The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.

Over twelve months, this is the story of Cockshutt Wood in Shropshire, representative of all the small woods in our landscape and the sanctuary they provide.

From January through to December, John Lewis-Stempel records the passage of the seasons in exquisite prose, as the cuckoo flits through the green shade in the silence and the wind of winter. He explores from the roots of the oak to its tips, under the black, spicy leaf mould of the woodland floor and up into the mysterious canopy.

It's a unique account of the animals that inhabit this refuge - the fox, the pheasant, the wood mouse and the tawny owl, among others - with the stories of their births, lives and deaths threaded through the book.

Read by Greg Wise
Produced by David Roper
A Heavy Entertainment production for BBC Radio 4.

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A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Sarah Teather, Director of the Jesuit Refugee Service UK.

With people's attention well and truly focused on cutting down the amount of plastics we use, a listener puts the case forward for the much maligned material.

Mariella Frostrup reads Your News. Plus we hear from a listener who set up a vineyard in South Africa, despite knowing nothing about making wine. Will that be the location of the iPM outside broadcast?

iPM is the news programme that starts with its listeners. Email ipm@bbc.co.uk. Twitter: @BBCiPM. Presented by Luke Jones and Eddie Mair. Produced by Cat Farnsworth.

The latest news headlines. Including the weather and a look at the papers.

Clare Balding joins Gill Callow, a teacher from York who takes her on a favourite six mile route around the city. Walking has always been an important part of Gill's life; a joy to share with friends, a way to appreciate the wonders of the British countryside, a stress - buster from intense days in the classroom and now vital to help her come to terms with the loss of her partner, Martin. Gill talks to Clare about how she introduced him to the joys of walking , the long distance routes they tackled and the plans they had for the future. She finds walking a good way to remember him and the many happy times they shared.
Producer Lucy Lunt.

There's one year left to go until the UK leaves the European Union, on 29th March 2019. What will agriculture and food production look like after that? Sybil Ruscoe puts the question to a panel of experts, who give their opinions on how trade, jobs, the environment and farming in the devolved nations could change as a result.

On the panel: Ian Mitchell, Associate Fellow with Chatham House's Energy, Environment and Resources Department; Vicki Hird from 'Sustain', a group which campaigns for sustainable high-welfare food production; Nick von Westenholz, Director of EU Exit and International Trade at the NFU; and Emily Norton, a Norfolk farmer who also works as an agricultural researcher for a UKIP MEP.

Presented by Sybil Ruscoe and produced by Emma Campbell.

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News and current affairs. Including Yesterday in Parliament, Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.

Alexandra Burke reveals the life events that have inspired the songs on her new album.

Raynor Winn was made bankrupt and lost her home, just as her husband was diagnosed with a terminal illness. They embarked on the journey of their lifetime - to walk the 630-mile sea-swept trail from Somerset to Dorset, via Devon and Cornwall. She discusses the impact of this on their outlook on life and ideas of home.

The archaeologist and historian, Jules Hudson, describes his fascination with walled gardens.

This week Sport Relief has been raising money for UK charities like WEN, the Women Environment Network. Henrietta Harrison went to meet Sharon at the Bromley by Bow community Centre in East London where she takes care of the garden and runs gardening groups for local vulnerable people.

Saturday Live listener Darren Townsend-Handscomb grew up as the child of a Deaf parent. He went on to become a sign language interpreter, which has taken him to some rather unusual situations, including signing at an exorcism for a Deaf poltergeist. He's about to travel to the Gambia to train sign language interpreters.

David Morrissey shares his Inheritance Tracks: She's Leaving Home by The Beatles and Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen) by Baz Luhrmann.

The Truth Is by Alexandra Burke is out now. And she starts a UK tour on 1 September.
The Salt Path by Raynor Winn is out now.
Walled Gardens by Jules Hudson is out now.
David Morrissey is appearing in Julius Caesar at The Bridge Theatre in London until 15 April, 2018.

