Madeleine Farewell, a lonely young woman haunted by premonitions of catastrophe, closes the circle - it was Madeleine who narrowly escaped the killer's stranglehold that afternoon and now she walks the streets in terror of him finding her again.
Curtain Call is a poignant comedy of manners, and a tragedy of mistaken intentions. From the glittering murk of Soho's demi-monde to the grease paint and ghost-lights of theatreland, the story plunges on through smoky clubrooms, street corners where thuggish Blackshirts linger and tawdry rooming houses.
Read by Nancy Carroll
Abridged, directed and produced by Jill Waters
A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4.
WED 23:00 Roger McGough's Other Half (b04ykdyj)
Kids, eh?
Roger McGough is joined by Helen Atkinson-Wood, Philip Jackson and Richie Webb in a hilarious and surreal new sketch show for BBC Radio 4. With sketches about Fandom, Fatherhood and 17th Century France, you'll hear his familiar voice in a whole new light. Expect merriment and melancholy in equal measures, and a whisker of witty wordplay too. Produced by Victoria Lloyd.
WED 23:15 Love in Recovery (b04ykdyl)
Series 1
Simon
The lives of five very different recovering alcoholics.
Set entirely at their weekly meetings, we hear them get to know each other, learn to hate each other, argue, moan, laugh, fall apart, fall in love and, most importantly, tell their stories.
Comedy drama by Pete Jackson, set in Alcoholics Anonymous. Starring Sue Johnston, John Hannah, Eddie Marsan, Rebecca Front, Paul Kaye and Julia Deakin.
In this episode, Simon surprises everyone when he tells his story of being a war correspondent in the line of fire.
Julie ...... Sue Johnston
Marion ...... Julia Deakin
Fiona ...... Rebecca Front
Simon ...... John Hannah
Danno ...... Paul Kaye
Andy ...... Eddie Marsan
There are funny stories, sad stories, stories of small victories and milestones, stories of loss, stories of hope, and stories that you really shouldn't laugh at - but still do. Along with the storyteller.
Writer Pete Jackson is a recovering alcoholic and has spent time with Alcoholics Anonymous. It was there he found, as many people do, support from the unlikeliest group of disparate souls, all banded together due to one common bond. As well as offering the support he needed throughout a difficult time, AA also offered a weekly, sometimes daily, dose of hilarity, upset, heartbreak and friendship.
Director: Ben Worsfield
A Lucky Giant production for BBC Radio 4 first broadcast in 2015.
WED 23:30 Today in Parliament (b04ykdyn)
David Cameron is challenged over the long delays to publication of the Chilcot Inquiry report into the war in Iraq. Sean Curran covers the exchanges at Prime Minister's Questions.
Also on the programme:
* Reaction to the Oxfam report that concludes 1 per cent of the world's population now owns all the globe's wealth.
* The latest arguments in the Commons over the state of the Health Service in England..
* Peers focus on the arguments over televised election debates between the party leaders.
* And MPs react to the uncertain future for Yemen, scene of a recent violent coup.
THURSDAY 22 JANUARY 2015
THU 00:00 Midnight News (b04y6vj1)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.
THU 00:30 Book of the Week (b04ykbjm)
[Repeat of broadcast at
09:45 on Wednesday]
THU 00:48 Shipping Forecast (b04y6vj3)
The latest shipping forecast.
THU 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (b04y6vj5)
BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service.
THU 05:20 Shipping Forecast (b04y6vj7)
The latest shipping forecast.
THU 05:30 News Briefing (b04y6vj9)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4.
THU 05:43 Prayer for the Day (b04yyw9s)
With Andrew Graystone.
THU 05:45 Farming Today (b04ykk4h)
Toxic silt, Milk update, Abattoir on Skye, Lamma
Environmentalists are celebrating a victory which halts the dumping of poisonous silt off the south Cornish coast. For twenty years they have been trying to stop contaminated silt dredged from the naval dockyard at Devonport from smothering environmentally sensitive reefs near the mouth of the river Tamar.
The Isle of Skye could get an abattoir of its own. It would make a big difference to livestock producers on the island, who currently have to drive 150 miles each way to a slaughterhouse near Inverness.
And there may finally be a hint of good news on the horizon for dairy farmers.
Presented by Charlotte Smith and produced by Emma Campbell.
THU 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b04t0sqd)
Greater Roadrunner
Michael Palin presents the greater roadrunner of south western North America. A cuckoo that can run at 20 miles per hour and snap up venomous reptiles might not seem destined for cartoon fame, but that's exactly what happened to the Greater Roadrunner.
The loud "beep-beep" call of the Warner Brothers cartoon creation, always out-foxing his arch-enemy Wile-E. Coyote brought this very odd member of the cuckoo family racing into the living rooms of the western world from 1949 onwards . Greater roadrunners live in dry sunny places in the south western states of North America, where their long-tailed, bushy--crested, streaky forms are a common sight. They will eat almost anything from scorpions to rats, outrunning small rodents and lizards and even leaping into the air to catch flying insects.
As it runs across the desert, the roadrunner's footprints show two toes pointing forward and two backwards. The "X" shape this forms was considered a sacred symbol by Pueblo tribes and believed to confound evil spirits because it gives no clues as to which way the bird went.
THU 06:00 Today (b04ykk4k)
Morning news and current affairs. Including Sports Desk, Yesterday in Parliament, Weather and Thought for the Day.
THU 09:00 In Our Time (b04ykk4m)
Phenomenology
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss phenomenology, a style of philosophy developed by the German thinker Edmund Husserl in the first decades of the 20th century. Husserl's initial insights underwent a radical transformation in the work of his student Martin Heidegger, and played a key role in the development of French philosophy at the hands of writers like Emmanuel Levinas, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and Maurice Merleau-Ponty.
