SATURDAY 05 JUNE 2021

SAT 00:00 Midnight News (m000wly2)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


SAT 00:30 Natives: Race & Class in the Ruins of Empire by Akala (m000wlxk)
Episode 5

From the first time he was stopped and searched as a child to his first encounters with racist teachers, race and class have shaped Akala's life and outlook. In Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire he charts his own personal story alongside the social, historical and political factors that have shaped the world we live in today.

Kingslee Daley, better known by his stage name Akala, is a British rapper, author, and activist. In 2006, he was voted the Best Hip Hop Act at the MOBO Awards. He is the founder of the The Hip Hop Shakespeare Company and has recently published a novel called The Dark Lady, which features a 15-year-old orphan on the streets of Elizabethan London.

Written and read by Akala
Abridged by Jill Waters and Isobel Creed
Produced by Jill Waters
A Waters Company production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wly4)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


SAT 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wly6)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


SAT 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wly8)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


SAT 05:30 News Briefing (m000wlyb)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


SAT 05:43 Prayer for the Day (m000wlyd)
A reflection and prayer to start the day with Rev Cheryl Meban


Good morning.

On this day in 1981, the US Center for Disease Control reported on pneumonia affecting 5 homosexual men in Los Angeles. It is from this date that the AIDS epidemic is officially measured.

The virus was isolated at the Pasteur institute in Paris in 1983. Then an American-discovered virus was given a different name, though it turned out to be the same. There was wrangling over what it should be called until both names were replaced by HIV, Human Immunodeficiency Virus.

Naming is a powerful thing. One early name for AIDS was, Gay-Related Immunodeficiency syndrome. This effectively stigmatised its sufferers, implying causation or judgment, and made no room for complex lives or other causes of infection. Throughout the eighties one big debate was whether AIDS was “God’s judgment on gays.” A teenage contemporary of mine, as sexuality developed, would feel cosmically judged for sexual attraction beyond their control. The naming of, Human Immunodeficiency Virus, and the embodied and relational interactions of ordinary compassionate people - brought sufferers back, verbally and visibly, to human inclusion. But the economic divide between Global north and South still leaves vast swathes of the human race unable to access the lifesaving treatments UK citizens can take for granted.

God teach us to see and name each other first as human. Inspire and equip us -researchers, politicians and business-people - to support life and change how we do relationships (so no one feels inferior or excluded) and economics, so that all who need healthcare and treatment may have life, and have it to the full, as you promised us in Christ. Amen


SAT 05:45 Bodies (m000rnl9)
Episode 10: Visible and Invisible - where the body ends

The human body is the battleground where our most fundamental ideas about the way the world is come into sharp focus.

When we think and talk about the body, we are suddenly very aware of that pattern of thinking which frames concepts in opposition, divides the world up between dark and light, material and immaterial, technology and humanity, invisible and visible, mind and body, body and soul.

In this ten part series, academic and broadcaster Professor Alice Roberts traces how human knowledge of anatomy has grown and changed over time, and how this changing understanding has in turn affected our understanding of who we are.

Episode 10: Visible and Invisible - where the body ends

Professor Alice Roberts ends her journey through the history of anatomy. From pre-history until the 20th century, the story was broadly the transformation of a conception of the body as a mysterious black box into the body as a machine. But now we seem on the cusp of a new era – with technology profoundly changing the ways we view our bodies both metaphorically and practically.

Presenter: Professor Alice Roberts
Actor: Jonathan Kydd

A Made in Manchester production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 06:00 News and Papers (m000wrs9)
The latest news headlines. Including the weather and a look at the papers.


SAT 06:07 Ramblings (m000wlnh)
Mallerstang in Cumbria with Debbie North.

Debbie North uses a motorised wheelchair and is a powerful advocate for making the countryside accessible for all. Debbie had always been a keen walker but, in her 40s, was diagnosed with spinal degeneration. Very quickly she became a wheelchair user yet made the decision that this wasn’t going to stop her accessing the countryside that she loves. Today she takes Clare on one of her favourite rambles in Mallerstang. It starts at The Thrang, south of Outhgill. Although officially at the eastern edge of Cumbria, the walk is in the Yorkshire Dales National Park. Their destination is the 'Water Cut' stone sculpture which overlooks some of the area's most beautiful and expansive scenery.

Grid Ref for start of walk: NY783004

OS Map: OL19 Howgill Fells and Upper Eden Valley

Producer: Karen Gregor


SAT 06:30 Farming Today (m000wrsc)
05/06/21 - Farming Today This Week: Carbon tax, HS2 Ltd, a green recovery and rural tourism

Over the last few weeks, there’s been heated debate about the Government's attempts to sign a free trade deal with Australia, and it’s showing no signs of going away. Farmers are concerned that giving Australian agricultural produce tariff-free access to the UK market could lead to them being out-competed by cheaper imports and that it would set the precedent for other trade deals. But the Environment Secretary, George Eustice, said this week that a carbon tax on imported meat could stop British farmers being undercut on environmental standards. So how would such a system work?

HS2 was “dishonest, misleading and inconsistent” when negotiating compensation with a farmer who had to move to make way for the new high-speed rail line. That's according to the Parliamentary Ombudsman, which has just published its findings into complaints made by a family from a village near Lichfield, in Staffordshire. The building of the high-speed rail link between London, Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds has meant more than 900 properties worth nearly six hundred million pounds have been bought up to release land for the new routes.

The Wildlife Trusts are calling on government and local authorities to invest in nature to help rebuild after the pandemic. Their ‘Wilder Recovery’ Report says increased spending on nature and the environment would lead to new jobs, a growing economy and a healthier, happier population. Caz Graham visits a initiative in Morecambe called ‘The Bay - A Blueprint for Recovery’, which aims to tackle mental health problems, exacerbated by Covid, by encouraging greater connection with nature, with social prescribing by GPs and mental health teams.

Presented by Caz Graham
Produced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Heather Simons


SAT 06:57 Weather (m000wrsf)
The latest weather reports and forecast


SAT 07:00 Today (m000wrsh)
Including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.


SAT 09:00 Saturday Live (m000wrsk)
Big Zuu

Radio 4's Saturday morning show brings you extraordinary stories and remarkable people.


SAT 10:30 You're Dead To Me (p07pj5m9)
Joan of Arc

Delusion or divine intervention? Learn about Joan of Arc’s super sewing skills, her badass credentials, and the story of why it took nearly half a century for her to become a saint. If you think it’s tough being a woman now, find out what it was like in 1400s France.

Joining historian Greg Jenner to learn about Joan are comedian Catherine Bohart of The Mash Report, and Dr Helen Castor, medieval historian and author of The Women Who Ruled England Before Elizabeth.

Script: Greg Jenner
Research: Emma Nagouse
Producer: Dan Morelle

A Muddy Knees production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 11:00 School for Communists (m000wrsn)
A witty and surprising personal view of communism from Alexei Sayle, whose parents were Communists and took him on holidays to the Eastern bloc during the Cold War. Alexei soon rejected their brand of left wing politics - and became a Maoist. He says, "I'm a Marxist-Leninist survivor!"

Alexei meets children's author Michael Rosen, and shares memories of growing up in Jewish Communist homes.

He also meets Tom Bell, a former member of the London Recruits, who was sent to apartheid South Africa to work for the ANC and the South African Communist Party. While Nelson Mandela and others were jailed, Tom and others worked under cover, risking arrest and death.

The current General Secretary of the Young Communist League, Johnny Hunter, explains why they have returned to the Hammer and Sickle, love pictures of Che Guevara and want the destruction of capitalism.

The Young Communist League is a democratic organisation for people under 30, founded in 1921 as the youth wing of the Communist Party of Great Britain. They describe themselves as "Britain's biggest organisation of revolutionary young people - fighting for a society that provides for workers and young people, not big business". They want a revolutionary transformation of society - an end to poverty, unemployment, destruction of the environment, exploitation and division, including oppression based on gender, race and sexual orientation.

In the 1930s, many League members volunteered to join the International Brigades and fight for the Spanish Republic against Franco.

In the 1960s, the YCL helped establish the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and organised medical aid and hundreds of bicycles to support Vietnam against the United States.

A Perfectly Normal production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 11:30 From Our Own Correspondent (m000wrsq)
Insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents, journalists and writers from around the world


SAT 12:00 News Summary (m000wrss)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


SAT 12:04 Money Box (m000wrsv)
DWP urged to rethink the two child Universal Credit cap

Children’s Commissioner for Wales Professor Sally Holland explains why she, along with the Commissioners for Scotland and Northern Ireland, want the DWP to drop a Universal Credit entitlement rule introduced by the coalition government in 2017. It only provides support for a maximum of two children with a few specific exceptions.

Money Box reporter Joice Etutu hears from some of the thousands of people who have received random cheques from HSBC Banking Group. Amounts vary from tens to thousands of pounds. They’re still also being sent out to the group’s M&S Bank, first direct and John Lewis Finance customers who had arrears on loans between 2010 and 2019. Many thought it was a scam, but it’s not.

EU citizens who want to continue living in the UK are in danger of missing a crucial deadline which could see them lose access to benefits and the right to work. June the 30th is the last date to apply for the EU settlement scheme which allows people to retain their legal status post Brexit. However there’s concern many won’t realise they have to do it. Guest: Kate Smart, Chief Executive of the charity Settled.

The ban on bailiff-enforced evictions in England was an emergency measure to protect renters in arrears related to the pandemic. It ended this week so where does that leave renters who are still having money problems and what other changes might be on the way for them - and their landlords? Meera Chindooroy, Deputy Director of Campaigns, Public Affairs & Policy for the National Residential Landords Association and Chris Wood Assistant Director of Policy at Shelter discuss.

Presenter: Paul Lewis
Reporter: Joice Etutu
Researcher: Stefania Okereke
Producer: Charmaine Cozier
Editor: Alex Lewis


SAT 12:30 The News Quiz (m000wm56)
Series 105

Episode 8

Andy Zaltzman presents a look back at the week's headlines with guests Andrew Maxwell, Kiri Pritchard-McLean, Alex Massie and Ria Lina.

It's the last episode in the series and Andy FINALLY becomes the first News Quiz host to present the programme from the BBC Test Match Special commentary box at Lords.

Written by Andy Zaltzman with additional material from Alice Fraser, Max Davis and Tasha Dhanraj.

Producer: Richard Morris
Production Coordinator: Cherlynn Andrew-Wilfred
Sound Editor: Marc Willcox

A BBC Studios Production


SAT 12:57 Weather (m000wrsx)
The latest weather forecast


SAT 13:00 News and Weather (m000wrsz)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4


SAT 13:10 Any Questions? (m000wlxt)
James Graham, Rachel Maclean MP, Luke Pollard MP, Ann Widdecombe

Chris Mason presents political debate and discussion from the Landmark Theatre in Ilfracombe with the playwright James Graham, Minister for the Future of Transport and Decarbonisation Rachel Maclean MP, Shadow Environment Secretary Luke Pollard MP and former politician and author Ann Widdecombe.
Producer: Camellia Sinclair
Lead broadcast engineer: Tim Allen


SAT 14:00 Any Answers? (m000wrt1)
Have your say on the issues discussed on Any Questions?


SAT 14:45 One to One (m000v7pd)
OCD: Tuppence Middleton talks to Rose Cartwright

Actress Tuppence Middleton has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). It's not something she's really talked about before, except with a therapist. That is, until now. In this series, she's on a mission to find out more about the disorder - and herself - and to bust some myths along the way.

Today, she talks to screenwriter and author Rose Cartwright, who wrote her memoir 'Pure' after a ten-year struggle with 'Pure O'. What is Pure O? Why are the intrusive thoughts that come with it often violent or sexual? And why do so many people with Pure O suffer in silence?

Photo credit: Robert Harper. Producer: Becky Ripley.


SAT 15:00 Drama (m000wrt3)
The Last of England

A darkly comic drama by BAFTA award-winning dramatist Neil McKay, with a title inspired by Ford Madox Brown’s painting. Three 60-something friends argue passionately over the course of a ferry journey from Portsmouth to Santander, returning to their expat life in Spain after attending the UK funeral of their friend Ken, who went home for a visit and would never come back.

Hywel, a loquacious Welshman, Irishman Jim from Lurgan and pugnacious ex-MP Malcolm from Glasgow are unlikely allies (and enforced drinking pals) in the small Spanish town they now call home. Fuelled by some indifferent Rioja and cheap Spanish brandy, through the course of a night they try - and fail - to come to terms with life, death, truth and Brexit.

Also on the ferry are Ken’s daughter Gemma and her partner Rashid, carrying the ashes of Ken, to scatter beneath an almond tree in his favourite spot near the village. But Gemma is furious with her father for abandoning his English family and falling for a bartender more than half his age. She’s furious with her father’s so-called friends for encouraging him. And she’s quite cross with Rashid.

As the ferry heads for Spain and the sea gets rougher, secrets and motivations are revealed, showing nothing is quite as anyone believed and nobody is quite what they seem. Is home where you live, or where your heart is?

Neil McKay - The Moorside, Appropriate Adult, Mo, See No Evil, The Hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper - is one of our foremost television dramatists, specialising in factually-based drama. He has written many comic pieces including: Hot Money, about female Bank of England employees who robbed the bank of disused notes; Planespotting about British plane-spotters arrested for spying in Greece, starring Lesley Sharp; and, most recently, feature film Dream Horse for Film4/ Warner Bros about a female cleaner in a South Wales village who bred a champion racehorse - starring Toni Collette and Damian Lewis.

Cast
Hywel – Anthony O’Donnell
Malcolm – Gary Lewis
Jim – Dan Gordon
Rashid – George Bukhari
Gemma – Faye McKeever

Writer – Neil McKay
Director – Melanie Harris
Executive Producer – Jeremy Mortimer
Production Co-ordinator - Darren Spruce
Sound Recordist - Louis Blatherwick
Sound Designer – Eloise Whitmore

A Sparklab production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 16:00 Woman's Hour (m000wrt5)
Weekend Woman's Hour: Author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Composer Arooj Aftab, Reclaiming sexist language

How possible is it to actually earn a living from sport? The latest BBC Elite British Sportswomen’s Survey found that four out of five elite British sportswomen feel they are not paid enough compared to their male counterparts and more than 60% of UK’s top female athletes make less than £10,000 a year. On the other hand revenue generated by women's sport in the UK is set to grow to £1bn a year by 2030 – up from £350m a year currently – making it one of the fastest growing sectors in the sports industry. The Women’s Sports Trust says the key to unlocking this impressive growth will be the increased visibility of female athletes and teams. Emily Defroand is a Great Britain and England Hockey player, Zarah El-Kudcy is a Trustee at the Women’s Sports Trust and the Head of Commercial partnership development at Formula 1, and Dr Ali Bowes is a senior lecturer in the Sociology of Sport at Nottingham Trent University.

Lord Michael Heseltine, who was Deputy Prime Minister in the mid-nineties, says he's had to attend a House of Lords course to do with what's right and what's wrong when it comes to conduct between colleagues, especially between men and women. The training is called "Valuing Everyone". The House of Lords has been very firm about this online course on inappropriate behaviour and prejudice, saying all peers must attend. Lord Heseltine was sent a reminder that he MUST complete it, which seems to have aggravated him a great deal. He’s here, and so is Wera Hobhouse, Lib Dem MP. In the House of Commons, the course isn't mandatory for MPs.

Language – and the way we use it – is forever changing. We explore how the word ‘bitch’ and other similar words with a sexist history are being reclaimed and reinvented by women to mean something positive. Chante Joseph is a social media creative and writer. Jacqueline Springer is a Black music and culture journalist. Helen Taylor is an Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Exeter.

Why, after decades of social progress is motherhood still so much harder than it needs to be? Why aren't we honest about the realities of being a mother? These are just two of the themes explored in a trio of books about motherhood that have just been published. It's not as if these questions haven't been asked before. There is a rich vein of literature from Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex through to Adrienne Rich's classic study Of Woman Born, Juliet Mitchell's A Women's Estate , Jane Lazarre's The Mother Knot and many more. And many second wave feminists fought hard for the rights of mothers on both sides of the Atlantic. And yet very little, if any progress, has been made according to this new crop of authors. Elaine Glaser is the author of Motherhood: A Manifesto, Pragya Agarwal is the author of (M)otherhood: On the Choices of Being a Woman, and Marina Fogle co-presents the podcast 'As Good As It Gets?'

Arooj Aftab is a Pakistani composer, based in Brooklyn. She joins Anita to talk about her music and influences from jazz and Qawwali to Jeff Buckley and Abidi Parveen. She explains how grief has shifted the tone of her music to ‘heavy metal harp’, and discusses her latest album, Vulture Prince, which honours and reimagines centuries-old ghazals, a form of South Asian poetry and music that she grew up listening to with her family.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is the author of novels including 'Purple Hibiscus', 'Half of a Yellow Sun', which won the Orange Prize (now called the Women’s Prize for Fiction), and 'Americanah', which won the US National Book Critics Circle Award. Chimamanda has also delivered two landmark TED Talks: The Danger of A Single Story, and We Should All Be Feminists, which started a worldwide conversation about feminism and was published as a book in 2014. She has now written a more personal book. On 10 June 2020 her father died suddenly in Nigeria. A self-confessed daddy’s girl, she has now remembered her father in a tribute, 'Notes on Grief'. Her mother has since also died. How do you deal with double heartbreak?