Producer: Louise Corley
Editor: Eleanor Garland.

Comedian and writer Jenny Eclair throws away her To Do list. She wants to understand why women write so many lists and what life would be like without them.

She discovers there are to-do lists, to-buy lists, to take-back lists, holiday lists and even secret lists of hidden yearnings. Jenny talks to good friend and producer Judith Holder about her own lists. Judith has a small library of books, each with a different list inside. Jenny realises she's on the nursery slopes of lists by comparison.

Going to her local butcher's - listless - Jenny finds out that men who shop there keep their lists on a mobile phone. Not only that, they haven't written the list themselves and, according to the butcher, look wistfully at what they want to buy but don't, because it's not on the list.

Artist Alice Instone made an exhibition of lists called The Pram in the Hall. She wrote to successful women and asked for their lists - and was amazed at how much these women had to do. Alice tells Jenny she was particularly interested in the lists because they're one of the rare things people still hand write.

Jenny also talks to Gena-mour Barrett - who writes articles online made up of lists - about why they are so compelling. According to Gena-mour, you can tell a good list if it is shared and attracts a community of readers. The most successful one she wrote attracted three million readers.

Jenny finally returns to her lists but not without first consulting coach Juliet Landau-Pope about what the perfect list would look like. And she discovers a whole new world of lists just waiting to be completed.

A Pennine production for BBC Radio 4.

Paul Waugh of the Huff Post asks if the NHS pay deal means austerity is over. He hears reaction to the latest Brexit summit. And what do local elections hold in store for the two main parties?

Editor: Peter Mulligan.

The US Air Force has a third of its drones stationed at Kandahar airbase in Afghanistan. Kate Adie introduces stories, insight, and analysis from correspondents around the world:

During almost two weeks with US Forces in Afghanistan, Justin Rowlatt gets a glimpse of the intensity of the air war that is a key part of President Trump's new strategy there.
Lucy Ash is in Belarus and wonders whether a Soviet-era tractor factory or designers in Minsk, who are creating virtual tanks for online computer games, offer a better route to post-Soviet economic success.
Paul Blake returns to the British Virgin Islands to see how their coping six months after Hurricane Irma tore through the Caribbean.
Jane Dyson marvels at the Pandav Lila - an epic, twelve-day re-enactment of the Hindu Mahabharata which consumes a village high up in the Indian Himalayas every two years.
And Petroc Trelawny meets A Transylvania aristocrat who's just got his castle back three-quarters of a century after it was seized.

Producer: Joe Kent.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

More than a million couples who could save £230 a year off their tax bill have still not claimed an allowance designed to support marriage. When the Marriage Tax Allowance began in April 2015, the Treasury estimated that 4.2 million people would be eligible, but so far only 65 per cent are taking advantage of the scheme. Plus, is the Savings Allowance system too complicated? We discuss the issues with Mel Stride, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury in charge of tax policy.

According to the National Crime Agency, 'significantly' more than ninety billion pounds of criminal money is laundered through Britain each year. Much of it through high-end property in London. Since the end of January, new powers called Unexplained Wealth Orders have been in place to seize these ill-gotten gains. The order requires those under investigation to explain how they paid for the assets, and if they can't do that satisfactorily, the assets can be taken by the state.

Online fraud is now the most prevalent crime in England and Wales, making it a major area of public concern costing an estimated at £10 billion. But how are banks coping at dealing with fraud and scams? We asked the big six high street how many reports of fraud they've had in the past year and how many people they employ in their fraud department, but none were forthcoming with the figures. Meg Hillier MP, Chair of the House of Commons' Public Finance Committee explains how MPs are looking into the issue, and Katie Warobec, of UK Finance outlines the industry's perspective.

Also, finally some good news for drivers. The cost of car insurance is expected to fall after the government introduced the Civil Liability Bill, designed to reduce the high number of whiplash claims in the UK. But will drivers really see their premiums fall?