Phenomenology has been a remarkably adaptable approach to philosophy. It has given its proponents a platform to expose and critique the basic assumptions of past philosophy, and to talk about everything from the foundations of geometry to the difference between fear and anxiety. It has also been instrumental in getting philosophy out of the seminar room and making it relevant to the lives people actually lead.
GUESTS
Simon Glendinning, Professor of European Philosophy in the European Institute at the London School of Economics
Joanna Hodge, Professor of Philosophy at Manchester Metropolitan University
Stephen Mulhall, Professor of Philosophy and Tutor at New College at the University of Oxford
Producer: Luke Mulhall.
THU 09:45 Book of the Week (b04ykk4p)
Epilogue: A Memoir
A Balancing Act
Will struggles to adapt to his new family circumstances and starts to question his understanding of events.
Jamie Parker continues reading from Will Boast's moving account of loss and coming to terms with the past.
Abridged by Miranda Emmerson
Producer: Gemma Jenkins
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015
THU 10:00 Woman's Hour (b04ykk4r)
Beyond Clueless; How Influential Are Our Teenage Film Heroines?
Coming-of-age movies like Clueless and The Breakfast Club show the transition from childhood to adulthood and what it's like to fit in - or not. But what do we learn from our teenage film heroines? Which female characters have - or will - stand the test of time?
At the moment, just over a fifth of MPs are women - but what are the chances women will be better represented after the General Election? Last month we looked at the efforts of the main political parties at Westminster to get more women to stand. Today we turn to those parties hoping to make big gains on May 7th - the Green Party
Around 7,000 women in the UK are diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer every year. What impact will the discovery of six new genes associated with the disease have on how it's treated .
This week marks the 750th anniversary of the first parliament of elected representatives at Westminster. The role the suffragettes played in getting women the vote is well documented. But they also owe something to the rise of the English tea room.
Plus the writer Diana Nneka Atuona on the inspiration behind her award-winning debut play
about a child soldier in Liberia's civil war
Presented by Jenni Murray
Producer Beverley Purcell.
THU 10:45 15 Minute Drama (b04ykk4t)
The Corrections
A Wonderland of Wealth
Dramatisation of Jonathan Franzen's darkly comic 2001 novel about the tribulations of a dysfunctional Midwestern family, starring Richard Schiff (The West Wing), Maggie Steed, Colin Stinton and Julian Rhind-Tutt. Dramatised by Marcy Kahan.
Episode 14: A Wonderland of Wealth - The prodigal Chip returns home.
Cast:
Narrator.....Richard Schiff
Enid Lambert.....Maggie Steed
Alfred Lambert.....Colin Stinton
Gary Lambert.....Richard Laing
Chip Lambert.....Julian Rhind-Tutt
Denise Lambert.....Roslyn Hill
Don Armour.....Shaun Mason
Brian Callahan.....Ian Conningham
Robin Passafaro.....Kelly Burke
Mrs Nygren.....Hannah Genesius
Sylvia Roth.....Elaine Claxton
Ted Roth.....David Acton
Gitanas Misevicius.....Sam Dale
Caroline Lambert.....Jane Slavin
Caleb Lambert.....Adam Thomas Wright
Jonah Lambert.....Sean McCrystal
Directed by Emma Harding
The Corrections was awarded the National Book Award in 2001, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2002. It was included in TIME magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.
Jonathan Franzen is the author of four novels (Freedom, The Corrections, Strong Motion, and The Twenty-Seventh City), two collections of essays (Farther Away, How to Be Alone), a personal history (The Discomfort Zone).
Marcy Kahan is a playwright and radio dramatist. Recent radio work includes two series of Lunch for BBC Radio 4 (starring Claire Skinner and Stephen Mangan) and Mr Bridger's Orphan. Theatre work includes 20 Cigarettes (Soho Theatre) and the stage version of When Harry Met Sally (Theatre Royal Haymarket).
Dramatisation of Jonathan Franzen's darkly comic 2001 novel about the tribulations of a dysfunctional Midwestern family, starring Richard Schiff (The West Wing), Maggie Steed, Colin Stinton and Julian Rhind-Tutt. Dramatised by Marcy Kahan.
Episode 14: A Wonderland of Wealth - The prodigal Chip returns home.
Directed by Emma Harding
The Corrections was awarded the National Book Award in 2001, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2002. It was included in TIME magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.
Jonathan Franzen is the author of four novels (Freedom, The Corrections, Strong Motion, and The Twenty-Seventh City), two collections of essays (Farther Away, How to Be Alone), a personal history (The Discomfort Zone).
Marcy Kahan is a playwright and radio dramatist. Recent radio work includes two series of Lunch for BBC Radio 4 (starring Claire Skinner and Stephen Mangan) and Mr Bridger's Orphan. Theatre work includes 20 Cigarettes (Soho Theatre) and the stage version of When Harry Met Sally (Theatre Royal Haymarket).
THU 11:00 From Our Own Correspondent (b04ykk4w)
The Knot Reaches the Comb
Correspondents' stories: in this edition Maria Margaronis on the keenly-awaited Greek election; Will Ross meets soldiers who've been dismissed from the Nigerian army and asks them for their views on the battle against Boko Haram; Susie Emmett's in South Africa talking to farmers about controversial government plans for land reform; Richard Fleming's in Haiti where he's been meeting a photographer who found himself caught up in the devastating earthquake five years ago and Lucy Daltroff is on one of the many thousands of islands sprinkled along Chile's skinny coastline hearing magical legends and fears about what the modern world might bring once that community is joined to the mainland by a new bridge.
THU 11:30 The Real MacColl (b04ykk4y)
John Cooper Clarke looks back at the life of Ewan MacColl, a working class boy from Salford, who became renowned as a dramatist, broadcaster, songwriter and folk singer.