SAT 17:00 PM (m000wrt7)
Full coverage of the day's news


SAT 17:30 Political Thinking with Nick Robinson (m000wrt9)
Nick Robinson talks to the Shadow Business Secretary and former Labour leader, Ed Miliband, in a personal and political interview.


SAT 17:54 Shipping Forecast (m000wrtc)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


SAT 17:57 Weather (m000wrtf)
The latest weather reports and forecast


SAT 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wrth)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4


SAT 18:15 Loose Ends (m000wrm2)
Stephanie Cole, Larry Lamb, Peter Wohlleben, Dawn Walton, Sons of Kemet, Sam Wills, Anneka Rice, Clive Anderson

Clive Anderson and Anneka Rice are joined by Stephanie Cole, Larry Lamb, Peter Wohlleben and Dawn Walton for an eclectic mix of conversation, music and comedy. With music from Sons of Kemet and Sam Wills.


SAT 19:00 Profile (m000wrtl)
An insight into the character of an influential person making the news headlines


SAT 19:15 Women Talking About Cars (b092r4rs)
Series 2

Sheila Hancock

The first in the new series of the off-beat light-hearted interview show. Victoria Coren Mitchell meets actress and writer Sheila Hancock for a programme that uses the cars Sheila has known to take us on a trip through her remarkable life from the first stirrings of her theatrical ambitions through to the day John Thaw fell for her and why the number of seats in a Morgan sports car is important, and thence to the enduring lure of a Jaguar and how the trick of getting older is actually to speed up...
With contributions from our studio audience and tongue in cheek readings from Morwenna Banks.
Produced by Gareth Edwards

A BBC Studios Comedy Production.


SAT 19:45 Just One Thing - with Michael Mosley (m000wjdt)
Hot Bath

In this episode, Michael takes a long soak in the bath, and explores why it might be good for our heart, metabolism and sleep. He speaks to one of the UK’s leading sleep experts, Professor Jason Ellis, Director of the Northumbria Sleep Centre, to find out why a hot bath a couple of hours before bed can help us get to sleep. They discuss the interplay of responses in your brain and body that work together to get your body ready for rest - and why a hot bath one to two hours before bed can help kick start the process… Crucially, it is not the warm, relaxing bath that’s important, but what happens afterwards.


SAT 20:00 Archive on 4 (m000wrtn)
Covering Edward Said: 40 years of Islam, Media and the West

In 1981, the Jerusalem-born intellectual Edward Said published a book that examined how ideas of Islam are disseminated in the western news media by commentators and experts. It was called Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World.

Forty years on, columnist and author Nesrine Malik examines how Said's ideas - and the responses to them - stack up. Through his blistering public lectures and interviews, we hear not only Said’s irrepressible erudition and his humour but the prescience of Said’s ideas today - ones that speak to questions of identity and coexistence.

Covering Islam emerged from Said’s observations of the western media’s coverage of the Iranian Revolution in 1979. Reflecting later, Said said the media's 'arsenal of images' created an impression of "the utmost negative sort of evil emanation...as if the main business of Muslims was to threaten and try to kill Americans.” When he came to update Covering Islam 17 years later, after the Gulf War, Said believed the situation to be even worse.

Nesrine Malik explores how Said’s scholarship and public intellectualism sought to dismantle the idea of a “clash of civilisations” between ‘The West’ and ‘Islam’ through the 80s and 90s to his death in 2003 - and how these tropes have played out and twisted since. Nesrine also considers what Said’s ideas might offer us now, and how he might have dealt with social media and its dissemination of his ideas.

With contributions from Timothy Brennan, the author of the biography Places of Mind, a Life of Edward Said; D D Guttenplan, the editor of The Nation Magazine; Rizwana Hamid, the Director of the Muslim Council of Britain's Centre for Media Monitoring; and Asad Haider, on of the founding editors of Viewpoint magazine and the author of Mistaken Identity.

Producer: Katherine Godfrey
Assistant Producer: Dahaba Ali-Hussen
Mixing Editor: Sami El-Enany
Executive Producer: Steven Rajam

An Overcoat Media production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 21:00 Pilgrim by Sebastian Baczkiewicz (b071sn29)
Series 7

Clennan Court

By Sebastian Baczkiewicz

William Palmer has been betrayed by evil magician Morgan Hambleton. He promised to track him down but so far has done nothing, much to the anger of the King of the Greyfolk

Pilgrim ..... Paul Hilton
Laura ..... Adie Allen
Coral ..... Cassie Layton
Delancey ..... David Schofield
Frances ..... Nicola Ferguson
Mrs. Greeves ..... Susan Jameson

Directed by Marc Beeby


SAT 21:45 The Hotel (m000mrcd)
1: The Hotel

Daisy Johnson's deliciously unsettling series of ghost stories, set in a remote hotel on the Fens. Readers in the series include Maxine Peake, Nicola Walker and Juliet Stevenson.

Today: Sara Kestleman kicks off the series with a story of rumour, myth and secrets about The Hotel. Why are only some people haunted by The Hotel? Why do they return again and again? And why are they all women?

Writer: Daisy Johnson is a British novelist and short story writer. Her debut novel, Everything Under, was shortlisted for the 2018 Man Booker Prize, making her the youngest nominee in the prize's history.
Reader: Sara Kestelman
Producer: Justine Willett


SAT 22:00 News (m000wrtq)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4


SAT 22:15 Moral Maze (m000wjly)
Happiness

Philosophers and artists, from Epicurus to Ken Dodd, have grappled with the secret to happiness. Now, neuroscientists at University College London suggest the answer could lie in the equation: (t)=w0 +w1∑j=1tγt −jCRj +w2∑j=1tγt −jEVj +w3∑j=1tγt −jRPEj. While hardly rolling off the tongue, the formula roughly translates to mean that we should lower our expectations to be happy – but not so low, and for so long, that it makes us unhappy. This appears to fly in the face of a celebrity culture that chases fame, status and success as ends in themselves. Self-help books and "positive psychology" promise to train us into a happy mood. While the wellness industry is booming, so is the prescription of antidepressants, increasingly for teenagers – according to The National Institute for Health Research. What does this reveal about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? What is wrong with personal happiness as a life goal? Some think that there is too much stuffiness about happiness, that there is nothing selfish about self-care, and that people should be free to set the bar as high as they wish and explore personal fulfilment however they chose. Others believe that life should be about more than seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, that the conscious pursuit of happiness can make us more miserable, and that happiness – rather than being an expectation – should be a by-product of a life well-lived. How useful or desirable is it to measure happiness, particularly when it comes to the wellbeing of a nation? As some economists have observed, beyond a certain point, GDP no longer captures the nuances of citizens’ happiness. Is it time to consider Gross Domestic Happiness? Or is there something dystopian about a government defining what happiness means, since our moods are fleeting and we all have own definition of a happy life? With Dr Andy Cope, Dr William Davies, Dr Ashley Frawley and Sir Anthony Seldon.

Producer: Dan Tierney.


SAT 23:00 The 3rd Degree (m000wl3t)
Series 11

The University of Southampton

A funny, lively and dynamic quiz presented by Steve Punt and recorded on location at a different university each week, pitting three undergraduates against three of their professors. This week the show comes from the University of Southampton.

The rounds vary between specialist subjects and general knowledge, quickfire bell-and-buzzer rounds and the Highbrow and Lowbrow round cunningly devised to test not only the students’ knowledge of current affairs, history, languages and science, but also their Professors’ awareness of television, sport, and quite possibly Ed Sheeran. And the Head-to-Head rounds, in which students take on their Professors in their own subjects, offer plenty of scope for mild embarrassment on both sides.

The specialist subjects this week are Biological Sciences, Fashion Design and Film Studies and the questions range from Harry Styles to dinosaur hips via Bullet Time and British Home Stores.

The other universities in this series are Cumbria, Nottingham Trent, Northampton, Anglia Ruskin and Brasenose College Oxford.

Producer: David Tyler
A Pozzitive production for BBC Radio 4


SAT 23:30 On Form (m000wjfc)
The Ghazal

In this series, free verse poet Andrew McMillan meets a diverse group of contemporary British poets who are reframing traditional techniques to write about the modern world, exploring why form is fashionable again.
For hundreds of years, writers have experimented with the ghazal – one of the oldest and most popular verse forms in the world. First written in pre-Islamic Arabia, the ghazal spread to Africa and Spain where it was often used as a form of lyrical across-cultural dialogue. It has been central to Persian writing since the 13th century, then became a mainstay of traditional verse throughout the Indian Sub-Continent, and is now appearing in contemporary English language poetry.

In today’s programme, poet and academic Aviva Dautch who translates ghazals as well as writing her own, takes us around the world to unpick the music and meaning of the form and explores its use in political and religious dialogue. She considers the elements of the ghazal, from its traditional rhymes and refrain to the register of tone and images with which it is often associated.

We meet Syima Aslam, director of Bradford Literature Festival, who tells us about the importance of the ghazal to her community. Our Guest poet, award winning poet writer Mona Arshi describes how her experimental English ghazals draw on the Indian and Spanish traditions, and Afghan refugee poet Suhrab Sirat explains why the ghazal has given him a home in language.

The reader is Juliet Stevenson.

Photo of Andrew McMillan credited to Urszula Soltys

Producer: Mohini Patel



SUNDAY 06 JUNE 2021

SUN 00:00 Midnight News (m000wrts)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


SUN 00:30 Short Works (m000wm4w)
Lava! Lava! Lava!

Lava! Lava! Lava! by Tiffany Murray.

Following her mother’s instructions, Ruthie has gone to Iceland: to wait for the volcano to erupt and to complete an important task.

Tiffany Murray is the author of the novels Diamond Star Halo, Happy Accidents and Sugar Hall. Her fourth book, The Girl Who Talked to Birds, is set in Iceland. She is completing a memoir, You, Me, and The Rock n’ Roll Cook, about growing up with Queen and Black Sabbath sleeping in your house.

Writer: Tiffany Murray
Reader: Tanya Reynolds
Producer: Jeremy Osborne

A Sweet Talk Production for BBC Radio 4


SUN 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wrtv)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


SUN 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wrtx)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


SUN 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wrtz)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


SUN 05:30 News Briefing (m000wrv1)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


SUN 05:43 Bells on Sunday (m000wrv3)
St Margaret’s Church, Dunham Massey in Altrincham, Cheshire

Bells on Sunday comes from St Margaret’s Church, Dunham Massey in Altrincham, Cheshire. There are ten bells all cast in 1854 specifically for the church, whilst it was still under construction. They were rehung in 1974 with only minimal retuning and the Tenor remains a “maiden” or un-tuned bell. We now hear them ringing, Bristol Surprise Royal.


SUN 05:45 Profile (m000wrtl)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Saturday]


SUN 06:00 News Summary (m000wsgt)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4


SUN 06:05 Something Understood (b06y96gs)
Living With Poverty

Mark Tully considers social, religious and personal attitudes towards poverty.

The Archbishop of Canterbury recently said, “It’s a tragedy that hunger still exists in the United Kingdom in the 21st century. Yet, we continue to live with scandalous inequality”.

Living in Delhi, Mark Tully is also concerned by the poverty that he sees around him there. In this edition of Something Understood, he contemplates poverty and explores the social obligations to do something about it. He talks to Dr. John Kirkby about the practical solutions to the relief of poverty on an individual level. There are readings from poet Robert Sosa, theologian Reinhold Niebuhr and philosopher Loren Eiseley - with music from Bessie Smith, Femi Kuti and J.S. Bach.

The readers are Polly Frame, Francis Cadder and Jasper Britton

Presenter: Mark Tully
Producer: Frank Stirling
A Unique production for BBC Radio 4


SUN 06:35 Natural Histories (b05w9l34)
Oak

Oak is the symbol of noble endurance, loyalty, strength, constancy and longevity, and there are over 600 species. Heart of Oak is the official march of the Royal Navy – a rallying cry to brave sailors to guard our shores. Tennyson urges us to live our lives like the oak, to be "bright in spring, Living in gold." Its broad, pleasing shape, hard wood and prolific acorns, as well as the lovely shape of the leaves, establishes the oak as the nation's favourite tree.

As a timber its fine qualities also make it perfect for prestigious buildings, such as the debating chamber of the House of Commons. It is the symbol of Germany and the national tree of the US. In war it is used on medals of honour. The acorn has been eaten by many cultures and North American peoples revere the ancient oaks, their acorns made flour and the bark medicine. Oaks have inspired many moral tales. Huge, sturdy oaks grow slowly from small acorns and in The Man Who Planted Trees and old shepherd re-forests a barren valley by carefully and steadily planning a few acorns each day.

We have rested under oaks, climbed them, used their acorns, bark and wood. We have even made music from their tree rings. We see the oak as a symbol of virtue and goodness and in druidism the oak is central to beliefs that stretch back two millennia or more - no wonder we have a love affair with oaks.

Original Producer : Andrew Dawes
Archive Producer : Andrew Dawes for BBC Audio

Revised Repeat : First Broadcast BBC Radio 4; 20th October 2015


SUN 06:57 Weather (m000wsgx)
The latest weather reports and forecast


SUN 07:00 News and Papers (m000wsgz)
The latest news headlines. Including a look at the papers.


SUN 07:10 Sunday (m000wsh1)
A look at the ethical and religious issues of the week


SUN 07:54 Radio 4 Appeal (m000wsh3)
Marine Conservation Society

TV presenter Simon Reeve makes the Radio 4 Appeal on behalf of Marine Conservation Society

To Give:
- Freephone 0800 404 8144
- Freepost BBC Radio 4 Appeal. (That’s the whole address. Please do not write anything else on the front of the envelope). Mark the back of the envelope ‘Marine Conservation Society’.
- Cheques should be made payable to ‘Marine Conservation Society’.
- You can donate online at bbc.co.uk/appeal/radio4

Registered Charity Number: 1004005


SUN 07:57 Weather (m000wsh5)
The latest weather reports and forecast


SUN 08:00 News and Papers (m000wsh7)
The latest news headlines. Including a look at the papers.


SUN 08:10 Sunday Worship (m000wsh9)
A Centenary of Note

Mattins from St George's Chapel, Windsor, marking the centenary of the birth of the late Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh this week.
The promise of Resurrection, living by faith, and a building from God eternal in the heavens, are themes of the New Testament reading in this first broadcast service from the Chapel since the Duke of Edinburgh was laid to rest there just weeks ago. Sermon: The Dean of Windsor, The Rt Revd David Conner, KCVO.
Order of service:
Let all the world in every corner sing (Luckington); Preces & Responses (Radcliffe); Psalm 100 (Ouseley); 1 Sam 8:4-11; Benedictus in C (C.V. Stanford); 2 Cor 4:13-5.1;
The Call (Vaughan Williams); Guide me, O thou great redeemer (Cwm Rhondda); National Anthem; Organ voluntary: Nun danket alle Gott (Karg-Elert)
Director of Music: James Vivian; Assistant Director of Music: Luke Bond; Producer: Philip Billson


SUN 08:48 A Point of View (m000wlxw)
The Past is Never Dead

Sara Wheeler rereads her youthful diaries and ponders lessons learned.

'Discarding perished rubber bands that once sheaved the slim volumes,' Sara writes, 'I read the story of my own life.'

She wonders if accepting and understanding the past can help us escape 'the three rs of lived experience - regret, remorse and recrimination.'

Producer: Adele Armstrong


SUN 08:58 Tweet of the Day (b04hkym5)
Blue-Footed Booby

Tweet of the Day is the voice of birds and our relationship with them, from around the world.

Miranda Krestovnikoff presents the Galapagos Islands blue-footed booby. Far off the Ecuador coastline the Galapagos Archipelago is home to a strange courtship dance and display of the male blue-footed booby and his large bright blue webbed feet. The intensity of the male's blue feet is viewed by the female as a sign of fitness and so he holds them up for inspection as he struts in front of her. She joins in, shadowing his actions. As the pair raise and lower their feet with exaggerated slow movements, they point their bills sky-wards while spreading their wings, raising their tails and calling.


SUN 09:00 Broadcasting House (m000wshc)
The Sunday morning news magazine programme. Presented by Paddy O'Connell


SUN 10:00 The Archers Omnibus (m000wshf)
Writers, Keri Davies and Daniel Thurman
Director, Peter Leslie Wild
Editor, Jeremy Howe

Helen Archer … Louiza Patikas
Brian Aldridge … Charles Collingwood
Jennifer Aldridge … Angela Piper
Lee Bryce … Ryan Early
Alice Carter … Hollie Chapman
Ian Craig … Stephen Kennedy
Ruairi Donovan … Arthur Hughes
Adam Macy … Andrew Wincott
Ed Grundy … Barry Farrimond
Eddie Grundy … Trevor Harrison
Emma Grundy … Emerald O’hanrahan
Mia Grundy … Molly Pipe
Will Grundy … Philip Molloy
Joy Horville … Jakie Lye
Tracy Horrobin … Susie Riddell
Jazzer McCreary … Ryan Kelly
Calvin … Greg Jones


SUN 10:54 Tweet of the Day (m000wshh)
Tweet Take 5 : Egrets

Seemingly all too often we hear of bird species declining in Britain. However three members of the heron family have expanded their range in recent decades and are now known to breed here. As we will hear in this extended version of Tweet of the day on the little egret with Miranda Krestovnikoff, the great white egret with Sir David Attenborough and the cattle egret with wildlife sound recordist Chris Watson.