Steve Punt, Hugh Dennis and guests Gemma Arrowsmith, Marcus Brigstocke, Jess Robinson and Ahir Shah present the week via topical stand-up and sketches.

Steve and Hugh try and get their heads round Cambridge Analytica, Marcus completely and definitely seriously calls for the Berlin Wall to be re-erected, while Ahir has a few things to say about baby boomers, and Jess tackles the news of a feminist James Bond.

Steve and Hugh also talk to Adam Kay about life as a Junior Doctor.

It was a BBC Studios Production.

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Jonathan Dimbleby presents political debate from Crosfield Hall in Romsey Hampshire with the Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott MP, the leader of the Liberal Democrats Sir Vince Cable MP, Brexit Minister Suella Fernandes MP and businessman Richard Tice who is the co-chairman of Leave Means Leave.

Listeners have their say on the issues discussed on Any Questions?

John Milton was a successful poet and political activist. By the time he began writing Paradise Lost in the 1650's he had become blind . Poet Michael Symmons Roberts has turned Paradise Lost into a vital gripping piece of storytelling broadcast in two parts , that will ricochet off the events that are turning our own political and social landscape upside own .

Milton wrote scathing pamphlets against corruption in the Anglican Church and its ties to King Charles. At one point Milton was jailed for recording his thoughts on paper. Paradise Lost, as much as anything, is a series of arguments put forth by the characters.

It follows the exploits of a hero (or anti-hero); it involves warfare and the supernatural; it begins in the midst of the action, with earlier crises in the story brought in later by flashback; and it expresses the ideals and traditions of a people. The poem is in blank verse, that is, non-rhyming verse.

The central story line is built around a few paragraphs in the beginning of Genesis-the story of Adam and Eve. The epic also uses elements from many other parts of the Bible, particularly involving Satan's role. Focusing his poem on the events surrounding the fall of Adam and Eve, Milton intended, in his words, to "justify the ways of God to men," by tracing the cause and result for all involved.

Directed in Salford by Susan Roberts

Milton's mission was to show not only what caused man's fall, but also the consequences upon the world, both bad and good. A concept central to this tale is that of the "felix culpa" or fortunate fall. This is the philosophy that the good which ultimately evolves as a result of the fall leaves us in a better place, with opportunity for greater good than would have been possible without it. The characters in Paradise Lost find themselves in situations which genuinely are political. In directing the Son to create earth, God the Father is conducting an act of ruler ship, which is inescapably political.

Likewise, Satan's attempts to rouse the fallen angels in Book I really are reminiscent of Milton's desire to rally support for the Cromwellian government. Mid 17c was a time of great social and cultural turmoil. A series of political and military conflicts, the English Civil War or the English Revolution raged intermittently between Parliamentarians and Royalists from 1642 to 1651. Many factors contributed to the tensions between Crown and Parliament - Charles' marriage to a Catholic, his desire to be involved in wars with Europe and ideological questions that were being raised about the nature of government and authority . Sounds familiar ?

Milton's response to what he perceived as the disintegration of society and turmoil around him was to reach back to the very beginning of time to search for the events that had led to this political and social upheaval to look for answers and ask questions abiut how society had arrived at a place of dysfunction .Staying true to the blank verse, the adaptation will include a blind narrator - Milton , played by Ian McKellen , whose eyesight worsens throughput the development of the drama .

The Comedian Eline Van der Velden talks about her alter-ego Miss Holland, her new series on BBC Three and what she thinks makes Britain British.

Helen Walmsley-Johnson on how she was coercively controlled by former partners and why she believes it could happen to any one of us.

Do you have a suffragette in the family? Jane Mace tells us about her suffragette relative Emmeline Pethick Lawrence.

We discuss calls for working dads to be given more support in the workplace with Sarah Jackson Chief Executive at Working Families and Frank Young from the family unit at the Centre for Social Justice.