Ewan MacColl immortalised his city, Salford, in the song Dirty Old Town. To many, he's best known as the creator of that song and The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, but it's perhaps the lesser known things about him that are the most fascinating - his struggles as a young boy growing up in the Salford slums, his involvement with radical street theatre, and his re-appearance after the Second World War with a new name.
A century on from his birth, John Cooper Clarke looks back at MacColl's early years and formative influences and discovers how his upbringing went on to inform the important work he would go on to do in theatre, radio and in the British folk revival. With contributions from biographer Ben Harker, legendary folk artist Martin Carthy and American folk singer and musician Peggy Seeger, MacColl's partner from 1956 until the day he died.
Produced by Kellie While
A Smooth Operation production for BBC Radio 4.
THU 12:00 News Summary (b04y6vjc)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.
THU 12:04 A History of Ideas (b04ykk50)
Barry Smith on Noam Chomsky and Human Language
Barry Smith argues that language is our most important uniquely human attribute. It doesn't just help us communicate, it helps us to think. He makes the case for the distinctiveness of human language against the limited signalling systems of other animals. He looks at Noam Chomsky's idea of a universal grammar – that there is something in the human brain that gives us an innate ability to produce language from very early in our lives. And he talks to experts on other intelligent animals - Prof. Nicola Clayton and Prof. Robin Dunbar - to ask how human language and imagination compares with that of birds and primates.
THU 12:15 You and Yours (b04ykk52)
Carrier Bags, Ex-Council Flats, the Cost of Living
Consumer news.
THU 13:00 World at One (b04ykk54)
Analysis of current affairs reports, presented by Martha Kearney.
THU 13:45 Churchill's Other Lives (b00zft85)
Son and Father
Winston Churchill was revered by millions as the saviour of Britain in the Second World War, but he wasn't just a great war leader - he wrote millions of words of journalism, he painted, he built brick walls, he owned racehorses, he gambled in Monte Carlo casinos and even wrote screenplays. Yet his personality was mercurial; bouts of hyper-activity were interspersed with black days of depression. While he had a loving marriage, he spent long periods apart from his wife and children, some of whom caused him deep anxiety and distress.
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of his death, celebrated historian Sir David Cannadine, author of In Churchill's Shadow, examines the life and career of Winston Churchill by looking at ten different themes that are less well known, but which are crucial to a fuller understanding of one of the most extraordinary individuals ever to occupy No. 10 Downing Street.
Winston Churchill had an unhappy childhood. His father was distant, drunken and cold. His mother was a spendthrift who had numerous affairs. So how was he able to rise above his difficult upbringing and become the success he did? Sir David Cannadine looks at Winston Churchill's family life, exploring the legacy left by Churchill's childhood when he himself became a father.
Featuring Roger Allam as Winston Churchill.
Producer: Melissa FitzGerald
A Blakeway production for BBC Radio 4.
THU 14:00 The Archers (b04ykd7h)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 on Wednesday]
THU 14:15 GF Newman's The Corrupted (b04ykk56)
Series 2
Episode 4
Crime drama based on the characters from the best selling novel by the multi-award winning writer, GF Newman. This second series runs from 1961 to 1970.
Spanning six decades, the saga plots the course of one family against the back-drop of a revolution in crime as the underworld extends its influence to the very heart of the establishment, in an uncomfortable relationship of shared values.
At the start of the 1960s, Joey Oldman acquires crafty Arnold Goodman as his solicitor, and buys shares in the civil engineering firm owned by the corrupt Minister of Transport, Ernest Marples.
Prospering with the help of venal bankers, and growing more devious, he and his wife Cath join Macmillan's Conservative Party. They strive without success to keep their son Brian free of the influence of Jack Braden (Cath's brother) as he takes their 'firm' from running illicit clubs, where they entertain politicians and judges, to armed robbery. All the while, Jack and Brian struggle to keep free of the police and further entanglements with the law, the Kray twins and the Richardsons.
Episode 4:
Joey is approached by the police to fence a lot of money from the Great Train Robbery.
Written by GF Newman
Produced and Directed by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4.
THU 15:00 Open Country (b04ykk58)
Churchill's Chartwell in Kent
To mark the 50th anniversary of the death of Sir Winston Churchill, Helen Mark heads to Chartwell in Kent to explore the family home and gardens.
Churchill bought the home in 1922 to live in with his wife Clementine and their children and remained here until his death in 1965. As well as making structural changes to the grounds he used it as an inspiration for writing and painting and it's been maintained to reflect how he kept it. Helen asks what Chartwell tells us about the man - to so many a great leader - but also a father, husband and nature lover.
Producer: Anne-Marie Bullock.
THU 15:27 Radio 4 Appeal (b04y9nkx)
[Repeat of broadcast at
07:55 on Sunday]
THU 15:30 Open Book (b04y9rj6)
[Repeat of broadcast at
16:00 on Sunday]
THU 16:00 The Film Programme (b04ykk5b)
Alex Garland on Ex Machina, Liz Fraser on I'm All Right Jack, JC Chandor on A Most Violent Year
With Francine Stock.
Novelist Alex Garland discusses his directorial debut Ex Machina and tells Francine why he thinks Professor Stephen Hawking is wrong to worry that the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race.
Liz Fraser is known as one of the Carry On girls, even though she only appeared in four of the series. As her film debut, I'm All Right Jack, is released on DVD, she spills the beans on stereotyping, Peter Sellers, and the unions.
Director J.C. Chandor reveals why he set his crime drama A Most Violent Year in 1981, statistically the most violent 12 months in the history of New York city.
THU 16:30 BBC Inside Science (b04ykk5d)
GMOs; International Year of Light; Coral health
It is likely that scientists will soon engineer strains of "friendly" bacteria which are genetically recoded to be better than the ones we currently use in food production. The sorts of bacteria we use in cheese or yoghurt could soon be made to be resistant to all viruses, for example.