Producer : Andrew Dawes for BBC Audio in Bristol


SUN 11:00 Desert Island Discs (m000wshk)
Heather Hallett, former judge and crossbench peer

Heather Hallett, Baroness Hallett of Rye, is a former judge and a cross-bench peer.

Called to the Bar in 1972, Heather practised family, civil and criminal law, eventually specialising in criminal law. In 1989 she became a QC and was the first woman to chair the Bar Council in 1998. She was only the fifth woman to be appointed to the Court of Appeal in 2005 and was appointed vice president of the Court of Appeal Criminal Division in 2013.

Heather was born in Eastleigh in Hampshire. Her father Hugh was a policeman who worked his way up to the rank of assistant chief constable. With each promotion the family moved house and Heather’s education was disrupted, leading her teachers to conclude that she was unlikely to secure a place at university. Heather proved them wrong and studied law at the University of Oxford.

In 2009 she acted as coroner at the inquest into the deaths of the 52 victims of the July 7th London bombings in 2005 and she has taken over the inquest of Dawn Sturgess who died in the Salisbury Novichok poisonings.

Heather retired as a judge in 2019 and currently sits as a life peer.

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley


SUN 11:45 Just One Thing - with Michael Mosley (m000wshm)
Count Your Blessings

Surprisingly simple ways to boost your health and wellbeing - in one easy step.


SUN 12:00 News Summary (m000wshp)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


SUN 12:04 Nature Table (m000wl46)
Series 2

Episode 5

Nature Table is comedian, broadcaster and writer Sue Perkins’ new comedy ‘Show & Tell’ series celebrating the natural world and all its funny eccentricities.
Taking the simple format of a ‘Show & Tell’, each episode Sue is joined by celebrity guests from the worlds of comedy and natural history. Each of the natural history guests brings an item linked to the wild world to share with the audience, be it an amazing fact or funny personal anecdote. Each item is a springboard for an enlightening and funny discussion, alongside fun games and challenges revealing more astonishing facts. We also hear from some of the London Zoo, as they bring us their own natural history ‘show and tells’ for Sue and the guests to discuss.
Nature Table has a simple clear brief: to positively celebrate and promote the importance of all our planet’s wonderfully wild flora and fauna in an fun and easily grasped way... whilst at the same time having a giggle.
Note: Series 2 was recorded in November 2020, during lockdown conditions, so this time round there is no studio audience this time round. The host, panel and guest zookeepers recorded the series at ZSL London Zoo, socially distanced.

Episode 5
Recorded at London Zoo, this week Sue Perkins is joined by special guests:
Martin Hughes-Games (Zoologist, Wildlife presenter), Dr. Chris Thorogood (Deputy Director of Oxford Botanic Garden) and comedian Felicity Ward.

Written by: Catherine Brinkworth, Kat Sadler & Jon Hunter
Researcher: Catherine Beazley
Music by Ben Mirin. Additional sounds were provided by The Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
Produced by: Simon Nicholls
A BBC Studios Production


SUN 12:32 The Food Programme (m000wrnb)
Tom Kerridge: A Life Through Food

Tom Kerridge is probably best known as the first chef in the UK to be awarded two prestigious Michelin stars for food served in a pub, not even a year after opening 'The Hand and Flowers' in Marlow in Buckinghamshire in 2005. Then he was in his early thirties; Known, in the business, for his hard work ethic and hard partying.

Today, he's given up the booze and the partying, but as Sheila Dillon finds, he's as driven as ever with a string of restaurants, a food festival company, a catering company, a TV production house, a shelf full of cook books and many BBC food TV series' to his name. Not to mention advocating on a national level for the hospitality industry and working with footballer Marcus Rashford to do his bit to end child food poverty.

In line with Tom's latest BBC TV series 'Saving Britain's Pubs with Tom Kerridge', Sheila finds that the democratic environment of the pub has shaped Tom's life and his career in hospitality. And hears why these important community spaces need investing in at all costs.

Presented by Sheila Dillon.
Produced in Bristol by Clare Salisbury.


SUN 12:57 Weather (m000wshs)
The latest weather forecast


SUN 13:00 The World This Weekend (m000wshv)
Jonny Dymond looks at the week’s big stories from both home and around the world.


SUN 13:30 The Listening Project (m000wshx)
The Listening Project

Fi Glover presents strangers, friends and relatives in conversation.

This week: Strangers Helen and Chris confront each others ideas about how holiday lets and second homes impact communities in parts of Wales; Elvis tribute acts Sal and Tony swap notes on what it takes to be the King; and Claire from Edinburgh, who’s mum is an alcoholic discusses the challenges of day to day life with Sarah, who’s a mother and a recovering alcoholic herself.

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. The conversations are being gathered across the UK by teams of producers from local and national radio stations who facilitate each encounter. Every conversation lasts up to an hour, and is then edited to extract the key moments 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 this decade of the millennium. You can learn more about The Listening Project by visiting bbc.co.uk/listeningproject

Producer: Kerry Devine


SUN 14:00 Gardeners' Question Time (m000wm4t)
GQT at Home: Fish Tank Flowers and Gardening After Hours

Peter Gibbs hosts the show with a group of gardening experts. Bunny Guinness, Bob Flowerdew and Matthew Pottage answer questions from the virtual audience.

This week, the panellists tackle questions ranging from when you can first harvest your asparagus to what to plant in an old fish tank. They also solve the mystery of a funny-looking fungus, offer advice on regenerating a lawn which has been driven over, and share their favourite nighttime gardening activities.

Away from the questions, we revisit Matthew and Jane Wilson to hear more about their cut flower garden project, and Hafsah Hafeji gives us the ultimate guide for maximising a plot through companion planting.

Producer - Jemima Rathbone
Assistant Producer - Millie Chu

A Somethin' Else production for BBC Radio 4


SUN 14:45 Thought Cages (m000182y)
The Fallacy of Market Research

Key idea: we think we can measure what makes better services and systems. But what if people don’t really know – or admit – what actually matters to their deepest desires?
Advertising guru and writer on human behaviour Rory Sutherland is joined by legendary advertising creative Dave Trott, as well as statistician, trader and iconoclast Nassim Nicholas Taleb, to explore the ways in which our consumer and business decisions are driven by things we don’t realise – and how some of the most brilliant pieces of behavioural insight seem utterly counterintuitive.

Produced by Steven Rajam for BBC Wales


SUN 15:00 Hardy's Women (m000wshz)
Jude the Obscure

Episode 2

Sue Bridehead relates the story of her radical relationship with stonemason, Jude. Despite their love for each other, Jude is still legally married to Arabella, so Sue determines to marry Phillotson. Starring Robert Emms, Kirsty Oswald and Julius D'Silva. Dramatised by Graham White.

Directed by Emma Harding

Sue.....Kirsty Oswald
Jude.....Robert Emms
Phillotson.....Julius D’Silva
Drusilla.....Jane Slavin
Arabella.....Elinor Coleman
Juey.....Rafferty Railton
Mrs Edlin.....Jessica Turner
Taylor....Nicholas Murchie
Vicar.....David Sturzaker
Mary/Grace.....Megan McInerney
Woman.....Marilyn Nnadebe
Customer 1.....Joshua Riley
Customer 2....Stewart Campbell

Production Co-ordinator.....Maggie Olgiati
Sound designer.....Caleb Knightley


SUN 16:00 Bookclub (m000wsj1)
Melissa Harrison - All Among the Barley

Melissa Harrison is an acclaimed nature writer, novelist and podcaster. She joins James Naughtie and a group of her readers to discuss her novel All Among the Barley, set in Suffolk in the mid 1930’s. Centring on the experiences of teenage Edie Mather whose family have been farming the land for generations, the novel touches on the backdrop of shifting political and social change, as well as the dramatic change that’s just starting in the English countryside.

Presenter: James Naughtie
Producer: Allegra McIlroy

July’s Bookclub choice: Golden Hill by Francis Spufford


SUN 16:30 On Form (m000wsj3)
The Villanelle

In the third and last of this series, Andrew McMillan meets a diverse group of contemporary British poets who are reframing traditional techniques to write about the modern world, exploring why form is fashionable again.

In today’s programme, poet and academic Aviva Dautch, traces the roots of the villanelle back to its musical origins and explores how it developed into a poetic form with fixed rules. To understand the interplay of the form’s complex refrains and rhymes we hear Juliet Stevenson reads classic twentieth century villanelles: ‘Do Not Go Gently’ by Dylan Thomas and ‘One Art’ by Elizabeth Bishop, exploring how these poets use the form to contain grief.

We meet bestselling poet, Wendy Cope, a former teacher whose comic villanelles play with the formal counterpoint between repetition and surprise. Irish poet Gail McConnell describes how her experimental villanelle helps her articulate what it means to be part of non-traditional family structures, and the transition from the one she grew up in to the queer one she has created with her partner. And finally, Marvin Thompson, winner of this year’s National Poetry Competition with a villanelle variation, tells us about his passion for the form and reads his award-winning poem about his Jamaican-British identity.

The reader is Juliet Stevenson.

Photo of Andrew McMillan credited to Urszula Soltys

Producer: Mohini Patel


SUN 17:00 File on 4 (m000wjr9)
Leaseholder Losses

The government recently introduced new laws to protect leaseholders from large ground rent increases. But campaigners say more widespread changes are needed to properly protect the millions of leaseholders in England and Wales.

The cladding scandal has highlighted just how few rights leaseholders have when it comes to what happens to the buildings they live in. Felicity Hannah discovers there are many other issues they face.

A change in planning law means freeholders can now build extra apartments on top of blocks of flats without having to get planning permission. While such developments could bring in millions of pounds for landlords, the leaseholders can't object and in some cases could see the value of their homes plummet. Felicity speaks to residents who say one such development has turned their lives into a nightmare

Other leaseholders have been left reeling after their council landlord landed them with estimated bills of over £100,000 for improvements to their homes. Under the rules, the homeowners can't challenge the costs and some fear they could have to sell up.

Many people are now asking: is the current leasehold system fit for purpose?

Reporter: Felicity Hannah
Producer: Paul Grant
Editor: Gail Champion


SUN 17:40 Profile (m000wrtl)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Saturday]


SUN 17:54 Shipping Forecast (m000wsj5)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


SUN 17:57 Weather (m000wsj7)
The latest weather reports and forecast


SUN 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wsj9)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4


SUN 18:15 Pick of the Week (m000wsjc)
Gillian Reynolds

The sun came out. Test Match Special came back. Noel Gallagher surprised the nation. A doctor and a psychologist learned a new way to breathe. Against all the odds, a thirteen year battle for justice came to a decisive conclusion on Radio 4. And one of Ireland’s finest poets had his wish come true on Radio 3’s Jazz Record Requests...listen in to find out what it was...

Presenter: Gillian Reynolds
Producer: Elizabeth Foster
Production support: Emmie Hume
Studio Manager: Sue Stonestreet


SUN 19:00 Short Works (b07w6jhn)
Give Me a Buzz by Emma Healey

One of five new stories originally commissioned from outstanding younger writers to accompany the 2016 BBC National Short Story Award:

GIVE ME A BUZZ by Emma Healey
Carla has a telephone phobia, whilst her mother is seldom off the thing. Mother has a PHD in History of Art, and somehow telephoning and Dutch Flower Paintings become connected in this world of theirs..

Reader Louise Brealey

Producer Duncan Minshull


SUN 19:15 The Confessional (m000wsjf)
Series 1

The Confession of Lucy Porter

Actor, comedian and broadcaster Stephen Mangan presents a comedy chat show about shame and guilt.

Each week Stephen invites a different eminent guest into his virtual confessional box to make three 'confessions'. This is a cue for some remarkable storytelling, and surprising insights.

We’re used to hearing celebrity interviews, where stars are persuaded to show off about their achievements and talk about their proudest moments. Stephen isn't interested in that. He doesn’t want to know what his guests are proud of, he wants to know what they’re ashamed of. That’s surely the way to find out what really makes a person tick. Stephen and his guest reflect with empathy and humour on why we get embarrassed, where our shame thresholds should be, and the value of guilt.

This week, comedian Lucy Porter apologises for a youthful indiscretion, discusses the disadvantages of PVC and reveals a secret as yet untold.

Other guests in this series include Cariad Lloyd, Dr Phil Hammond, Clarke Peters, Suzi Ruffell, Marian Keyes, Phil Wang, Joan Bakewell, Nigel Planer and Alastair Campbell.

Written and presented by Stephen Mangan
With extra material by Nick Doody.
Devised with Dave Anderson

Produced by Frank Stirling
A 7digital production for BBC Radio 4


SUN 19:45 The Things We Leave Behind (m000wsjh)
Episode 5

A five-part series specially written for Radio 4 by Mary Paulson-Ellis.

THE THINGS WE LEAVE BEHIND tells the story of a life in five objects. Starting near the end of her life and moving backwards in time, the defining moments of Rosalind Goddard’s life are revealed through seemingly random accumulated items. It is the day of Rosalind's eighth birthday party.

Part Five THE PHOTOGRAPH is read by Alexandra Mathie.

Producer - Gaynor Macfarlane


SUN 20:00 More or Less (m000wjlh)
Bolton vaccines, Yorkshire versus Scotland and the average gamer

Health Minister Matt Hancock recently told the House of Commons that: “The number of vaccinations happening in Bolton right now is phenomenal - tens of thousands every single day.” We explain why this is not the case.

The recent SNP election success has turned attention to the question of independence. We compare Scotland’s finances to the comparably sized Yorkshire and Humber region.

How do you work out 28 + 47 in your head? We speak to mathematician Katie Steckles.

A listener asked us to find out if it is true that the average age of a gamer is over 40.

Plus, we take a look at this claim from Netflix documentary Seaspiracy: “if current fishing trends continue we will see virtually empty oceans by the year 2048.”


(a man receives a Covid-19 vaccine at a temporary vaccination centre in Bolton, May 2021. Credit: Oli Scarff /Getty Images)


SUN 20:30 Last Word (m000wm4y)
Eric Carle (pictured), Helen Murray Free, Michael Parsons, Evelyn McNicol

Matthew Bannister on

The children’s author and illustrator Eric Carle, best known for creating The Very Hungry Caterpillar which has sold fifty-five million copies.

Helen Murray Free, the American chemist who developed revolutionary simple tests for diabetes and other serious conditions.

Michael Parsons, the engineer who designed some of the world’s longest suspension bridges, including the Severn Bridge and the Humber Bridge.

Evelyn McNicol, the pioneering Scottish mountaineer who was a member of the first all-female British expedition to the Himalayas.

Producer: Rabeka Nurmahomed

Interviewed guest: Oliver Jeffers
Interviewed guest: Julia Eccleshare
Interviewed guest: Dr Bill Carroll
Interviewed guest: Philip Parsons
Interviewed guest: Kate Ross

Archive clips used: Open Book: Radio 4, TX 4.5.1999; The Severn Bridge at 50_A High Wire Act: BBC One Wales, TX 7.9.2016; Ladies Scottish Climbing Club: Radio Scotland, TX 20.12.2006


SUN 21:00 Money Box (m000wrsv)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:04 on Saturday]


SUN 21:25 Radio 4 Appeal (m000wsh3)
[Repeat of broadcast at 07:54 today]


SUN 21:30 Analysis (m000wl4d)
The Zoomshock Metropolis

Our towns and cities are facing an existential crisis. The rise of online shopping has left gaping holes in high streets. And if hybrid working takes off, some economists predict a dramatic 'zoom shock' as workers spend less time and money in city centres. What seems like a crisis could be an opportunity to reinvent our cities and 'Level Up' struggling towns. But are we ready to seize this moment?

Helen Grady meets local leaders embracing this moment of change - from the Teesside town bulldozing a shopping centre to create a park to the US community paying remote tech workers to relocate. She hears how big cities like Manchester are enticing people back to the office. And she asks if we're about to see a move away from city-led growth to a model where jobs and prosperity are more evenly spread between towns and cities.

Producer and presenter Helen Grady
Editor Jasper Corbett


SUN 22:00 Westminster Hour (m000wsjk)
With guests Steve Brine MP, Conservative, former public health minister, Cat Smith MP, shadow minister for young people and democracy, and Stephen Bush, political editor, New Statesman. The columnist is Caroline Wheeler, deputy political editor, Sunday Times.


SUN 23:00 The Film Programme (m000wlnk)
Ben Whishaw

With Antonia Quirke

Ben Whishaw reveals why he went up to complete strangers on Tottenham High Road for his latest film Surge, and why nobody seemed to recognise him.

After Love is the story of a Muslim convert who discovers that her husband was leading a double life. Writer/director Aleem Khan reveals how much of the story is autobiographical, and how much isn't.