But what if the GM bacteria were to escape into the wild?
Researchers writing in the Journal Nature propose this week a mechanism by which GMO's could be made to be dependent on substances that do not occur in nature. That way, if they escaped, they would perish and die.
George Church, of Harvard Medical School, tells Adam Rutherford about the way bacteria - and possibly eventually plant and animal cells - could be engineered to have such a "failsafe" included, thus allowing us to deploy GM in a range of applications outside of high security laboratories.
Adam reports from this week's launch in Paris of the International Year of Light marking 100 years since Einstein's Theory of General Relativity. Amongst the cultural and scientific events at UNESCO in Paris, Nobel Prize winner Bill Philips explains how using lasers can achieve the most accurate atomic clocks imaginable and we hear how Google X is embracing new ways to manipulate light to ignite some of the team's futuristic technologies
And as the global decline in coral reefs continues as a result of human activity, Adam talks to Hawaii based biologist Mary Hagedorn who is using unusual techniques normally adopted for fertility clinics, to store and regrow coral species that are in danger
Producer: Adrian Washbourne.
THU 17:00 PM (b04ykk5g)
PM at
5pm- Carolyn Quinn with interviews, context and analysis.
THU 18:00 Six O'Clock News (b04y6vjf)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.
THU 18:30 Bridget Christie Minds the Gap (b04ykk5j)
Series 2
Episode 3
Bridget Christie tries to find a feminist icon who doesn't want to replace the word 'feminism' with 'bootylicious'.
She also discusses how adverts have ruined her sex life, and why Twitter is a sexist's natural habitat.
Multi-award winning series about modern feminism.
Bridget thought that she'd be able to put her feet up after her last series, she expected it to bomb. Sadly it was a huge success. But it's OK, because actually she's solved the feminist struggle all by herself.
She's assisted by token man, Fred MacAulay.
Written by Bridget Christie.
Producers: Alison Vernon-Smith and Alexandra Smith
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015.
THU 19:00 The Archers (b04yjz69)
Jill has suggested to Bert that he partners Carol for the Valentine's Dance. David raises an eyebrow, but Jill assures him Bert's a perfect gentleman. Jill is exasperated when she asks David to sort out some of his stuff from the attic so it can be given to the jumble sale. He makes a hasty exit.
When Lynda raises the same topic, David is curt. Lynda supposes she shouldn't be surprised; David will soon be taking his money and running. An argument ensues. When Jill walks in, David snaps that she can get rid of all his old stuff. He doesn't want it.
Kate cajoles Phoebe into going to the pub.
Lynda is shocked at the squalor when she calls at Roy's. He insists he's fine. He's going out with Tom tonight.
At the Bull, Tom desperately tries to cheer Roy up. He is making some headway when Kate walks in. Kate is loud and embarrassing. Phoebe feels even worse when she sees her dad there too.
Roy can't believe it. He stops listening to Tom. All he can hear is Kate making a fool of herself. Caught between her two difficult parents, Phoebe squirms.
Tom reassures Roy, pointing out that Phoebe is unimpressed with her mum too. He persuades Roy to turn the other cheek. But Roy can't stay. He thanks Tom for the drink and makes his excuses.
THU 19:15 Front Row (b04ykk5l)
Johnny Depp and Paul Bettany, Imogen Cooper, Kate Saunders, Fortitude
Johnny Depp and Paul Bettany discuss their new film Mortdecai, a slapstick art heist caper set amongst the British aristocracy.
Sofie Gråbøl, star of The Killing, returns to the small screen in Fortitude. Gråbøl's first British drama series focuses on a small community in the Arctic Circle where a murder has been committed. Novelist Tom Harper reviews.
Pianist Imogen Cooper discusses her new album on which she performs works by the husband-and-wife team of Robert and Clara Shumann, based on the letters they exchanged during their courtship.
Costa Children's Book Award winner Kate Saunders discusses Five Children on the Western Front, her update of E Nesbit's Five Children and It stories, which transports the children to 1914 and imagines their fortunes at war.
Presenter Kirsty Lang
Producer Jerome Weatherald.
THU 19:45 15 Minute Drama (b04ykk4t)
[Repeat of broadcast at
10:45 today]
THU 20:00 The Report (b04ykk5n)
Germany, Islam and the New Right
Germany's new anti-Islamisation movement, Pegida, is attracting a middle-aged, middle class following to its weekly marches around the country. The founder, Lutz Bachmann, has criminal convictions for burglary and assault. He rarely gives interviews to the media. However in this edition of The Report he talks to our reporter Catrin Nye.
Producer: Smita Patel
Researcher: James Melley.
THU 20:30 In Business (b04ykk5q)
Ttip: The world's biggest trade deal
The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, or Ttip, is currently being negotiated between the US and the EU. It is the world's biggest trade deal and highly controversial. Peter Day asks how it may effect what we eat, how we work and the strength of our democracy. Will it provide a beneficial boost for business or allow big corporations to side-step important regulation?
Producer: Rosamund Jones.
THU 21:00 BBC Inside Science (b04ykk5d)
[Repeat of broadcast at
16:30 today]
THU 21:30 In Our Time (b04ykk4m)
[Repeat of broadcast at
09:00 today]
THU 22:00 The World Tonight (b04ykk5s)
Duke of York speaks publicly for first time about sex allegations
Prince says he wanted to "reiterate" statements issued by Palace rejecting the claim.
THU 22:45 Book at Bedtime (b04ykk5v)
Curtain Call
Episode 9
On a sultry afternoon in the summer of 1936, a woman accidentally interrupts an attempted murder in a London hotel room. Nina Land, a West End actress, faces a dilemma. She's not supposed to be at the hotel in the first place, and certainly not with a married man - the celebrated portrait artist, Stephen Wyley - but once it becomes apparent that she may have seen the face of the man dubbed 'the Tie-Pin Killer' she realises that another woman's life could be at stake.
Jimmy Erskine is the raffish doyen of theatre critics who fears that his star is fading. Age and drink are catching up with him and, in his late-night escapades with young men, he walks a tightrope that may snap at any moment. He has depended for years on his loyal and longsuffering secretary Tom, who has a secret of his own to protect. Tom's chance encounter with Madeleine Farewell, a lonely young woman haunted by premonitions of catastrophe, closes the circle - it was Madeleine who narrowly escaped the killer's stranglehold that afternoon and now she walks the streets in terror of him finding her again.
Curtain Call is a poignant comedy of manners, and a tragedy of mistaken intentions. From the glittering murk of Soho's demi-monde to the grease paint and ghost-lights of theatreland, the story plunges on through smoky clubrooms, street corners where thuggish Blackshirts linger and tawdry rooming houses.
Read by Nancy Carroll
Abridged, directed and produced by Jill Waters
A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4.
THU 23:00 Colin Hoult's Carnival of Monsters (b04ykk5x)
Series 2
Episode 3
Enter the Carnival of Monsters, a bizarre and hilarious world of sketches, stories and characters, presented by the sinister Ringmaster.
A host of characters are the exhibits at the Carnival - all played by Colin himself.
Meet such monstrous yet strangely familiar oddities as: Wannabe Hollywood screenwriter Andy Parker; Anna Mann - outrageous star of such forgotten silver screen hits such as 'Rogue Baker', 'Who's For Turkish Delight' and 'A Bowl For My Bottom'; and a host of other characters from acid jazz obsessives, to mask workshop coordinators.
Producer: Sam Bryant
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015.
THU 23:30 Today in Parliament (b04ykk5z)
Susan Hulme reports from Westminster.
FRIDAY 23 JANUARY 2015
FRI 00:00 Midnight News (b04y6vkf)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.
FRI 00:30 Book of the Week (b04ykk4p)
[Repeat of broadcast at
09:45 on Thursday]
FRI 00:48 Shipping Forecast (b04y6vkh)
The latest shipping forecast.
FRI 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (b04y6vkk)
BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service.
FRI 05:20 Shipping Forecast (b04y6vkm)
The latest shipping forecast.
FRI 05:30 News Briefing (b04y6vkp)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4.
FRI 05:43 Prayer for the Day (b04yywcl)
With Andrew Graystone.
FRI 05:45 Farming Today (b04ykkts)
Campylobacter trials
We go to a farm that's trialing ways of reducing the incidence of campylobacter in live chickens. This bacterium is the biggest cause of food poisoning in the UK. Several farms are stopping the process of 'thinning' - where half the birds are taken out of the sheds to sell, while the rest are left to fatten. Thinning is thought to increase the spread of infection.
And we hear from a researcher speaking at a conference on rural affairs, who says governments should get involved in increasing the amount of food we grow in urban areas.
FRI 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b04t0sry)
Snail Kite
Michael Palin presents the snail kite from the Florida Everglades. Unlike many birds of prey which are known for their speed and agility, the snail kite hunts at a leisurely pace, one which matches its prey; and here in Florida's swamps, it is on the lookout for the apple snail.
To pick them out of floating vegetation the kite has evolved long needle-like claws, and its slender, viciously - hooked bill is perfect for snipping the snails' muscles and winkling them out of their shells. Snail kites are common across wetlands in South and Central America, but rare in Florida where there are around one thousand birds. Drainage of these marshes has made them scarce, but popular with bird watchers.
It's easy to see why, because snail kites are striking birds with their orange feet and black and red bill. The males are ash-grey apart from a white band at the base of their tails. Females and young birds are browner and more mottled. In times of drought, they will eat turtles, crabs or rodents, but these avian gourmets always return to their favourite dish of, escargots.
FRI 06:00 Today (b04yjtjg)
Morning news and current affairs. Including Sports Desk, Yesterday in Parliament, Weather and Thought for the Day.
FRI 09:00 Desert Island Discs (b04y9nl6)
[Repeat of broadcast at
11:15 on Sunday]
FRI 09:45 Book of the Week (b04yjtjj)
Epilogue: A Memoir
Ambrosia
A thoughtful gesture breaks down barriers between Will and his new-found family.
Jamie Parker concludes Will Boast's moving account of loss and coming to terms with the past.
Abridged by Miranda Emmerson.
Producer: Gemma Jenkins
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2015.
FRI 10:00 Woman's Hour (b04yjts5)
Plus-Size Fashion; Lesbians on TV; the Real Tennis Sisters; Sarah Jane Morris
The UK's first plus-size fashion magazine was recently launched. Slink, is hoping to tap into a growing demand for publications that, in the words of its editor, realise "beauty and style doesn't stop at a size 8". Editor of Slink, Rivkie Baum, and weight management expert, Dr Orla Flannery from the University of Chester join Jenni to discuss whether there's been a growth in the acceptability of obesity, and whether it's any good for women? Should women be encouraged to lose weight not justify their obesity?
It's 16 years since Queer as Folk came to our screens, as a new drama focusing on gay life starts on Channel 4 tonight, we'll be asking where are the lesbians in British TV drama?
Real Tennis was played during age of Henry VIII, it's a combination of tennis as we know it now and squash. British sisters, Claire Fahey and Sarah Vigrass are regularly beating some of the top male players in the sport, they join Jenni.
Sarah Jane Morris makes music in many guises, she was the female voice in the communards in the 1980's, but she's also a jazz crooner and a blues singer. Her new album is dedicated to Africa and some of the songs address some uncomfortable social issues, from homophobia in Africa and child soldiers, to honour killings, but the music maintains a sense of vitality and energy. Sarah Jane came into the studio to perform a track from her new album.