SUN 23:30 Something Understood (b06y96gs)
[Repeat of broadcast at 06:05 today]



MONDAY 07 JUNE 2021

MON 00:00 Midnight News (m000wsjm)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


MON 00:15 Thinking Allowed (m000wl5s)
COALMINING - LUDDISM

Coalmining & Luddism: Laurie explores the meaning of progress, from the former pit villages of South Wales & Durham to contemporary high tech industry. He's joined by Huw Beynon, Emeritus Professor in the School of Social Sciences at the University of Cardiff, who charts the rise and fall of coalmining. What has happened to those communities in a post industrial era? Those who opposed the closure of the mines were often described as Luddites, trapped in a romanticised version of a lost world, but Gavin Mueller, a Lecturer in Media Studies at the University of Amsterdam, suggests that Luddism may not always be regressive. His research provides an innovative rethinking of labour and machines & argues that improvement in people's working lives may depend on subverting or halting some technological changes. Thinking Allowed is produced in partnership with the Open University.

Producer: Jayne Egerton


MON 00:45 Bells on Sunday (m000wrv3)
[Repeat of broadcast at 05:43 on Sunday]


MON 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wsjp)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


MON 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wsjr)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


MON 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wsjt)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


MON 05:30 News Briefing (m000wsjw)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


MON 05:43 Prayer for the Day (m000wsjy)
A reflection and prayer to start the day with Rev Cheryl Meban

Good morning.

100 years ago today, James Craig was appointed the first Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. Son of a financially successful whiskey distiller, he would later become Viscount Craigavon, He’s perhaps most quoted for his various versions of the phrase, “A Protestant Parliament for a Protestant people” When Craig became Prime Minister much of the island of Ireland was in a state of rebellion. Atrocious acts of violence were common in many places. Later in June 1921, King George 5th would make a speech at the first State opening of the newly created devolved Northern Irish parliament, calling for reconciliation in Ireland. I wonder if he imagined what it would look like, or how such a reconciliation would be achieved.

Over 50 years ago, Rev Ray Davey, who had been a prisoner of war, watching from outside Dresden as the allies engulfed that city in flames. Davey came home to Northern Ireland and as university chaplain in Belfast, drew together a community concerned to build reconciliation globally and locally. Seeds of injustice set in the concrete of Catholic exclusion and Protestant domination were bearing bitter fruit; their roots were cracking the foundations of this little country. The Corrymeela community was born, and continues today to affirm the inclusion of outsiders as essential to all of us living well in reconciling, listening, honouring-each-other diversity. But reconciliation has not been fully achieved.

God of widows and orphans, you reminded the Hebrews, that having been slaves in Egypt, they should always honour and welcome outsiders. Remind us to see your face in otherness. Give us courage to build for our neighbours as well as for ourselves. Amen


MON 05:45 Farming Today (m000wsk0)
The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.


MON 05:56 Weather (m000wsk2)
The latest weather forecast for farmers.


MON 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b04mlpj8)
Plumbeous Antbird

Tweet of the Day is the voice of birds and our relationship with them, from around the world.

Chris Packham presents the Plumbeous antbird in a Bolivian rainforest. When army ants go on the march in the Bolivian rainforest, they attract a huge retinue of followers; often heard but rarely seen. These include Antbirds. The Plumbeous Antbird is a lead-coloured bird; the males have a patch of blue skin around their eyes, whilst the females are bright russet below. Like other antbirds they are supreme skulkers, hiding under curtains of dense foliage and only betraying themselves by their calls and song, a particularly fluty call. But you'd think that with a name like antbirds, their diet is easily diagnosed, but surprisingly antbirds rarely eat ants. Instead, most species shadow the columns of army ants which often change nest-sites or raid other ant colonies. As the ants march across the forest floor, they flush insects and other invertebrates which are quickly snapped by the attendant antbirds.


MON 06:00 Today (m000wrl5)
News and current affairs, including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.


MON 09:00 Start the Week (m000wrlc)
Lionel Shriver on life and death decisions

In a year when Covid-19 has had a devastating effect on families, with loved ones dying sometimes alone in hospital or without the usual funeral rites, Tom Sutcliffe and guests discuss mortality and what it means to have ‘a good death’.

In her latest book, Should We Stay Or Should We Go, the writer Lionel Shriver explores a number of alternative endings. The couple at the centre of her novel make a pact to end their lives when they hit 80, to avoid a slow decline either physically or mentally. As Shriver looks at how that decision might play out in reality, she’s arguing for a more open discussion about the end of life.

It’s a view shared by the consultant geriatrician David Jarrett. In 33 Meditations on Death – Notes from the Wrong End of Medicine he draws on family stories and case histories from his three decades treating those who become old and frail. Jarret’s book is an impassioned plea for everyone – old and young – to engage and make plans for the end.

The playwright Jack Thorne is part of the collaborative team (with designer Bunny Christie and director Jeremy Herrin) behind the National Theatre’s new play, After Life, based on Hirokazu Kore-eda's award-winning film. It follows a group of strangers as they grapple with the question: if you could spend eternity with just one precious memory, what would it be? Although all the characters are deceased, the play is a celebration of life, and about what matters to us most.

Producer: Katy Hickman


MON 09:45 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjd3)
Episode 1

The revelatory biography of the early life of Prince Philip.

We have grown so used to seeing Prince Philip as a loyal, dutiful elderly man that it is easy to forget what a strange and intriguing life he led when he was younger. Originally published to coincide with his 90th birthday in 2011, 'Young Prince Philip' tells the story of the first half of his life.

Philip Eade focuses on those aspects of the Prince's early life that are most compelling: his father's dramatic flight from revolutionary Greece; the subsequent madness of his deaf mother and prolonged absences of his feckless father; his school days in Nazi Germany; his relationship with his four sisters, all married to Germans, one to an officer in the SS; his rather breezy courtship and marriage to the most eligible young woman in the world; and his membership of raffish circles during the 1950s and '60s.

Abridged by Polly Coles
Read by Nicholas Woodeson

Produced by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4


MON 10:00 Woman's Hour (m000wrlq)
Dido Harding, Friendship between gay men and straight women, Foreign aid cuts

It’s just over a year since the businesswoman and conservative peer Dido Harding was brought in to set up a test and trace system to help stop the Covid-19 pandemic. The system was going to be “world beating” and help get the UK out of lockdown according to the Prime minister but the incredible costs involved – around £37 billion – have been criticised for failing to make an impact. The system has improved but what will its legacy be? Dido Harding talks to Emma Barnett on Woman’s Hour today in her first interview since leaving the role last month and reflects on the ups and downs of the last year.

As we celebrate Pride Month throughout June we thought we'd spend a moment celebrating the relationship between gay men and their female BFF. From reality stars like Jenny and Lee on Googlebox and Olivia Bentley's relationship with Ollie and Gareth in Made in Chelsea to Will and Grace to the designer Halston and Liza Minelli. What is it about the relationship that makes them so special?

A group of MPs, Including the former Prime Minister Theresa May, are trying to push through a vote in parliament which they hope will reverse controversial cuts to the international aid budget. It's likely that an amendment to the Advanced Research and Invention Agency bill will happen, and that technical change will result in aid spending going back to what it was. It was recently cut from 0.7% to 0.5. Ella Whelan is a journalist and commentator who doesn't believe in foreign aid.

Presenter: Emma Barnett
Producer: Lucinda Montefiore


MON 11:00 The Untold (m000wrlx)
The Boy Next Door

A year of lockdowns has made a lot of us re-evaluate our lives and our priorities. For busy people, especially busy people who actually like their work, it can be a challenging thing to slow down. What happens when the thing at the centre of your life – the thing that makes your life make sense – ceases to be there? And what might that make space for, if you let it? Maybe you’d start to notice other things that you had overlooked, because you were so busy all the time…

Grace Dent tells the story of a Leicester secondary school teacher whose life has been radically changed by a year of lockdowns.

Produced by Mair Bosworth in Bristol for BBC Audio


MON 11:30 Loose Ends (m000wrm2)
[Repeat of broadcast at 18:15 on Saturday]


MON 12:00 News Summary (m000ws9g)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


MON 12:04 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wrm9)
Episode 1

Asha is halfway through her PhD and working on an algorithm to develop empathy in artificial intelligence. When she meets up with her high-school crush Cyrus, now a charismatic creator and celebrant of secular rituals, she sees the opportunity to adapt her research into a revolutionary new social media platform bringing meaning into millions of lives.

She also falls back in love with Cyrus and they get married in a whirlwind of passion, ambition and excitement. Together with Cyrus’s best friend Jules, they are invited to join the super-cool startup incubator Utopia, and their journey through the cutting-edge world of tech innovation begins.

As their app takes off, Asha finds herself confronting challenges to her marriage, her dreams for the future and her independence, and discovers the brave new world of tech is still, like the old one, dominated by men and their ambitions.

Episode 1/10: An old crush, a magic funeral, a wedding and a brilliant idea.

Tahmima Anam is a novelist, short-story writer and Harvard educated anthropologist. Her first novel, A Golden Age, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Costa First Novel Award, and won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book. Her other novels are The Good Muslim and The Bones of Grace. The Startup Wife owes its inspiration to her own experiences as executive director of a music technology startup founded by her husband.

Reader: Preeya Kalidas
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Celia de Wolff
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

Image: Tahmima Anam
Credit: Abeer Y. Hoque


MON 12:18 You and Yours (m000wrmf)
News and discussion of consumer affairs


MON 12:57 Weather (m000wrml)
The latest weather forecast


MON 13:00 World at One (m000wrms)
Forty-five minutes of news, analysis and comment, with Sarah Montague.


MON 13:45 Small Island or Global Britain? (m000wrmy)
At the Top Table

As Britain prepares to host the leaders of the richest democracies in the world at the G7 summit, Nick Robinson begins a week-long series  exploring Britain’s place in the world.

Over five programmes, Nick considers our hard, soft and economic power, our influence and alliances, whether we are we just a Small Island or whether we can be, in Boris Johnson’s phrase, Global Britain?  

1. At the Top Table
With guests including the former Prime Ministers of Australia and Denmark, Nick explores Britain’s place at the diplomatic ‘Top Table'. He considers the value of Britain’s position in global institutions like the G7 and the UN Security Council and asks whether, as other countries grow wealthier and demand a seat, that position is increasingly weakened. Nick asks what a suitable role for Britain on the international stage could be - perhaps a convener of countries, and a connector of rivals, embodied in Britain’s role as host of COP26 later this year. This programme includes data from a new Ipsos Mori poll on public attitudes to Britain’s place in the world.

A Juniper Connect production for BBC Radio 4


MON 14:00 Drama (m000wrn2)
Jazz and Dice

Two teenage girls, best friends and lovers, anticipate their future together as one of them goes off to university, causing a rift between them. Nevaeh, also known as Dice, is secretly dating her best friend Jazz. When Jazz goes off to university, Dice is left heartbroken, and her mother is left to pick up the pieces.

A year later, Dice is moving on, having shed the shame around her queerness, when she finds out Jazz is engaged to a man she met at university. And she wants Dice to come to the wedding. Dice and her mother make the long drive to the occasion, for a dramatic finale. Will Jazz go through with her vows?

Starring Claire Rushbrook (Secrets and Lies, Home Front), Carly Houston (BBC 3 Crip Tales) and Lucy Fallon (Coronation Street), Jazz and Dice is a fresh funny drama with a big heart.

The play, by new writer Leanne Allen tackles love and families, with a witty, warm touch. Her protagonist is a wheelchair user (like Leanne) but the drama is not about disability, it’s about love in the 21st century. Leanne first started writing in 2018 when she attended the Writing for Radio course at Moniack Mhor. Since then she has gone on to write for Naked Productions and Theatre of Debate. Connections was her first radio drama for community radio and BBC Radio 4, broadcast in 2020. Leanne's work with Theatre of Debate was part of the COVID And Me campaign by the National Institute for Health Research. The monologue was made public on the NIHR website in 9th July 2020 and shared widely across social media. Jazz and Dice is her first full length BBC Radio 4 commission.

Jazz and Dice is co-produced by Krishna Istha, a writer, comedian and performance artist making work about taboo or under-represented experiences of gender, race and sexual politics.

Cast:
Dice ..... Carly Houston
Jazz ..... Lucy Fallon
Laurie ..... Claire Rushbrook
Sat Nav/Registrar ..... Garry Robson

Production team:
Co-Directors/Co-Producers, Polly Thomas and Krishna Istha
Sound Recordist, Louis Blatherwick
Sound Designer, Paul Cargill
Illustration, Isobel Platt
Executive Producer, Eloise Whitmore

A Naked production for BBC Radio 4


MON 14:45 The Why Factor (b067x3vy)
Why would anyone devote their life to collecting cuckoo clocks?

Stamps, coins, sea shells, wine - the list of things that humans collect is endless. But why do people do it? What does a collection of inanimate objects bring to our lives that other things do not? Are people attracted by the thrill of the chase, the pleasure of possession or the control in acting as the custodian of precious things?

Mike Williams talks to an eclectic group of collectors in search of some answers. Roman and Maz Piekarski have spent the last 50 years building up a collection of some of the world's finest cuckoo clocks. When Lisa Courtney was bullied as a child she gained comfort in building her collection of Pokemon toys.Seventeen-year-old Tushar Lakhanpal started his pencil collection at the age of three and when David Fulton sold his business to Microsoft in the 90s his new found wealth allowed him to pursue and acquire one of the finest collections of rare instruments ever assembled.


MON 15:00 The 3rd Degree (m000wrn6)
Series 11

The University of Cumbria

A funny, lively and dynamic quiz presented by Steve Punt and recorded on location at a different university each week, pitting three undergraduates against three of their professors. This week the show comes from the University of Cumbria.

The rounds vary between specialist subjects and general knowledge, quickfire bell-and-buzzer rounds and the Highbrow and Lowbrow round cunningly devised to test not only the students’ knowledge of current affairs, history, languages and science, but also their Professors’ awareness of television, sport, and quite possibly Ed Sheeran. And the Head-to-Head rounds, in which students take on their Professors in their own subjects, offer plenty of scope for mild embarrassment on both sides.

The specialist subjects this week are Marine and Freshwater Biology, Education and Forestry Management and Conservation, and the questions range from brothels and bats to Barnaby Bear. There's also a chance to brush up on your fronted adverbials.

The other universities in this series are Southampton, Nottingham Trent, Northampton, Anglia Ruskin and Brasenose College Oxford.

Producer: David Tyler
A Pozzitive production for BBC Radio 4


MON 15:30 The Food Programme (m000wrnb)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:32 on Sunday]


MON 16:00 A Life in Music (m000wln3)
Later life

When music journalist Jude Rogers lost her father aged five, she turned to songs for solace and structure. Music helped her redefine her identity as a teenager and connect with her young child as a parent after post-natal depression.

In this emotional and educational series, we explore how music impacts us at each stage of our lives. In four programmes, Jude speaks to musicians, neuroscientists, psychologists and music-lovers to discover why music means so much to us all.

In this fourth and final episode, Later life, Jude explores how music can keep us active, alert, and involved in the world around us as we grow older. We now know that learning music as a child or taking part in a choir as an older adult for just 16 weeks can improve the way our brains process sound. Participating in a choir also makes us feel less lonely and increases our interest in life as we age.

We hear from English singer-songwriter Marianne Faithfull, neuroscientists Professor Nina Kraus, Assistant Professor Assal Habibi, and Professor Julene Johnson, palliative care consultant and clinical director Professor Mark Taubert and Welsh chorister Effie Evans.

Producer: Georgia Moodie
A Reduced Listening production for BBC Radio 4


MON 16:30 The Digital Human (m000wrng)
Series 20

Orphaned

Aleks Krotoski talks to the children of those lost to Qanon conspiracies. Many have sought support and advice in online forums where they exchange stories of estrangement and bereavement unable to prevent their parent falling further down the rabbit of outlandish plots, twisted ideas and political extremism.

For many experts Qanon behaves like an authoritarian cult demanding total obedience to its ideas and anyone who can’t be converted are to be shunned. In an ironic twist on the classic cult narrative there as many parents as impressionable young people that have fallen under Qanon’s sway. But like cult members of the past can they be deprogrammed and reunited with their children?

Producer: Peter McManus


MON 17:00 PM (m000wrnj)
Afternoon news and current affairs programme, reporting on breaking stories and summing up the day's headlines.


MON 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wrnn)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.


MON 18:30 Nature Table (m000wrnq)
Series 2

Episode 6

Nature Table is comedian, broadcaster and writer Sue Perkins’ new comedy ‘Show & Tell’ series celebrating the natural world and all its funny eccentricities.
Taking the simple format of a ‘Show & Tell’, each episode Sue is joined by celebrity guests from the worlds of comedy and natural history. Each of the natural history guests brings an item linked to the wild world to share with the audience, be it an amazing fact or funny personal anecdote. Each item is a springboard for an enlightening and funny discussion, alongside fun games and challenges revealing more astonishing facts. We also hear from some of the London Zoo, as they bring us their own natural history ‘show and tells’ for Sue and the guests to discuss.
Nature Table has a simple clear brief: to positively celebrate and promote the importance of all our planet’s wonderfully wild flora and fauna in an fun and easily grasped way... whilst at the same time having a giggle.
Note: Series 2 was recorded in November 2020, during lockdown conditions, so this time round there is no studio audience this time round. The host, panel and guest zookeepers recorded the series at ZSL London Zoo, socially distanced.