FRI 10:45 15 Minute Drama (b04yjv7g)
The Corrections
Corrections
Dramatisation of Jonathan Franzen's darkly comic 2001 novel about the tribulations of a dysfunctional Midwestern family, starring Richard Schiff (The West Wing), Maggie Steed, Colin Stinton and Julian Rhind-Tutt. Dramatised by Marcy Kahan.
Episode 15: Corrections - When Alfred's condition worsens, Enid is forced to move him into the Deep Mire Residential Home - an event that coincides with life changes for all members of the Lambert family.
Directed by Emma Harding
The Corrections was awarded the National Book Award in 2001, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2002. It was included in TIME magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels since 1923.
Jonathan Franzen is the author of four novels (Freedom, The Corrections, Strong Motion, and The Twenty-Seventh City), two collections of essays (Farther Away, How to Be Alone), a personal history (The Discomfort Zone).
Marcy Kahan is a playwright and radio dramatist. Recent radio work includes two series of Lunch for BBC Radio 4 (starring Claire Skinner and Stephen Mangan) and Mr Bridger's Orphan. Theatre work includes 20 Cigarettes (Soho Theatre) and the stage version of When Harry Met Sally (Theatre Royal Haymarket).
FRI 11:00 Churchill's Grave (b04yjv7j)
Marking the 50th anniversary of Winston Churchill's death on 24th January, 1965, William Crawley travels to the wartime leader's final resting place in the Oxfordshire village of Bladon.
Tucked discreetly around the side of the small parish church of St Martin's, Churchill's understated grave contrasts utterly with the pomp and ceremony of the State Funeral at St Paul's Cathedral and procession through the capital held in his honour on the 30th of January 1965, six days after he'd died at the age of ninety.
Following the same journey taken by Churchill's coffin from London to this small village six miles north west of Oxford, William meets members of St Martin's Parish, Bladon residents, and the visitors who continue to make their own 'pilgrimage' to the graveside to pay their respects.
Along the way, he asks why Churchill chose Bladon, what impact this decision has had on the village, and explores the nature of commemoration as we mark 50 years since the passing of the Prime Minister still considered by many to be our greatest Briton.
Producer: Stan Ferguson.
FRI 11:30 Mark Steel's in Town (b03s76dh)
Series 5
Southall
Mark Steel returns to Radio 4 for a fifth series of the award winning show that travels around the country, researching the history, heritage and culture of six towns that have nothing in common but their uniqueness, and does a bespoke evening of comedy in each one.
As every high street slowly morphs into a replica of the next, Mark Steel's in Town celebrates the parochial, the local and the unusual. From Corby's rivalry with Kettering to the word you can't say in Portland, the show has taken in the idiosyncrasies of towns up and down the country, from Kirkwall to Penzance, from Holyhead to Bungay.
This edition comes from Southall in Middlesex, which is also known as "little India" due to the large Asian community there. Mark tried the local food - Jalebi, Paan, Pakora - that can seem alien to someone who grew up in 1960s Kent. The twin landmarks of Heathrow Airport and the Sikh temple dominate the area, with the latter proving more popular as Mark also discusses football, astrology and bank openings. From January 2014.
Written and performed by ... Mark Steel
Additional material by ... Pete Sinclair
Production co-ordinator ... Trudi Stevens
Producer ... Ed Morrish.
FRI 12:00 News Summary (b04y6vkt)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.
FRI 12:04 A History of Ideas (b04ykktv)
Giles Fraser on Wittgenstein and Blade Runner
Giles Fraser thinks being human isn't a matter of biology or some unique attribute like language. It's not to do with what we are but about how we treat each other. Taking the work of the philosopher Wittgenstein he argues that to be human is to be considered worthy of certain kinds of respect and moral compassion. For Giles, human is a moral category and it is an instruction to treat each other well.
FRI 12:15 You and Yours (b04yjvbw)
Rural Fuel Prices, Student Debt, Nursery Funding
Consumer news.
FRI 12:57 Weather (b04y6vkw)
The latest weather forecast.
FRI 13:00 World at One (b04yjvby)
Analysis of current affairs reports, presented by Mark Mardell.
FRI 13:45 Churchill's Other Lives (b0505wjd)
Education
Winston Churchill was revered by millions as the saviour of Britain in the Second World War, but he wasn't just a great war leader - he wrote millions of words of journalism, he painted, he built brick walls, he owned racehorses, he gambled in Monte Carlo casinos and even wrote screenplays. Yet his personality was mercurial; bouts of hyper-activity were interspersed with black days of depression. While he had a loving marriage, he spent long periods apart from his wife and children, some of whom caused him deep anxiety and distress.
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of his death, celebrated historian Sir David Cannadine, author of In Churchill's Shadow, examines the life and career of Winston Churchill by looking at ten different themes that are less well known, but which are crucial to a fuller understanding of one of the most extraordinary individuals ever to occupy No. 10 Downing Street.
He may have been one of the most visionary and impressive people who lived, but Churchill had a difficult time at school and a limited education. Today, Sir David Cannadine explores how Churchill's school days were rebellious and underachieving and how, after leaving Harrow, he applied three times to Sandhurst before passing the entrance exam. Being denied the benefit of an Oxbridge education left Churchill with complicated feelings of regret so, while serving as a young officer in India, he resolved to educate himself. The autodidact who never went to University later became the Chancellor of Bristol University and even had a Cambridge College named after him.
Producer: Melissa FitzGerald
A Blakeway production for BBC Radio 4.
FRI 14:00 The Archers (b04yjz69)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 on Thursday]
FRI 14:15 GF Newman's The Corrupted (b04ykktx)
Series 2
Episode 5
Crime drama based on the characters from the best selling novel by the multi-award winning writer, GF Newman. This second series runs from 1961 to 1970.