Episode 6
Recorded at London Zoo, this week Sue Perkins is joined by special guests:
Dr. Helen Scales (Marine Biologist), Dr. Erica McAlister (Senior Curator, Diptera, Natural History Museum) and comedian Felicity Ward.

Written by: Catherine Brinkworth, Kat Sadler & Jon Hunter
Researcher: Catherine Beazley
Music by Ben Mirin. Additional sounds were provided by The Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
Produced by: Simon Nicholls
A BBC Studios Production


MON 19:00 The Archers (m000wrkn)
The situation becomes overwhelming for Jennifer while Harrison makes plans.


MON 19:15 Front Row (m000wrns)
Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music


MON 19:45 The Art of Innovation (m0008wt4)
Plants on Paper

Sir Ian Blatchford, Director of the Science Museum Group, and the Science Museum’s Head of Collections, Dr Tilly Blyth, continue their series exploring how art and science have inspired each other from the Enlightenment to dark matter

They focus on new ways of illustrating scientific knowledge in the mid 19th century through early photography and print in the blooming world of botanical science.

The desire to take emerging technology and try something new is evident from the first photographic images of plants in a print book: Ian examines botanist Anna Atkins’ stunning and detailed hand printed images of algae held in the Science Museum Group’s collection. Her “cyanotypes” were created by placing specimens of seaweed directly onto photographic paper.

Artist and scientist appear as one, but tensions arise in the desire to create images of plants that are both scientifically useful yet aesthetically pleasing. As Tilly reveals, botanical illustration continued to thrive from a growing need to advance botanical science through the shared drawings and print engravings of skilled naturalists, such as George Worthington Smith. His detailed illustrations for the long running Gardener’s Chronicle ensured new discoveries reached a vast discerning and diverse readership.

Producer Adrian Washbourne

Produced in partnership with the Science Museum Group

Photograph by SSPL/Getty Images


MON 20:00 Born in Bradford (m000wrnv)
Mental Health

The focus of Born in Bradford is shifting, as young people in the study start to play a more active role in shaping the research. In this programme the focus is on mental health, as schools grapple with how lockdown has affected pupils and hospitals report an increase in referrals following self-harm and a range of anxiety related conditions. Winifred Robinson investigates and talks to young people about how research might help them and how they handle the pressures they feel.

Fifteen year old Billy has already benefited from a more pro-active approach to mental health and new links between the NHS and the 38 secondary schools across Bradford. He was feeling tired and lethargic during the pandemic and struggled to complete online lessons at home. His head teacher at the Keighley University Academy, Jon Scurr, invited him to take part in a new counselling service and he began addressing his problems, starting with prioritising his worries:

"I told the NHS practitioner about passing people me on the pavement and my fear of not knowing what strangers would do to me. She got me to explain the impact of this, how I'd tremble and my palms would get sweaty and she explained what to do in that process. It was such a help - that was all I needed to do, I feel so much better. Before I didn't feel energised and now I feel like studying and feel in control."

For other head teachers the focus as Born in Bradford moves into this new phase will also bring opportunities to assess how pupils handle the move from primary to secondary school. Lynette Clapham is the head of Crossley Hall Primary and is worried about how covid will place extra pressures on year six pupils already worried about how they will cope:

"Change makes adults anxious and children anxious. It’s also an added concern that they haven’t been able to visit their new schools because of covid. We have to prepare them for what's next; we are on borrowed time with them. Some of the children are going to high schools on their own and not with friends from here – so far they haven’t had the chance to meet others and get ready for what’s ahead."

Dr John Wright, who heads Born in Bradford, is excited by the new phase of research as the 13,000 Born in Bradford children move through their teenage years: “it’s a remarkable period in life never do you get such change and transition and that’s biological psychological and social change.

“There’s a metamorphosis from being a child to an adult and it’s a time of great change and experimentation. It’s also a time of great change in our mental health - over half of mental disorders start in adolescence and we are very keen to understand the causes and what we can do and to track what happens over time


MON 20:30 Analysis (m000wrnx)
Funny Money

What is the money in your pocket really worth? Come to think of it now we’re virtually cashless, do you even keep money in your pocket? Maybe you’re worried about the growth of government debt during the pandemic you now store your wealth in commodities such as gold or silver? Or maybe you’re a fan of another asset class: bitcoin. Are cryptocurrencies the future of money or a giant bubble waiting to burst? Why are governments and companies such as Facebook so interested in developing their own digital currencies?

Fifty years since the ‘Nixon shock’ when US president Richard Nixon changed global currencies forever by taking America off the gold standard, the BBC’s Ben Chu is on a mission to find out what money means to us today. Where does its value come from in this increasingly online world? Are we witnessing a revolution in the transfer of value into the metaverse? And how should make sense ofl this funny money business?

Guests include:
Historian Niall Ferguson
Economist and academic Stephanie Kelton
Investor Daniel Maegaard
Investment strategist Raoul Pal
Financial commentator Peter Schiff
Economist Pavlina Tcherneva

Producer Craig Templeton Smith
Editor Jasper Corbett


MON 21:00 A Sense of Music (m000wjpx)
Music can make us feel happy and sad. It can compel us to move in time with it, or sing along to a melody. It taps into some integral sense of musicality that binds us together. But music is regimented, organised. That same 'sense' that lets us lean into Beethoven makes a bad note or a missed beat instantly recognisable. But does that same thing happen in the minds of animals? Can a monkey feel moved by Mozart? Will a bird bop to a beat?

Do animals share our 'Sense of Music'?

Charles Darwin himself thought that the basic building blocks of an appreciation for music were shared across the animal kingdom. But over decades of scientific investigation, evidence for this has been vanishingly rare.

Fresh from his revelation that animals' experience of time can be vastly different to our own, in the award-winning programme 'A Sense of Time', presenter Geoff Marsh delves once more into the minds of different species. This time he explores three key aspects of musicality: rhythm, melody and emotional sensitivity.

Geoff finds rhythm is lacking in our closest relatives, the chimpanzees. But it's abundantly clear in a dancing Cockatoo, and internet sensation, named Snowball. He speaks with scientists who have revealed that birds enjoy their own music, but may be listening for something completely different to melody. And Geoff listens to music composed for tamarin monkeys, that apparently they find remarkably relaxing, but which sets us on edge.

In 'A Sense of Music', discover what happens when music meets the animal mind.

Produced by Rory Galloway
Presented by Geoff Marsh


MON 21:30 Start the Week (m000wrlc)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today]


MON 22:00 The World Tonight (m000wrp0)
In-depth reporting, intelligent analysis and breaking news from a global perspective


MON 22:45 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wrm9)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:04 today]


MON 23:00 American Psycho at 30 (m000tfl6)
Bret Easton Ellis’s third novel, American Psycho, was nearly not published. Leaked pages of some of the novel’s most violent scenes provoked outrage, and the original publishers pulled out.

But 30 years on, the book’s cultural relevance is hard to deny, as is its eerie prescience. The world of Wall Street serial killer Patrick Bateman looks alarmingly similar to today's world - a consumerist, narcissistic and brand-obsessed society, rife with racism and misogyny, and perhaps most eerie of all, an obsession with Donald Trump.

The writer Octavia Bright unravels why this acerbic satire of a cruel capitalist world, and its dubious social and cultural values, continues to resonate. She unpacks our reaction to disturbing and disgust-provoking literature, asking why this novel struck such a nerve.

Octavia speaks to Bret Easton Ellis, the film’s director Mary Harron, Professor of Business Ethics John Paul Rollert, Professor of Social Psychology Sophie Russell, an expert in the emotion of disgust, and novelist Eliza Clark. With readings from the novel by Christopher Ragland.

Did we never leave the 80s? Are we all psychos now?

Presenter: Octavia Bright
Producer: Sasha Edye-Lindner

A Whistledown production for BBC Radio 4


MON 23:30 Today in Parliament (m000wrp2)
Today in Parliament

News, views and features on today's stories in Parliament



TUESDAY 08 JUNE 2021

TUE 00:00 Midnight News (m000wrp4)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


TUE 00:30 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjd3)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Monday]


TUE 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wrp6)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


TUE 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wrp8)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


TUE 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wrpb)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


TUE 05:30 News Briefing (m000wrpd)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


TUE 05:43 Prayer for the Day (m000wrpg)
A reflection and prayer to start the day with Rev Cheryl Meban



Good morning.

As we emerge hopefully from the worst of COVID, many people – too long cooped up, long for a change of scene, a move of home, or just a holiday. Some have lost jobs and can’t pay rent. Migration is a fact of life and sometimes with armies, sometimes with nothing, or from sheer curiosity and a spirit of adventure.

Also on this day in the year 793, on the beautiful Lindisfarne Island, in the North-East of England, Vikings arriving in longboats visited St Cuthbert’s monastery, not to pray or seek wisdom or blessing, but to plunder and slaughter. Alcuin of York wrote to his bishop, "They have desecrated God's sanctuary, shed the blood of saints around the altar, laid waste the house of our hope and trampled the bodies of the saints like dung on the street." People were shocked. Why would God allow such a thing?

The account resonates emotionally with stories of attacks in London, Oklahoma, Rwanda, Belfast, New York, Israel-Palestine, Central African Republic; violence by strangers creates terror and hatred for generations. Yet violence by loved ones, intimate partners or sometimes our “own sort” can be somehow normalised, internalised.

Creator of All, of us and them, both here and there, teach us humanity that reflects your generous and courageous love. In all our encounters, relationships and travels, whether we are on an ego-trip, or a religious pilgrimage,, show us how our arrival in another place, in another’s life, can be experienced as unwelcome invasion. You cross heavens and earth to make peace with us. Make us makers of peace. Amen.


TUE 05:45 Farming Today (m000wrpj)
The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.


TUE 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b04mlpll)
Bell Miner

Tweet of the Day is the voice of birds and our relationship with them, from around the world.

Chris Packham presents the bell miner of eastern Australia. The sound of a tiny hammer striking a musical anvil in a grove of gum trees signifies that bell miners are in search of sugar. More often heard than seen the bell miner is a smallish olive-green bird with a short yellow bill, with a small orange patch behind the eye. It belongs to a large family of birds known as honeyeaters because many have a sweet tooth and use their long bills to probe flowers for nectar. But the bell miner gets its sugar hit in other ways. Roving in sociable flocks, bell miners scour eucalyptus leaves for tiny bugs called psyllids who produce a protective waxy dome. Bell miners feed on these sweet tasting shelters. Some scientists suggest that Bell Miners actively farm these insects by avoiding over-exploiting of the psyllid colonies, allowing the insects numbers to recover before the birds' next visit. So dependent are they on these psyllids bugs that Bell Miners numbers can often fluctuate in association with any boom-and-bust changes in psyllid population.


TUE 06:00 Today (m000wrjn)
News and current affairs, including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.


TUE 09:00 The Long View (m000wrjs)
The Roaring Twenties

Break-neck technological innovation, a realignment in both British politics and the global order, a decade of economic boom and bust. Jonathan Freedland and his guests ask if the post-pandemic 1920s deserve their golden reputation and whether we're now on the brink of a second 'Roaring Twenties'.

Joining Jonathan to look back at the 1920s and forward to the 2020s are the historian Dr Luke Blaxill of the University of Oxford, the economists George Magnus and Dr Linda Yueh and journalists Tim Stanley of The Telegraph and John Harris of The Guardian. The actor is Beattie Edmondson.

Producer Julia Johnson


TUE 09:30 A Show of Hands (m000wrjw)
Manipulation

We use our hands to explore the world around us; to manipulate and change it; to communicate; to signify aggression, submission or gratitude; to comfort or arouse; to make music, craft and create. We point, punch, tweak and text. We ball our fists, spread our palms, give someone the thumbs up and close our hands in prayer.

More than anything else, is it our hands which make us human?

In this series considers the human hand from five quite different angles: manipulation, creativity, gesture, communication and touch. In each programme we hear from people who have a very particular perspective on hands and the way we use them, including a dancer, a blacksmith, a massage therapist, a priest and the recipient of a hand transplant. Each of them takes a long look at their own hands, describes what they see and considers the relationship with the world which their hands give them.

As we encounter healing hands, steady hands, talking hands, holding hands and the laying-on of hands we come to understand just how much our hands identify and define us

The very word ‘manipulate’ has the image of the hand embedded in it and the first episode explores how we use them to organise, shape and change our world. We hear from consultant plastic surgeon Professor Simon Kay who leads the UK’s only hand transplant service at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust. He considers the psychological aspects of hand injury and how much our identity and sense of ‘self’ is tied up in our hands.

We meet Tanya Shepherd who lost both her hands and one of arms to sepsis. In 2018 she became the first woman in the UK to receive a double hand transplant. She reflects on learning to touch and manipulate objects with a new pair of donor hands.

And Professor Tracy Kivell from the University of Kent takes a paleoanthropologist’s view, considering the evolution of an organ which has the strength to grip and wield heavy tools but which can also perform the finest, most delicate tasks – for example by Simon Kay in a surgical operation.

Producer: Jeremy Grange

Photograph courtesy of Tim Booth.


TUE 09:45 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjtt)
Episode 2

The revelatory biography of the early life of Prince Philip.

We have grown so used to seeing Prince Philip as a loyal, dutiful elderly man that it is easy to forget what a strange and intriguing life he led when he was younger. Originally published to coincide with his 90th birthday in 2011, 'Young Prince Philip' tells the story of the first half of his life.

Philip Eade focuses on those aspects of the Prince's early life that are most compelling: his father's dramatic flight from revolutionary Greece; the subsequent madness of his deaf mother and prolonged absences of his feckless father; his school days in Nazi Germany; his relationship with his four sisters, all married to Germans, one to an officer in the SS; his rather breezy courtship and marriage to the most eligible young woman in the world; and his membership of raffish circles during the 1950s and '60s.

Abridged by Polly Coles
Read by Nicholas Woodeson

Produced by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4


TUE 10:00 Woman's Hour (m000wrk0)
Women's voices and women's lives - topical conversations to inform, challenge and inspire.


TUE 11:00 Adults, Almost (m000wrk2)
Frank and fearless teenagers from Company Three youth theatre spent 2020 making a time capsule of their lives in lockdown, from the day their schools shut down to the present. Recording on their phones, they created lively, intimate scenes from family life, reflecting on what it means to come of age without the usual rites of passage like exams and school leaving parties. They have lost much - but, as the year went on, they found sides to themselves that took them by surprise, and a new appreciation of relationships with others.

Presented by Kezia Adewale and Shilton Freeman, the programme includes songs, jokes, sound recordings and thoughts from many other members of Company Three.

With thanks to Angie Peña Arenas, project manager for Company Three.

Sound design and original music by Jon Nicholls.

Produced by Monica Whitlock.

(image of Kezia Adewale with members of the youth theatre. Photo Credit: James Bellorini for Company Three.)


TUE 11:30 Natalie Haynes Stands Up for the Classics (m000wrk4)
Series 7

Clytemnestra

"Rock star classicist" and reformed stand-up Natalie Haynes is obsessed with the ancient world. In these series she explores (historical and mythological) lives from ancient Rome and Greece that still have resonance today. They are hilarious and tragic, mystifying, revelatory. And they always tell us more about ourselves now than seems possible of stories from a couple of thousand years ago.

Today Natalie stands up for Clytemnestra, who has been characterised as the worst wife in Greek mythology. This is open to debate: she's certainly a good mother, if a little bit murderous of her husband. But it turns out that Agamemnon probably deserves it. After all he sacrifices one of their daughters to Artemis without a second thought and then turns up at home years later with Cassandra, the future-seeing woman he has 'won' as a prize (also read: trafficked and enslaved) at the Battle of Troy. These actions demonstrate a certain lack of respect for his wife, as well as cruelty of the highest order. Cassandra reads the room, obviously, but nobody listens to her. Clytemnestra has a good legal brain and states her case convincingly. But it's unlikely to end well.

With Professor Edith Hall.
Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery


TUE 12:00 News Summary (m000wrk6)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


TUE 12:04 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wrk8)
Episode 2

Asha is halfway through her PhD and working on an algorithm to develop empathy in artificial intelligence. When she meets up with her high-school crush Cyrus, now a charismatic creator and celebrant of secular rituals, she sees the opportunity to adapt her research into a revolutionary new social media platform bringing meaning into millions of lives.

She also falls back in love with Cyrus and they get married in a whirlwind of passion, ambition and excitement. Together with Cyrus’s best friend Jules, they are invited to join the super-cool startup incubator Utopia, and their journey through the cutting-edge world of tech innovation begins.

As their app takes off, Asha finds herself confronting challenges to her marriage, her dreams for the future and her independence, and discovers the brave new world of tech is still, like the old one, dominated by men and their ambitions.

Episode 2/10: People say there’s no such thing as Utopia, but they’re wrong.

Tahmima Anam is a novelist, short-story writer and Harvard educated anthropologist. Her first novel, A Golden Age, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Costa First Novel Award, and won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book. Her other novels are The Good Muslim and The Bones of Grace. The Startup Wife owes its inspiration to her own experiences as executive director of a music technology startup founded by her husband.

Reader: Preeya Kalidas
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Celia de Wolff
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

Image: Tahmima Anam
Credit: Abeer Y. Hoque


TUE 12:18 You and Yours (m000wrkc)
News and discussion of consumer affairs


TUE 12:57 Weather (m000wrkf)
The latest weather forecast


TUE 13:00 World at One (m000wrkh)
Forty-five minutes of news, analysis and comment, with Sarah Montague.


TUE 13:45 Small Island or Global Britain? (m000wrkk)
Rule the Waves?

As Britain prepares to host the leaders of the richest democracies in the world at the G7 summit, Nick Robinson begins a week-long series  exploring Britain’s place in the world.

Over five programmes, Nick considers our hard, soft and economic power, our influence and alliances, whether we are we just a Small Island or whether we can be, in Boris Johnson’s phrase, Global Britain?  

2. Rule the Waves?

From the flight deck of the aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth, and in the aftermath of the Government’s overhaul of defence in March’s Integrated Review, Nick asks if Britain is now a ‘pocket superpower’. Does HMS Queen Elizabeth, soon to embark for the South China Sea, embody a commitment to symbolism, as opposed to a practical ability, or willingness to engage on the international stage?

Joined by the current Chief of the Defence Staff, a former Foreign Secretary and a former Director of the CIA, Nick looks at what threats Britain faces and asks whether shrinking of the army in the Integrated Review is the nail in the coffin for Britain’s ability to operate alone overseas. Are we still a credible ally to our most important defensive partner, the United States? What price must we pay to retain our place at the top table of the global system? Ultimately, Nick asks if all this matters - did David Cameron’s historic defeat in the Commons over intervention in Libya mark the end of Britain’s willingness to engage in conflicts overseas at all?

A Juniper Connect production for BBC Radio 4


TUE 14:00 The Archers (m000wrkn)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Monday]


TUE 14:15 Dangerous Visions (m0005mtr)
Body Tourists

It's 2045 and scientists have found a way to store memory and personality digitally after death - inserting a chip into other living bodies. The procedure is still at the trial stage.

The drama follows consultant Luke Butler and the experiences of the first volunteer bodies - the Hosts - intercut with the experiences of their new inhabitants, the Body Tourists who have been cryogenically frozen in anticipation of being brought back to life.

Hosts are drawn from among the unemployed poor in fenced estates in the north of England, who are paid handsomely for their bodies. After 14 days, each body is returned to its owner.

But Luke has inserted the brain of a dead woman scientist he venerates, Octavia, into the body of a young man he admires, Ryan.

This play has been rewritten and expanded by Jane Rogers into a full-length novel called Body Tourists, which will be published later in 2019.

Cast:
Octavia ..... Susan Brown
Luke ..... Joseph Kloska
Paula ..... Lotte Rice
Ryan ..... Will Taylor
Gemma/Bot ..... Alana Ramsey

Music by 0171

Produced and Directed by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4


TUE 15:00 Short Cuts (m000wrkq)
Grace Notes

Audio adventures and short documentaries about music, presented by Josie Long. The soundtrack to an exploration of queerness, moments of transcendence in Indian classical music, and the folk singer Rowan Rheingans on her musical homage to a Dutch Jewish diarist.

Curatorial team: Alia Cassam and Eleanor McDowall
Producer: Andrea Rangecroft
Exec Producer: Zakia Sewell
A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4


TUE 15:30 Made of Stronger Stuff (p09cd8b9)
Serotonin

Psychologist Kimberley Wilson and Dr Xand van Tulleken take a journey around the human body, asking what it can tell us about our innate capacity for change. In this episode, they explore serotonin - a chemical involved in everything from sleep to bowel function, appetite to blood clotting.

Xand and Kimberley find out why serotonin’s reputation as the “happy chemical” is misleading, explore the interaction between serotonin and dopamine in sex drive, and hear about new approaches to treating depression using psychoactive drugs.

Producer: Dan Hardoon
Researcher: Emily Finch
Executive Producer: Kate Holland
A Whistledown production for BBC Radio 4


TUE 16:00 Law in Action (m000wrkt)
Traumatic brain injury and crime

Traumatic brain injury can cause neurological changes that make people more impulsive, less able to control their reactions, and less able to understand others. Therefore it's associated with violent crime. An estimated 60% of those in prison have a history of brain injury. But is prison the best place for them, and their rehabilitation? The criminal justice system is taking an ever greater interest in how to deal with traumatic brain injury. We hear about a Thames Valley Police pilot project to keep offenders out of prison, pre-sentence screening in the UK and elsewhere, and about an innovative court for those aged 18-25 in New Zealand.

Brain injury is as common among women prisoners, often due to a history of suffering domestic violence. For these women their injuries, compounded by other factors, lead to mental health issues so serious that it's estimated that three quarters of them have tried to take their own lives. What are prisons doing to help them? And what about women prisoners' additional burdens, such as anxiety about separation from their children, which affects them more than men? Can a new report by the Chief Inspector of Prisons point to ways forward for England and Wales?

Presenter: Joshua Rozenberg
Producer: Arlene Gregorius
Researcher: Diane Richardson


TUE 16:30 A Good Read (m000wttb)
Isy Suttie & Vick Hope

Comedian and writer Isy Suttie and the Radio 1 presenter and author Vick Hope are A Good Read's guests.

Vick loves Zadie Smith's Swing Time, Isy chooses Patrick Suskind's The Pigeon and we hear why Harriett's choice of the Young Adult book A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness has her guests in tears.

Producer for BBC Audio in Bristol: Caitlin Hobbs

Join our Instagram book club: @agoodreadbbc


TUE 17:00 PM (m000wrkw)
Afternoon news and current affairs programme, reporting on breaking stories and summing up the day's headlines.


TUE 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wrky)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.


TUE 18:30 Ed Reardon's Week (m000wrl0)
Series 14

Prosecco o’Clock

Author of several plays, television dramas, works of non-fiction, letters to the BBC about the pitiful decline in standards of literature and grammar, and master of the abusive email – Ed Reardon is back.

In these globally ‘unprecedented times’ Ed is enjoying unprecedented times himself as he has become financially independent and is living in a superb, stylish capsule urban living unit. This new lifestyle comes curtesy of the conversion of no longer required office space to flats made affordable by the timely arrival of his state pension.

For the first time in twenty years, he can afford to eat three meals a day and has the luxury of not having to do anything he doesn’t want to, so can settle down to a long-cherished project – his memoirs. That is if Jenna, the previous occupant of the urban unit when it was office space, would stop visiting his fire escape because she misses the gossip and bantz she no longer gets when working from home.

But old habits die hard for Ed and he is soon distracted not only by the joys of Prosecco o’clock , but also the temptation of the flip-flops lying tantalisingly outside the discount shop in town.

The regular cast this series are joined by guests Maggie Steed, Kathryn Drysdale, Mina Anwar and Phaldut Sharma.

Cast list ep 1:
Ed Reardon………..Christopher Douglas
Ping…………….……..Barunka O’Shaughnessy
Jaz Milvain…….……Philip Jackson
Stan……………………Geoffrey Whitehead
Pearl…………………..Brigit Forsyth
Olive…………………..Stephanie Cole
Jenna…………………Mina Anwar
Instructor…………..Nicola Sanderson
Assistant……………Tom Price

Written by Andrew Nickolds and Christopher Douglas
Produced by Dawn Ellis
Production Co-ordinator Cherlynn Andrew-Wilfred
A BBC Studios Production


TUE 19:00 The Archers (m000wrl6)
Brian eats humble pie and Jazzer finds himself caught in the middle.


TUE 19:15 Front Row (m000wrld)
Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music


TUE 19:45 The Art of Innovation (m0008y4q)
Reaching for the Moon

Nearly a century before the Apollo astronauts first captured close up images of the lunar surface, similar detailed photographs had appeared in a book by artist and engineer James Nasmyth. Ian unravels the extraordinary creative process Nasmyth went through. He made meticulous drawings from nightly moon observations though his 20 inch telescope, from which he moulded in plaster detailed recreations of the lunar surface. One of his carefully crafted models in the Science Museum Group’s collection is testament to the sheer amount of scientific detail Nasmyth fashioned, and went on to light and then photograph.

It’s no secret Nasmyth’s artistic creations were highly contrived. But intriguingly, as Ian reveals, at a time when this new era of photography offered science an objective untainted eye, it’s Nasmyth’s very contrivance that led to universal praise for their accuracy and authenticity. It was to prove a pivotal moment in the history of scientific imagery and kick-started realistic renderings of other worlds.

Producer Adrian Washbourne

Produced in partnership with The Science Museum Group

Photograph (C) The Science Museum Group


TUE 20:00 File on 4 (m000wrll)
The Cost of Care

File on 4 investigates the new challenges of providing home care during the Covid 19 pandemic - with some recipients seeing their care costs increased while their hours are reduced.

Exploring the phenomenon of retrospective charging, reports of financial assessments being neglected, and allegations that people's basic needs are not being met, are some of society’s most vulnerable being made to shoulder the cost of local council funding gaps?

Producer: Mike Cowan
Reporter: Claire Bolderson
Editor: Maggie Latham


TUE 20:40 In Touch (m000wrls)
News, views and information for people who are blind or partially sighted


TUE 21:00 All in the Mind (m000wrlz)
Programme exploring the limits and potential of the human mind. Producer: Deborah Cohen.


TUE 21:30 The Long View (m000wrjs)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today]


TUE 22:00 The World Tonight (m000wrm3)
In-depth reporting, intelligent analysis and breaking news from a global perspective


TUE 22:45 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wrk8)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:04 today]


TUE 23:00 Fortunately... with Fi and Jane (m000wrm8)
192. Elvis Ambivalence and Stallion Concierges, with Alastair Campbell

This week on Fortunately, Fi and Jane are joined by political strategist and author Alastair Campbell. The former No.10 insider discusses his book 'Living Better: How I Learned to Survive Depression', which explores mental illness in a family. Alastair also describes his perfect macho photoshoot, professes the importance of jam jars and offers to put a good word in with ol'Tony. Before Alastair logged in there's fuzzy forks, leftover wax and moon births.

Get in touch: fortunately.podcast@bbc.co.uk


TUE 23:30 Today in Parliament (m000wrmd)
Today in Parliament

News, views and features on today's stories in Parliament



WEDNESDAY 09 JUNE 2021

WED 00:00 Midnight News (m000wrmk)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


WED 00:30 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjtt)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Tuesday]


WED 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wrmr)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


WED 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wrmx)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


WED 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wrn1)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


WED 05:30 News Briefing (m000wrn5)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


WED 05:43 Prayer for the Day (m000wrn9)
A reflection and prayer to start the day with Rev Cheryl Meban


Good morning.

If you like Rugby, you may have noticed that Toulouse recently became the first side to win five Champions Cups. As a Francophile, I was fascinated to discover another Toulouse victory, in the year 721 – exactly 1300 years ago today.

Odo, Duc d’Acquitaine, had fled his capital city, Toulouse. The wali of Al-Andalus, had built up a strong Umayyad army to invade Acquitaine. Toulouse after a siege of some three months, was about to surrender, when Odo returned with reinforcements. The invaders had become overconfident, neglecting to maintain the outer defences around their siege camp. The returning Odo’s forces completely surprised the besieging army, scattering and slaughtering soldiers resting, and those fleeing without weapons or armour.

For this victory, Odo became “Odo the Great”. Even though he was dreadfully defeated 12 years later at Bordeaux,the Battle for Toulouse secured time for the Frankish forces to develop sufficiently eventually to secure a decisive victory against the Umayyads eleven years later at Tours.
We’ll never really know what would have happened, if Odo had been defeated at Toulouse, or arrived later – or sooner. And no earthly justice can repay the cruelties of the competitive human spirit and the inhumanity of the compulsion for power. But the arc of history is long…

God thank you that so many of our tribal battles can be played on pitches; and with rules and time limits rather than the powerful imposing their presence violence. Prevent us from perpetuating economic warfare, taking lands from indigenous peoples, burning rainforests and trashing ecosystems. Amen


WED 05:45 Farming Today (m000wrnf)
The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.


WED 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b03dwy14)
Black-Headed Gull

Martin Hughes-Games presents the Black-Headed Gull.
Black-Headed Gulls are our commonest small gull and throughout the year you can identify them by their rather delicate flight action, red legs and the white flash on the front edge of their wings.


WED 06:00 Today (m000wsdy)
News and current affairs, including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.


WED 09:00 More or Less (m000wsf0)
Tim Harford explains the numbers and statistics used in everyday life


WED 09:30 Four Thought (m000wsf2)
Thought-provoking talks in which speakers explore original ideas about culture and society


WED 09:45 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjtw)
Episode 3

The revelatory biography of the early life of Prince Philip.

We have grown so used to seeing Prince Philip as a loyal, dutiful elderly man that it is easy to forget what a strange and intriguing life he led when he was younger. Originally published to coincide with his 90th birthday in 2011, 'Young Prince Philip' tells the story of the first half of his life.

Philip Eade focuses on those aspects of the Prince's early life that are most compelling: his father's dramatic flight from revolutionary Greece; the subsequent madness of his deaf mother and prolonged absences of his feckless father; his school days in Nazi Germany; his relationship with his four sisters, all married to Germans, one to an officer in the SS; his rather breezy courtship and marriage to the most eligible young woman in the world; and his membership of raffish circles during the 1950s and '60s.

Abridged by Polly Coles
Read by Nicholas Woodeson

Produced by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4


WED 10:00 Woman's Hour (m000wsf4)
Women's voices and women's lives - topical conversations to inform, challenge and inspire.


WED 11:00 Born in Bradford (m000wrnv)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 on Monday]


WED 11:30 Mark Steel's in Town (b09jd67l)
Series 8

Inverness

Mark visits Inverness in the Highlands of Scotland.

Inverness is the 2nd happiest place in Britain, according to some polls, but Mark finds them to be a bit grumpy if the truth be known... some of them anyway... some of them are marvellous. He meets Sheena from the local taxi firm who tells a story about a fib she told to a tourist, and he meets Steve the Nessie Hunter, a man who has lived in a van on the shores of Loch Ness for 26 years.

The 8th series of Mark Steele's award winning show that travels around the country visiting towns that have nothing in common but their uniqueness. After thoroughly researching each town, Mark writes and performs a bespoke evening of comedy for the local residents.

Written and performed by ... Mark Steel
Additional material by ... Pete Sinclair

Production co-ordinator ... Hayley Sterling
Sound Manager ... Jerry Peal
Producer ... Carl Cooper

Picture Credit ... Tom Stanier

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in Decenber 2017.


WED 12:00 News Summary (m000wsf6)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


WED 12:04 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wsf8)
Episode 3

Asha is halfway through her PhD and working on an algorithm to develop empathy in artificial intelligence. When she meets up with her high-school crush Cyrus, now a charismatic creator and celebrant of secular rituals, she sees the opportunity to adapt her research into a revolutionary new social media platform bringing meaning into millions of lives.

She also falls back in love with Cyrus and they get married in a whirlwind of passion, ambition and excitement. Together with Cyrus’s best friend Jules, they are invited to join the super-cool startup incubator Utopia, and their journey through the cutting-edge world of tech innovation begins.

As their app takes off, Asha finds herself confronting challenges to her marriage, her dreams for the future and her independence, and discovers the brave new world of tech is still, like the old one, dominated by men and their ambitions.

Episode 3/10: Fundraising, or the art of kissing frogs.

Tahmima Anam is a novelist, short-story writer and Harvard educated anthropologist. Her first novel, A Golden Age, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Costa First Novel Award, and won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book. Her other novels are The Good Muslim and The Bones of Grace. The Startup Wife owes its inspiration to her own experiences as executive director of a music technology startup founded by her husband.

Reader: Preeya Kalidas
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Celia de Wolff
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

Image: Tahmima Anam
Credit: Abeer Y. Hoque


WED 12:18 You and Yours (m000wsfb)
News and discussion of consumer affairs


WED 12:57 Weather (m000wsfd)
The latest weather forecast


WED 13:00 World at One (m000wsfg)
Forty-five minutes of news, analysis and comment, with Sarah Montague.


WED 13:45 Small Island or Global Britain? (m000wsfj)
Brand Britain

As Britain prepares to host the leaders of the richest democracies in the world at the G7 summit, Nick Robinson begins a week-long series  exploring Britain’s place in the world.

Over five programmes, Nick considers our hard, soft and economic power, our influence and alliances, whether we are we just a Small Island or whether we can be, in Boris Johnson’s phrase, Global Britain?  

3. Brand Britain

Swapping the Beatles, Bond and Beckham for the Premier League, Nick examines the strength of Britain’s soft power through the lens of one of our most powerful international brands. He explores the confluence of factors that made the Premier League the premier league, and considers what the recent European Super League fiasco means. In addition, with the writer of the hit ITV series Victoria, Daisy Goodwin, Nick considers which British TV shows do, and do not, sell abroad and asks if Brand Britain is being diluted by a Netflix-induced pressure to make popular culture more palatable to many different countries at once. Finally, the programme questions whether Britain is too complacent about one of our largest soft power assets, higher education.