Spanning six decades, the saga plots the course of one family against the back-drop of a revolution in crime as the underworld extends its influence to the very heart of the establishment, in an uncomfortable relationship of shared values.
At the start of the 1960s, Joey Oldman acquires crafty Arnold Goodman as his solicitor, and buys shares in the civil engineering firm owned by the corrupt Minister of Transport, Ernest Marples.
Prospering with the help of venal bankers, and growing more devious, he and his wife Cath join Macmillan's Conservative Party. They strive without success to keep their son Brian free of the influence of Jack Braden (Cath's brother) as he takes their 'firm' from running illicit clubs, where they entertain politicians and judges, to armed robbery. All the while, Jack and Brian struggle to keep free of the police and further entanglements with the law, the Kray twins and the Richardsons.
Episode 5:
An elite band of policemen is formed to tackle the criminal 'firms' and corrupt police officers.
Written by GF Newman
Produced and Directed by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4.
FRI 15:00 Gardeners' Question Time (b04yjzvy)
Arundel Castle
Eric Robson chairs the programme from Arundel Castle, West Sussex. Taking questions in the Barons' Hall are Matt Biggs, Bob Flowerdew and Anne Swithinbank.
Anne takes a tour of The Collector Earl's Garden with Arundel's Head Gardener Martin Duncan while Eric has a look around the castle built to last for a thousand years...
Produced by Howard Shannon.
Assistant Producer: Hannah Newton
A Somethin' Else Production for BBC Radio 4.
FRI 15:45 Irish International (b04yk00p)
An Irishman's Guide to Paris by Robert McLiam Wilson
Three original stories from current, cutting edge Irish writers, Nick Laird, Philip Ó Ceallaigh and Robert McLiam Wilson, who have chosen to leave Ireland and make their homes in New York, Bucharest and Paris who each give their own unique take on being an Irishman living and writing abroad.
Writer ... Robert McLiam Wilson
Reader ..... Michael Smiley
Producer ..... Jenny Thompson.
FRI 16:00 Last Word (b04yk0jc)
Lord Brittan, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, Professor John Bayley, Anne Kirkbride
Matthew Bannister on
The former Tory Home Secretary Lord Brittan. As Leon Brittan, he also served as Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and as a European Commissioner.
Also: King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. He was the thirteenth of at least forty-five sons of the founder of modern Saudi Arabia and seen as a cautious reformer.
John Bayley, the eccentric Oxford don whose memoir of his life with the novelist Iris Murdoch was made into a film.
And Anne Kirkbride the actress who played Deirdre in Coronation Street for more than forty years.
FRI 16:30 More or Less (b04yk0jf)
Is Anti-Semitism Widespread in the UK?
Are 95% of hate crimes in the UK directed against Jewish people? Tim Harford and Ruth Alexander fact-check an unlikely statistic. Meanwhile the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism (CAA) says surveys show that almost half of adults believe at least one anti-Semitic statement shown them to be true and that half of British Jews believe Jews may have no long-term future in the UK. But how robust are these findings? More or Less speaks to Gideon Falter, chairman of the CAA and Jonathan Boyd, executive director of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research.
Who is in the global 1% of wealthiest people, and where do they live?
More than 200 of the MPS voting on the 2012 NHS reform have recent or current financial connections to private healthcare, a recent editorial in the British Medical Journal claimed. Richard Vadon and Keith Moore explain why it's not true.
Sixty bodies in 6 years - is a serial killer stalking the canals of Great Manchester? Hannah Moore investigates a theory first raised by the Star on Sunday's crime editor Scott Hesketh.
Plus the programme hears from Professor Carlos Vilalta from the University of California San Diego and Steven Dudley from Insight Crime about claims that "98% of homicides in Mexico are unsolved." A shocking statistic, but is it true?
Presenter: Tim Harford
Producer: Ruth Alexander.
FRI 16:55 The Listening Project (b04yk0jh)
Rab and Margaret - Clearing My Name
Fi Glover introduces a conversation between a husband and wife about the six year fight to clear Rab's name after the psychiatric nurse was wrongly blamed for an incident at work.
The Listening Project is a Radio 4 initiative that offers a snapshot of contemporary Britain in which people across the UK volunteer to have a conversation with someone close to them about a subject they've never discussed intimately before. The conversations are being gathered across the UK by teams of producers from local and national radio stations who facilitate each encounter. Every conversation - they're not BBC interviews, and that's an important difference - lasts up to an hour, and is then edited to extract the key moment of connection between the participants. Most of the unedited conversations are being archived by the British Library and used to build up a collection of voices capturing a unique portrait of the UK in the second decade of the millennium. You can learn more about The Listening Project by visiting bbc.co.uk/listeningproject
Producer: Marya Burgess.
FRI 17:00 PM (b04yk0l7)
PM at
5pm- Carolyn Quinn with interviews, context and analysis.
FRI 18:00 Six O'Clock News (b04y6vky)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.
FRI 18:30 The Now Show (b04yk373)
Series 45
Episode 3
Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis present the week's news via topical stand-up and sketches featuring guests Marcus Brigstocke and Nish Kumar.
FRI 19:00 The Archers (b04yk375)
Jill has suggested to Bert that he partners Carol for the Valentine's Dance. David raises an eyebrow, but Jill assures him Bert's a perfect gentleman. Jill is exasperated when she asks David to sort out some of his stuff from the attic so it can be given to the jumble sale. He makes a hasty exit.
When Lynda raises the same topic, David is curt. Lynda supposes she shouldn't be surprised; David will soon be taking his money and running. An argument ensues. When Jill walks in, David snaps that she can get rid of all his old stuff. He doesn't want it.
Kate cajoles Phoebe into going to the pub.
Lynda is shocked at the squalor when she calls at Roy's. He insists he's fine. He's going out with Tom tonight.