A Juniper Connect production for BBC Radio 4


WED 14:00 The Archers (m000wrl6)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Tuesday]


WED 14:15 Drama (b0952sv4)
Rumpole

Rumpole and The Quacks

It's 1966, and Rumpole meets a delightful, wise and kindly Asian Doctor who, unexpectedly accused of unprofessional conduct, needs his help.

The case involves both Rumpole and Phyllid, Rumpole's dear friend and his "Portia of the Chambers", as they learn about the shadowy behaviour of some unscrupulous drug companies and the correct way to diagnose glandular fever.

Their friendship also becomes just a tad more ambiguous as both their marriages prove irksome.

Adapted for radio by Richard Stoneman
Directed by Marilyn Imrie
A Catherine Bailey production for BBC Radio 4.


WED 15:00 Money Box (m000wsfl)
Paul Lewis and a panel of guests answer calls on personal finance. Producer: Emma Rippon


WED 15:30 All in the Mind (m000wrlz)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 on Tuesday]


WED 16:00 Thinking Allowed (m000wsfn)
Laurie Taylor explores the latest research into how society works.


WED 16:30 The Media Show (m000wsfq)
Social media, anti-social media, breaking news, faking news: this is the programme about a revolution in media.


WED 17:00 PM (m000wsfs)
Afternoon news and current affairs programme, reporting on breaking stories and summing up the day's headlines.


WED 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wsfv)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.


WED 18:30 Shush! (b08r1wd8)
Series 2

A Fairy Tale Ending

When family come to call, Snoo runs into problems with a grape and Alice has to learn a tricky manoeuvre.

Meet Alice (Rebecca Front) - a former child prodigy who won a place at Oxford aged 9 but, because Daddy went too, she never needed to have any friends. She's scared of everything. Everything that is except libraries and Snoo (Morwenna Banks) - a slightly confused individual with a have-a-go attitude to life, marriage, haircuts and reality. Snoo loves books, and fully intends to read one one day.

And forever popping into the library is Dr Cadogan (Michael Fenton Stevens) - celebrity doctor to the stars and a man with his finger in every pie. Charming, indiscreet and quite possibly wanted by Interpol, if you want a discrete nip and tuck and then photos of it accidentally left on the photocopier, Dr Cadogan is your man.

Their happy life is interrupted by the arrival of Simon Nielson (Ben Willbond), a man with a mission - a mission to close down inefficient libraries. Fortunately, he hates his mission. What he really wants to do is once - just once - get even with his inexhaustible supply of high-achieving brothers.

Written by Morwenna Banks and Rebecca Front
Based on an idea developed with Armando Iannucci

Produced by David Tyler
A Pozzitive production for BBC Radio 4.


WED 19:00 The Archers (m000wsfx)
Peggy has a confession to make and Fallon is left torn.


WED 19:15 Front Row (m000wsfz)
Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music


WED 19:45 The Art of Innovation (m0008wp3)
Dyeing to Display

A 19th-century purple silk dress in the Science Museum Group’s collection, dyed with the first synthetic dye, is witness to the sheer power that new artificial colours had on turning clothing into an eye-catching art form. The accidental discovery by William Henry Perkin of an artificial purple dye from coal tar extract gave birth to “Purplemania”. It sparked a frenzy of activity among research chemists for more bright new colour dyes and in turn a new rigour in rationalising chemical reactions.

But as Tilly reveals, many in the artistic community, such as the influential Arts and Crafts movement rejected the garishness and impermanence of artificial dyes within the Victorian culture of conspicuous consumption. They sought to influence wealthier individuals with a more modest palette of fast dyes, and in so doing helped condition our reaction to the subtleties in walking the ever important tightrope of taste.

Producer Adrian Washbourne

Produced in partnership with the Science Museum Group

Photograph (C) The Science Museum Group


WED 20:00 Moral Maze (m000wsg1)
Live debate examining the moral issues behind one of the week's news stories. #moralmaze


WED 20:45 Four Thought (m000wsf2)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:30 today]


WED 21:00 Made of Stronger Stuff (p09cd8b9)
[Repeat of broadcast at 15:30 on Tuesday]


WED 21:30 The Media Show (m000wsfq)
[Repeat of broadcast at 16:30 today]


WED 22:00 The World Tonight (m000wsg3)
In-depth reporting, intelligent analysis and breaking news from a global perspective


WED 22:45 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wsf8)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:04 today]


WED 23:00 Twayna Mayne: Black Woman (m000wsg5)
6. Stereotypes

Comedian Twayna Mayne, born to Jamaican parents and raised by a white parent, explores the subject of racial stereotyping and how it has an effect on identity from childhood onwards. Performing at the Radio Theatre with a virtual audience, Twayna also hears from chef and broadcaster Andi Oliver. Series 1 was awarded Best Comedy at the BBC Radio and Music Awards 2020.

The extended roundtable conversation is also available on BBC Sounds.

Written and performed by Twayna Mayne
Roundtable guests, Andi Oliver and Chantelle Lewis
Production coordinator, Beverly Tagg
Producer, Julia McKenzie
A BBC Studios Production


WED 23:15 The Skewer (m000wsg7)
Series 4

Episode 2

Returning to twist itself into - and remix - the news. Jon Holmes presents The Skewer.


WED 23:30 Today in Parliament (m000wsg9)
Today in Parliament

News, views and features on today's stories in Parliament



THURSDAY 10 JUNE 2021

THU 00:00 Midnight News (m000wsgc)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


THU 00:30 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjtw)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Wednesday]


THU 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wsgf)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


THU 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wsgh)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


THU 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wsgk)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


THU 05:30 News Briefing (m000wsgm)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


THU 05:43 Prayer for the Day (m000wsgp)
A reflection and prayer to start the day with Rev Cheryl Meban

Good morning.

The Cathedral at Chartres was begun in 1145, but fifty years later, it suffered a major fire. It was rebuilt so well that it stands, well preserved, still with its nearly 800 year old original stained glass windows. My friend’s family friend Christiane drove us, my schoolfriend and I, in her Citroen 2CV the 50 miles from Paris, to see Chartres. At 14, we didn’t fully appreciate it. But it was so other-worldly, so colourful, majestic, full of – to me- alien code and mysterious architecture, I had no translator to interpret the language of medieval or Gothic Christian spirituality into my low-church simplistic Biblical faith.

I didn’t understand it, but nor was I afraid of it. I was from a Plymouth Brethren background - we said we weren’t Catholic or Protestant, We were Christians. Our faith was based on keeping it simple – God relating to humans through God’s Spirit bringing the Bible to life – This faith had, as I heard it preached, no room for holy places or sanctuaries – God’s chosen dwelling, we knew, was human bodies, the temple of the Holy Spirit. Our worship of God should not be distracted by things made by human hands.

And yet, as I have grown in God, the gift of creativity and artistic expression, lifting spirits by shaping physical environments, and sounds - all this belongs, too. I felt the impact of Chartres cathedral - its size, its situation in the landscape, but also its sheer age, testimony to generations and generations touched by stories told in these windows and stones.

God of All Truth, creator of stone and light, of fields and spires, persevere with us, to write your eternal story of Word made flesh. Amen


THU 05:45 Farming Today (m000wsgr)
The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.


THU 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b03dwxfp)
Siskin

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs.

Martin Hughes-Games presents the Siskin. Siskins are visiting our gardens as never before. These birds now breed across the UK and cash in on our love of bird-feeding. They are now regular visitors to seed dispensers of all kinds.


THU 06:00 Today (m000wsxc)
News and current affairs, including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.


THU 09:00 In Our Time (m000wsxf)
Booth's Life and Labour Survey

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Charles Booth's survey, The Life and Labour of the People in London, published in 17 volumes from 1889 to 1903. Booth (1840-1916), a Liverpudlian shipping line owner, surveyed every household in London to see if it was true, as claimed, that at as many as a quarter lived in poverty. He found that it was closer to a third, and that many of these were either children with no means of support or older people no longer well enough to work. He went on to campaign for an old age pension, and broadened the impact of his findings by publishing enhanced Ordnance Survey maps with the streets coloured according to the wealth of those who lived there.

The image above is of an organ grinder on a London street, circa 1893, with children dancing to the Pas de Quatre

With

Emma Griffin
Professor of Modern British History at the University of East Anglia

Sarah Wise
Adjunct Professor at the University of California

And

Lawrence Goldman
Emeritus Fellow in History at St Peter’s College, University of Oxford

Producer: Simon Tillotson


THU 09:45 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjtr)
Episode 4

The revelatory biography of the early life of Prince Philip.

We have grown so used to seeing Prince Philip as a loyal, dutiful elderly man that it is easy to forget what a strange and intriguing life he led when he was younger. Originally published to coincide with his 90th birthday in 2011, 'Young Prince Philip' tells the story of the first half of his life.

Philip Eade focuses on those aspects of the Prince's early life that are most compelling: his father's dramatic flight from revolutionary Greece; the subsequent madness of his deaf mother and prolonged absences of his feckless father; his school days in Nazi Germany; his relationship with his four sisters, all married to Germans, one to an officer in the SS; his rather breezy courtship and marriage to the most eligible young woman in the world; and his membership of raffish circles during the 1950s and '60s.

Abridged by Polly Coles
Read by Nicholas Woodeson

Produced by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4


THU 10:00 Woman's Hour (m000wsxh)
Women's voices and women's lives - topical conversations to inform, challenge and inspire.


THU 11:00 From Our Own Correspondent (m000wsxk)
Insight, and analysis from BBC correspondents around the world


THU 11:30 Girl Stuck in Basketball Hoop (m000w4sp)
When stand-up comedian Ian Smith read the headline "GIRL RESCUED" in his local paper, The Goole Times, he wasn’t expecting to read about a young girl trapped in a basketball hoop. The article went on to say that this was the third time in as many months that a girl had to be prized from the rim of a basketball hoop in his home town. Maybe this wasn’t your regular teenage horseplay in the local basketball courts - Ian wondered if something more sinister was going on.

This is the story of his investigation into what happened, and more importantly, why it happened. It's not just a quest for the truth behind these "self-dunking" incidents but also a soul-searching examination of the lives of the teenagers of Goole and a probe into the psyche of people across the world who choose to squeeze themselves through small spaces.

Ian leaves no stone unturned as he asks the tough (and not so tough) questions to guests including his local MP, the education specialist Adele Bates author of "Miss I Don't Give a Sh*t", comedian Jessica Fostekew and the world famous contortionist, Captain Frodo.

Thanks to Angela Huzulak and Patrick Goldsborough at The Goole Times, Dan Sproats, Tilly Sproats, Terence Smith, Joe Zalias, Caroline Nicholls, The Delightful Sausage, Phil Ellis, Jack Gleadow, Nicky Wilkinson, Sebastian Søgaard Hansen and Bukky Fadipe.

Written and presented by Ian Smith with additional material by Alex Kealy
Production co-ordinator: Sarah Sharpe
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Producer: Richard Morris

A BBC Studios Production


THU 12:00 News Summary (m000wsxm)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


THU 12:04 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wsxp)
Episode 4

Asha is halfway through her PhD and working on an algorithm to develop empathy in artificial intelligence. When she meets up with her high-school crush Cyrus, now a charismatic creator and celebrant of secular rituals, she sees the opportunity to adapt her research into a revolutionary new social media platform bringing meaning into millions of lives.

She also falls back in love with Cyrus and they get married in a whirlwind of passion, ambition and excitement. Together with Cyrus’s best friend Jules, they are invited to join the super-cool startup incubator Utopia, and their journey through the cutting-edge world of tech innovation begins.

As their app takes off, Asha finds herself confronting challenges to her marriage, her dreams for the future and her independence, and discovers the brave new world of tech is still, like the old one, dominated by men and their ambitions.

Episode 4/10: How to succeed in business and marriage at the same time.

Tahmima Anam is a novelist, short-story writer and Harvard educated anthropologist. Her first novel, A Golden Age, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Costa First Novel Award, and won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book. Her other novels are The Good Muslim and The Bones of Grace. The Startup Wife owes its inspiration to her own experiences as executive director of a music technology startup founded by her husband.

Reader: Preeya Kalidas
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Celia de Wolff
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

Image: Tahmima Anam
Credit: Abeer Y. Hoque


THU 12:18 You and Yours (m000wsxr)
News and discussion of consumer affairs


THU 12:57 Weather (m000wsxt)
The latest weather forecast


THU 13:00 World at One (m000wsxw)
Forty-five minutes of news, analysis and comment, with Sarah Montague.


THU 13:45 Small Island or Global Britain? (m000wsxy)
This Trading Nation

As Britain prepares to host the leaders of the richest democracies in the world at the G7 summit, Nick Robinson begins a week-long series  exploring Britain’s place in the world.

Over five programmes, Nick considers our hard, soft and economic power, our influence and alliances, whether we are we just a Small Island or whether we can be, in Boris Johnson’s phrase, Global Britain?  

4. This Trading Nation

Nick explores the future of British trade - what will Britain will be selling in the future, and who will be buying it? He asks whether the vaccine success story where, according to those involved, Britain was able to move at speed, show flexibility, and encourage innovation, is demonstrative of the potential advantages for a new, nimble Britain outside the world’s biggest trading bloc. Is the vaccine-recipe of world-class academics, innovative finance and flexible regulation one that can be replicated elsewhere?

Nick looks to FinTech, an industry worth £11 billion to the UK economy, and hears from the founder of Starling Bank about what is needed to make the ‘magic’ of FinTech happen. Finally, with both an Indian and Australian trade deal being talked up by the Government, Nick asks a former Australian Prime Minister and a former President of Coca Cola UK, what we can hope for from our trading relationships with these countries.

A Juniper Connect production for BBC Radio 4


THU 14:00 The Archers (m000wsfx)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Wednesday]


THU 14:15 Drama (m00050qh)
The Macefield Plot

by Daniel Thurman

When fractious and enigmatic Edith Macefield refuses to move out of her Seattle home, the developers build a five-storey mall around her. Construction manager Barry Martin endeavours to smooth troubled waters.

Edith ..... Sian Phillips
Barry ..... Stanley Townsend
Joe ..... Joseph Balderrama
Cops ..... Helen Clapp & Christopher Harper

Director: David Hunter


THU 15:00 Ramblings (m000wsy0)
Urban Ambling in Cultural Coventry

A fascinating wander through Coventry, the 2021 UK City of Culture. Ian Harrabin is a Trustee of the City of Culture so is the perfect guide to lead Clare Balding along a richly historic urban route. He is also Chair of the 'Historic Coventry Trust' which is running a host of projects designed to preserve, and make more accessible, some of the most interesting and little known parts of the city.

The walk began at Nauls Mill Park, Coundon Road, Coventry CV1 4AR. Map: OS Explorer 221 Coventry & Warwick. Grid Ref for Nauls Mill Park - SP 328 796

Producer: Karen Gregor


THU 15:27 Radio 4 Appeal (m000wsh3)
[Repeat of broadcast at 07:54 on Sunday]


THU 15:30 Bookclub (m000wsj1)
[Repeat of broadcast at 16:00 on Sunday]


THU 16:00 The Film Programme (m000wsy2)
Film programme looking at the latest cinema releases, DVDs and films on TV.


THU 16:30 BBC Inside Science (m000wsy4)
A weekly programme that illuminates the mysteries and challenges the controversies behind the science that's changing our world.


THU 17:00 PM (m000wsy6)
Afternoon news and current affairs programme, reporting on breaking stories and summing up the day's headlines.


THU 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wsy8)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.


THU 18:30 John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme (m000wsyb)
Series 9

Episode 6

The ninth series of John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme is very different to the previous eight. It's still written by John Finnemore, "one of our best sketch writers", (The Observer), and performed by him with "a great supporting cast of Margaret Cabourn-Smith, Simon Kane, Lawry Lewin and Carrie Quinlan" (The Telegraph), and there are still sketches and songs. But, with no live studio audience this year, John has taken the opportunity to try something completely new.

John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme started in 2011 and quickly established itself as "One of the most consistently funny sketch shows for quite some time" (The Guardian), and "One of the funniest and most inventive new radio comedy shows of recent years" (The Daily Mail).

Written by ... John Finnemore
Newt ... John Finnemore
Russ ... Lawry Lewin
Deborah ... Margaret Cabourn-Smith
Jerry ... Simon Kane
Vanessa ... Carrie Quinlan

Other parts played by the cast.

Original music composed by .... Susannah Pearse
Original music performed by ... Susannah Pearse and Sally Stares
Recorded and edited by ... Rich Evans at Syncbox Post
Production coordinator ... Beverly Tagg
Producer ... Ed Morrish

A BBC Studios Production


THU 19:00 The Archers (m000wsyd)
Writer, Keri Davies
Director, Peter Leslie Wild
Editor, Jeremy Howe

Brian Aldridge … Charles Collingwood
Jennifer Aldridge … Angela Piper
Harrison Burns … James Cartwright
Alice Carter … Hollie Chapman
Chris Carter … Wilf Scolding
Neil Carter … Brian Hewlett
Ed Grundy … Barry Farrimond
Emma Grundy … Emerald O’Hanrahan
Jazzer McCreary … Ryan Kelly
Fallon Rogers … Joanna Van Kampen
Peggy Woolley … June Spencer


THU 19:15 Front Row (m000wsyg)
Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music


THU 19:45 The Art of Innovation (m0008wl9)
Capturing Time

Sir Ian Blatchford and Dr Tilly Blyth continue their series exploring how art and science have inspired each other. They focus on photographic innovators of the late 1800s who used new advances in camera techniques to freeze time in the name of science, reanimate in the name of entertainment and seek new truths to human and animal motion.

At the National Science and Media Museum in Bradford, Tilly examines part of the Science Museum Group’s extensive collection of photographs by photojournalist and arch showman Eadweard Muybridge. His ingenious photo sequences of stills of a horse in motion helped settle a bet over whether the animal’s hooves leave the ground at speed. He would go on to devise magic lanterns with counter rotating discs of his artistically modified picture sequences to recreate the effect of movement, to the awe and excitement of viewers across America and Europe.

Muybridge had little regard for scientific rigour but whilst on tour in Paris his methods were enough to intrigue scientists such as physiologist Etienne Jules Marey who, as Ian illustrates, devised a chronophotographic camera to achieve multiple exposures of athletes in one single plate.

Instantaneous movement had been finally captured for accurate scientific analysis and for art and entertainment.

Producer Adrian Washbourne

Produced in partnership with The Science Museum Group

Photograph by SSPL/Getty Images


THU 20:00 Law in Action (m000wrkt)
[Repeat of broadcast at 16:00 on Tuesday]


THU 20:30 The Bottom Line (m000wsyj)
Evan Davis chairs a discussion providing insight into business from the people at the top.


THU 21:00 BBC Inside Science (m000wsy4)
[Repeat of broadcast at 16:30 today]


THU 21:30 In Our Time (m000wsxf)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today]


THU 22:00 The World Tonight (m000wsym)
In-depth reporting, intelligent analysis and breaking news from a global perspective


THU 22:45 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wsxp)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:04 today]


THU 23:00 Rhysearch (m000wsyp)
Are Billionaires Evil?

Comedian Rhys James investigates topics that the rest of us are too busy to be bothered with.

1. Are Billionaires Evil?

Is money the root of all evil, or the solution to all your problems?

Everyone has big questions, but very few people have time to find the answers. Lucky for them, there’s one man with a completely empty diary. Join Rhys James as he interviews experts, conducts experiments and guesses his way to a solution. Join him as he does the Rhysearch.

Written and presented by Rhys James
Guest... Grace Blakeley
Guest... David Brown
Guest... Deborah Meaden

Produced by Carl Cooper

This is a BBC Studios Production


THU 23:30 Today in Parliament (m000wsys)
Today in Parliament

News, views and features on today's stories in Parliament



FRIDAY 11 JUNE 2021

FRI 00:00 Midnight News (m000wsyv)
The latest news and weather forecast from BBC Radio 4.


FRI 00:30 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjtr)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Thursday]


FRI 00:48 Shipping Forecast (m000wsyx)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


FRI 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes (m000wsyz)
BBC Radio 4 presents a selection of news and current affairs, arts and science programmes from the BBC World Service.


FRI 05:20 Shipping Forecast (m000wsz1)
The latest weather reports and forecasts for UK shipping.


FRI 05:30 News Briefing (m000wsz3)
The latest news from BBC Radio 4


FRI 05:43 Prayer for the Day (m000wsz5)
A reflection and prayer to start the day with Rev Cheryl Meban


Good morning.

I meet a lot of people with complicated lives. Often mental health is part of the challenge. The human mind is so complex, there are no easy solutions to mental health issues; and yet, there is hope: A teacher who noticed them, saw their hurt and/or their potential, gave them choices, believed in them, supported them. A youth leader who took time to listen. The kind stranger who saw a need and took the opportunity to make someone’s life better in that moment, not knowing it could change that person’s world. And often, medication and good clinical provision, are all part of the mix.

Humanity is one. When one suffers, we all suffer. But everyone’s health is improved by kindness, by truthfulness, by purifying the atmosphere of our communities and online. Also by nurturing physical health. Our brains and our bodies are not two separate systems; our soul and mind lives in and through our physical being. Hugs, a healthy diet, limiting mind-altering chemicals - like drugs and alcohol, and stress hormones- and together, working for cleaner air, greener cities, a fairer world - all of this makes our whole ecosystem healthier for all of us, body and mind. Over all and through all, generous Love offers real hope. Even when there are no easy answers.

Good and healthy God, touch those we know who feel lost today. Bring bodies, souls, minds and strengths together to thrive in the presence of the Life and Love you give. Heal us, restore us, so we can heal and restore each other, and the world we, in our brokenness, have been destroying. Amen


FRI 05:45 Farming Today (m000wsz7)
The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.


FRI 05:58 Tweet of the Day (b03dx96d)
Goshawk

Tweet of the Day is a series of fascinating stories about our British birds inspired by their calls and songs.

Martin Hughes Games presents the Goshawk. A favourite bird of Martin Hughes-Games, the goshawk is a powerful deep-chested relative of the sparrowhawk: its name derives from "goose-hawk", though in practice goshawks rarely catch geese - they prefer woodpigeons, rabbits and squirrels. A female goshawk is a hefty bird, as big as a buzzard and much bulkier than her smaller mate.


FRI 06:00 Today (m000wtry)
News and current affairs, including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.


FRI 09:00 Desert Island Discs (m000wshk)
[Repeat of broadcast at 11:00 on Sunday]


FRI 09:45 Young Prince Philip by Philip Eade (m000vjd1)
Episode 5

The revelatory biography of the early life of Prince Philip.

We have grown so used to seeing Prince Philip as a loyal, dutiful elderly man that it is easy to forget what a strange and intriguing life he led when he was younger. Originally published to coincide with his 90th birthday in 2011, 'Young Prince Philip' tells the story of the first half of his life.

Philip Eade focuses on those aspects of the Prince's early life that are most compelling: his father's dramatic flight from revolutionary Greece; the subsequent madness of his deaf mother and prolonged absences of his feckless father; his school days in Nazi Germany; his relationship with his four sisters, all married to Germans, one to an officer in the SS; his rather breezy courtship and marriage to the most eligible young woman in the world; and his membership of raffish circles during the 1950s and '60s.

Abridged by Polly Coles
Read by Nicholas Woodeson

Produced by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4


FRI 10:00 Woman's Hour (m000wts0)
Women's voices and women's lives - topical conversations to inform, challenge and inspire.


FRI 11:00 Descendants (m000wts2)
Marlon and Valerie

One year on from the toppling of the Colston Statue in Bristol, Descendants asks... how close is each of us to the legacy of Britain's role in slavery? And who does that mean our lives are connected to?

Yrsa Daley-Ward narrates seven episodes telling the stories of people whose lives today are all connected through this history and its legacy.

As a teenager growing up in South London, Marlon discovered steel pan and it changed his life. While grappling with the meaning of his own surname, and how it connects to the history of British slavery, he uncovers how the instrument he loves was also born out of the legacies of this history. The heritage of carnival and steel pan leads us to Valerie, a white woman, born and raised in Trinidad, who seeks to understand how her family ended up on this isle - and discovers her ancestor's role in the events which led to the creation of a cultural institution.

Producers: Polly Weston, Candace Wilson, Rema Mukena
Editor: Kirsten Lass
Academic consultants: Matthew Smith and Rachel Lang of the UCL Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery
Additional genealogical research is by Laura Berry


FRI 11:30 Prepper (m000wts4)
Series 2

We're All Preppers Now

Sylvia Garrett, a cut-throat shop-managing baby boomer (Sue Johnston), and 27 year old Rachel Olende, self-obsessed and having a quarter-life crisis (Lydia West) continue their podcast for anyone interested in surviving the coming breakdown of society - Prepper.

Preppers are a large and rapidly growing global community who have taken Armageddon readiness one step further than most. They’re actively skilling up, laying down supplies and readying themselves for ‘the end of the world’, in whatever form it comes. If people in south Manchester are prepping, it’s probably time to worry.

Aimed at both long-time preppers and the newly curious, Prepper gets to grips with the day-to-day challenges of getting ‘Armageddon-ready’ through pre-recorded features, on-air debates and interaction with listeners around the world​.​ The real story of Prepper, however, is the warped mother-daughter relationship between the two hosts, as Rachel’s deep seated neediness rubs up against Sylvia’s iron self-reliance.

The first series of Prepper won the Writers Guild of Great Britain Award for Best Comedy 2020. This second series, written by Caroline Moran, was delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic. No, the irony did not escape us.

In this series, while Sylvia (Sue Johnston - The Royle Family, Downton Abbey) continues to broadcast from her well-appointed double garage in south Manchester, Rachel (Lydia West - It's a Sin, Years and Years) is banished to a gazebo in the garden.

Cast:
Sylvia is played by Sue Johnston OBE
Rachel is played by Lydia West

Written by Caroline Moran
Technical Presentation: Jerry Peal
Producer: Steve Doherty

A Giddy Goat production for BBC Radio 4


FRI 12:00 News Summary (m000wts7)
National and international news from BBC Radio 4


FRI 12:04 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wts9)
Episode 5

Asha is halfway through her PhD and working on an algorithm to develop empathy in artificial intelligence. When she meets up with her high-school crush Cyrus, now a charismatic creator and celebrant of secular rituals, she sees the opportunity to adapt her research into a revolutionary new social media platform bringing meaning into millions of lives.

She also falls back in love with Cyrus and they get married in a whirlwind of passion, ambition and excitement. Together with Cyrus’s best friend Jules, they are invited to join the super-cool startup incubator Utopia, and their journey through the cutting-edge world of tech innovation begins.

As their app takes off, Asha finds herself confronting challenges to her marriage, her dreams for the future and her independence, and discovers the brave new world of tech is still, like the old one, dominated by men and their ambitions.

Episode 5/10: So we have to look for the assassin within.

Tahmima Anam is a novelist, short-story writer and Harvard educated anthropologist. Her first novel, A Golden Age, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Costa First Novel Award, and won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book. Her other novels are The Good Muslim and The Bones of Grace. The Startup Wife owes its inspiration to her own experiences as executive director of a music technology startup founded by her husband.

Reader: Preeya Kalidas
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Celia de Wolff
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

Image: Tahmima Anam
Credit: Abeer Y. Hoque


FRI 12:18 You and Yours (m000wtsc)
News and discussion of consumer affairs


FRI 12:57 Weather (m000wtsf)
The latest weather forecast


FRI 13:00 World at One (m000wtsh)
Forty-five minutes of news, analysis and comment, with Jonny Dymond.


FRI 13:45 Small Island or Global Britain? (m000wtsk)
Old Friends, New Friends.

As Britain prepares to host the leaders of the richest democracies in the world at the G7 summit, Nick Robinson begins a week-long series  exploring Britain’s place in the world.

Over five programmes, Nick considers our hard, soft and economic power, our influence and alliances, whether we are we just a Small Island or whether we can be, in Boris Johnson’s phrase, Global Britain?  

5. Old Friends, New Friends

We need friends, allies and partners to get things done in the world. Nick explores Britain’s alliances – new and old. Joined by the current Foreign Secretary, a former Australian Prime Minister, and a former Prime Minister of Denmark, among others, Nick explores how Britain can respond to shift of power and wealth to the East and the threat posed by China to the rules-based international order.

Do growing economies that are committed to the same rules, laws and institutions as us, such as Australia and India, need our friendship as much as we want theirs? Is there a case for a new partnership for Britain inside a new club of the global elite, the D10? How has the decision to cut foreign aid affected our standing overseas?

A Juniper Connect production for BBC Radio 4


FRI 14:00 The Archers (m000wsyd)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Thursday]


FRI 14:15 Limelight (p09h4vyy)
The System

The System - Level 3: Field Work

By Ben Lewis

A witty and propulsive six-part thriller about an exclusive personal development programme with a radical twist. Starring Siena Kelly, Jack Rowan and Iain de Caestecker.

Level 3: Field Work

The Past: pumped up and fighting fit, Jake and his unit learn how to hunt. And it’s not just animals they’re in search of.
The Present: Maya meets a woman she hopes can explain why Jake’s life hangs in the balance.

Cast:
Alex … Iain de Caestecker
Maya … Siena Kelly
Coyote…Divian Ladwa
Beau…Matthew Needham
DI Cohen… Chloe Pirrie
Grace…Ashna Rabheru
Jake …Jack Rowan

Original music and sound design by Danny Krass

With thanks to Dr Joel Busher at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations, University of Coventry.

A BBC Scotland Production directed by Kirsty Williams


FRI 14:45 Chinese Characters (b09zxl67)
Robert Hart: Chinese Customs

He was a servant of the Chinese empire, respected in Beijing and London alike. Yet he was no son of Shanghai, but of Ulster. Robert Hart grew up in Portadown, but his real life started when he shipped out to China. He rose to the top of the Maritime Customs Service, the remarkable body that kept tax revenue flowing into China. Hart was one of the people who brought real modernisation to China while managing to create a real bond with the imperial court. He agonised over how the British in China should conduct themselves, and did his best to bind the two nations together in his near half-century of work in Beijing. Little wonder that a London newspaper portrayed him in a cartoon wearing a silk robe and captioned "Chinese Customs."
Presenter: Rana Mitter
Producer: Ben Crighton
Researcher: Elizabeth Smith Rosser.


FRI 15:00 Gardeners' Question Time (m000wtsn)
GQT at Home

Kathy Clugston hosts the horticultural programme featuring a group of gardening experts. Chris Beardshaw, Christine Walkden and Anne Swithinbank are on hand to answer questions from the virtual audience.

Producer - Dan Cocker
Assistant Producer - Millie Chu

A Somethin' Else production for BBC Radio 4


FRI 15:45 Short Works (m000wtsq)
The Little Things by Kiare Ladner

In a newly commissioned short story by the acclaimed writer Kiare Ladner, the doorbell rings and a special day begins. Art, cocktails and a life long dream come together in this funny yet poignant tale.

The Little Things is the latest short story by the accomplished author, Kiare Ladner. Shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award, 2018 for her finely wrought story Van Rensburg's Card, her debut novel, Nightshift came out earlier in 2021 to critical acclaim.

Produced by Elizabeth Allard


FRI 16:00 Last Word (m000wtss)
Matthew Bannister tells the life stories of people who have recently died, from the rich and famous to unsung but significant. Prod: Eleanor Garland (Beverley Purcell Apr-July)


FRI 16:30 More or Less (m000wsf0)
[Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 on Wednesday]


FRI 17:00 PM (m000wtsv)
Afternoon news and current affairs programme, reporting on breaking stories and summing up the day's headlines.


FRI 18:00 Six O'Clock News (m000wtsx)
The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.


FRI 18:30 Dead Ringers (m000wtsz)
Series 21

Episode 1

Award-winning topical satire show.


FRI 19:00 Front Row (m000wtt2)
Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music


FRI 19:45 The Art of Innovation (m0008y8g)
Celebrating Speed

Sir Ian Blatchford and Dr Tilly Blyth continue their series exploring how art and science have inspired each other. They focus on responses to a new love of personalised transport and the thrilling exhilaration of speed brought about by the humble bicycle.

As Tilly reveals, the exquisite yet simple design of John Kemp Starley’s Rover Safety Bicycle ushered in the 1890s Golden Age of Bicycles – an affordable means of social mobility for all. For a new movement of Avant Garde artists – the Futurists – the energy and velocity of the humble bicycle came to symbolise Italy’s rapidly changing industrial, emotional and moral landscape.

Ian visits London's Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art to examine Umberto Boccioni’s Dynamism of a Cyclist, in which man and machine appear almost as one. The bicycle became star propaganda for the Futurists, whose manifesto set out to challenge traditional society and instil a new disruptive order amidst a future based on technological advance, new freedoms and the ever accelerating pace of modern life.

Producer Adrian Washbourne

Produced in partnership with The Science Museum Group

Photograph (C) Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art, London


FRI 20:00 Any Questions? (m000wtt4)
Dr Liam Fox MP, Sherelle Jacobs, Layla Moran MP

Chris Mason presents political debate and discussion from the Church of St Martin with St Peter in Worcester with a panel which includes the Conservative MP and former International Trade Secretary Dr Liam Fox MP, columnist at The Daily Telegraph Sherelle Jacobs and the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesperson Layla Moran MP.
Producer: Camellia Sinclair
Lead broadcast engineer: Sharon Hughes


FRI 20:50 A Point of View (m000wtt6)
Weekly reflections on topical issues from a range of contributors.


FRI 21:00 Meeting Myself Coming Back (b06ppm2m)
Kate Adie

Journalist Kate Adie reflects on her life and career, as revealed in excerpts from the BBC archives - from local radio shifts to the frontline of international crises.

Kate shares her reactions in conversation with John Wilson.

Producer: Ella-mai Robey

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in November 2015.


FRI 22:00 The World Tonight (m000wtt8)
In-depth reporting, intelligent analysis and breaking news from a global perspective


FRI 22:45 The Startup Wife by Tahmima Anam (m000wts9)
[Repeat of broadcast at 12:04 today]


FRI 23:00 A Good Read (m000wttb)
[Repeat of broadcast at 16:30 on Tuesday]


FRI 23:30 Today in Parliament (m000wttd)
Today in Parliament

News, views and features on today's stories in Parliament