At the Bull, Tom desperately tries to cheer Roy up. He is making some headway when Kate walks in. Kate is loud and embarrassing. Phoebe feels even worse when she sees her dad there too.
Roy can't believe it. He stops listening to Tom. All he can hear is Kate making a fool of herself. Caught between her two difficult parents, Phoebe squirms.
Tom reassures Roy, pointing out that Phoebe is unimpressed with her mum too. He persuades Roy to turn the other cheek. But Roy can't stay. He thanks Tom for the drink and makes his excuses.
FRI 19:15 Front Row (b04yk377)
Jessica Chastain, Ali Smith, Bob Copper at 100, the Art of the Self-Portrait
Jessica Chastain on her new film A Most Violent Year, the lack of diversity in Hollywood, and how she feels about missing out on an Oscar nomination this time.
Ahead of his centenary celebrations this weekend, the late British folk legend Bob Copper is remembered by singer Shirley Collins, Bob's grandson Ben Copper, and Jon Boden, singer and fiddle player with multi-award-winning innovative folk big band Bellowhead.
Art critic Richard Cork reviews Self: Image and Identity - Self-portraiture from Van Dyck to Louise Bourgeois at Turner Contemporary in Margate.
Ali Smith won this year's Costa Novel Award for How to be Both, a novel in two parts which can be read in either order. She tells John about the real painting that inspired the book.
Presenter: John Wilson
Producer: Ellie Bury.
FRI 19:45 15 Minute Drama (b04yjv7g)
[Repeat of broadcast at
10:45 today]
FRI 20:00 Any Questions? (b04yk3w1)
Bea Campbell, Peter Hain MP, Owen Paterson MP, Steve Webb MP
Jonathan Dimbleby presents political debate and discussion from Keynsham in Somerset with the writer Bea Campbell, former Welsh Secretary, Peter Hain MP, former Secretary of State for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Owen Paterson MP, and Pensions Minister Steve Webb MP.
FRI 20:50 A Point of View (b04yk3w3)
The Power of Art
AL Kennedy reflects on the importance of the beauty and creativity of art to sustain the human spirit.
"Art is a power and most of its true power is invisible, private, memorised and held even in prison cells and on forced marches, so you can see why totalitarians of all kinds dislike it."
Producer: Sheila Cook
Editor: Richard Knight.
FRI 21:00 A History of Ideas (b04yk3w5)
Omnibus
What Makes Us Human?
A new history of ideas presented by Melvyn Bragg but told in many voices.
Melvyn is joined by four guests with different backgrounds to discuss a really big question. This week he's asking What makes us human?
Helping him answer it are Philosopher Barry Smith, Classicist Catherine Edwards, historian Simon Schaffer and theologian Giles Fraser.
For the rest of the week Barry, Catharine, Simon and Giles will take us further into the history of ideas about what makes us human. With programmes of their own they will examine the evolution of language, the Stoic philosopher Seneca, the classification of all living species and the film Bladerunner.
This omnibus edition has all five programmes together.
FRI 21:58 Weather (b04y6vl0)
The latest weather forecast.
FRI 22:00 The World Tonight (b04yk3z5)
Greece - the world gathers.
Paul Moss is in Greece ahead of Sunday's General Election, as radical socialists and anti-austerity activists from around the globe gather, hoping for a Syriza win.
FRI 22:45 Book at Bedtime (b04yk3z7)
Curtain Call
Episode 10
On a sultry afternoon in the summer of 1936, a woman accidentally interrupts an attempted murder in a London hotel room. Nina Land, a West End actress, faces a dilemma. She's not supposed to be at the hotel in the first place, and certainly not with a married man - the celebrated portrait artist, Stephen Wyley - but once it becomes apparent that she may have seen the face of the man dubbed 'the Tie-Pin Killer' she realises that another woman's life could be at stake.
Jimmy Erskine is the raffish doyen of theatre critics who fears that his star is fading. Age and drink are catching up with him and, in his late-night escapades with young men, he walks a tightrope that may snap at any moment. He has depended for years on his loyal and longsuffering secretary Tom, who has a secret of his own to protect. Tom's chance encounter with Madeleine Farewell, a lonely young woman haunted by premonitions of catastrophe, closes the circle - it was Madeleine who narrowly escaped the killer's stranglehold that afternoon and now she walks the streets in terror of him finding her again.
Curtain Call is a poignant comedy of manners, and a tragedy of mistaken intentions. From the glittering murk of Soho's demi-monde to the grease paint and ghost-lights of theatreland, the story plunges on through smoky clubrooms, street corners where thuggish Blackshirts linger and tawdry rooming houses.
Read by Nancy Carroll
Abridged, directed and produced by Jill Waters
A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4.
FRI 23:00 Great Lives (b04yk47g)
[Repeat of broadcast at
16:30 on Tuesday]
FRI 23:30 Today in Parliament (b04yk4b0)
Mark D'Arcy reports from Westminster.
FRI 23:55 The Listening Project (b04yk4b2)
Alex and Rolf - Sing Our Own Song
Fi Glover introduces a conversation about musical roots, getting used to success, and the allure of writing your own songs rather than covering someone else's.
The Listening Project is a Radio 4 initiative that offers a snapshot of contemporary Britain in which people across the UK volunteer to have a conversation with someone close to them about a subject they've never discussed intimately before. The conversations are being gathered across the UK by teams of producers from local and national radio stations who facilitate each encounter. Every conversation - they're not BBC interviews, and that's an important difference - lasts up to an hour, and is then edited to extract the key moment of connection between the participants. Most of the unedited conversations are being archived by the British Library and used to build up a collection of voices capturing a unique portrait of the UK in the second decade of the millennium. You can learn more about The Listening Project by visiting bbc.co.uk/listeningproject
Producer: Marya Burgess.