What if your child had an accident at home, would you know what to do? We discuss simple but effective first aid with Tracey Taylor the First Aid Education Development Manager for the Red Cross and Sam Wilcox a paramedic and we also hear from Claudia and four year old Roman who rang for an ambulance when his mum collapsed.

The classically trained singer and actor Bernadette Robinson tells us about her show Songs for Nobodies where she portrays five iconic singers Judy Garland, Patsy Cline, Billie Holiday, Edith Piaf and Maria Callas.

Do women experience the feeling of being 'hangry' - hungry and angry - more than men? We discuss with Sophie Medlin, lecturer in nutrition and dietetics at Kings College London and the comedian Jess Fostekew.

Caroline Wyatt with coverage of the day's news.

As children few of us have had experience of running a business. But this week we'll be hearing from four teenage entrepreneurs who have been honing their business skills in one case, since the age of 6. Evan Davis hears their stories.

GUESTS

Kate and Annie Madden, Co-founders, FenuHealth

Henry Patterson, Founder and Director, Not Before Tea

Rebecca Patterson, Not Before Tea

Akshay Ruparelia, Founder and CEO, Doorsteps.co.uk.

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Clive Anderson and Emma Freud are joined by Lee Mack, Sharon D Clarke, Brett Anderson and Yolanda Mercy for an eclectic mix of conversation, music and comedy. With music from George Ezra and Imarhan.

Producer: Tim Bano.

Nigel Oaks was a pioneer of 'behaviour dynamics', the art of influencing people. He set up a successful company, Strategic Communications Limited, which boasts clients from NATO to the UK government. But now he finds himself caught up in the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

He was born in 1962 into a world of privilege. Schooled at Eton, his father was a Major in the Irish Guards and once captained the British Ski Team at the Winter Olympics. Once Nigel hit London he began a music career even releasing a single.

But it was the move into marketing that set him on the path to success, we hear how mobile discos, the Royal Family and the smell of golf all played a part in the story of the man who can allegedly help win elections and end wars.

Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon and Mindy Kayling star as deities who are millions of years old in the £108m mega-budget film: A Wrinkle In Time. It's a story which mixes physics, time travel, female empowerment, and bullying at school. Does the presence of Oprah et al make it divine or dreadful?
The Great Wave is a new play by Japanese Ulsterman Francis Turnly about the kidnapping in the 1970s of Japanese citizens by the North Korean authorities. Some returned, others were (and maybe still are) held by their captors. It's running at The Dorfman at London's National Theatre,
Philip Hensher's latest novel The Friendly Ones follows two contemporaneous storylines about 2 families; one British, the other Bangladeshi.
Come Home on BBC1 is a new drama about a family break-up told from different sides of the story. It's written by Danny Brocklehurst and features Christopher Eccleston as the dad, Greg
America's Cool Modernism at Oxford's Ashmolean looks at art from the US from O'Keeffe to Hopper; before the word 'cool' was synonymous with 'groovy'
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Mark Ravenhill, Deborah Orr and Amanda Craig . The producer is Oliver Jones.

Exactly 50 years ago, two assassinations rocked America. The civil rights leader, Dr Martin Luther King and Senator Robert F Kennedy were murdered two months apart. Michael Goldfarb retells their story and asks their children, grandchildren and close friends about America in those terrible days and America now.

Producer: Julia Hayball
A Certain Height production for BBC Radio 4.

written and dramatised from his own novel, CROSSING THE RIVER, by Caryl Phillips.

SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND is a story of love and race set in Yorkshire during the Second World War.

When the US Army arrived in Britain during World War Two, it came in still-segregated units. When a platoon of black GIs sets up camp near a quiet Yorkshire village, there are far-reaching consequences both for rebellious GI Travis Johnson and local shopkeeper, Joyce.

All other parts played by members of the cast

Produced/directed by Gaynor Macfarlane.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4, followed by weather.

The icy winds from the East have been an apt meteorological metaphor for UK-Russia relations. Since the Salisbury spy incident, and the immediate pointing of blame at the Kremlin, diplomats have been kicked out of both countries. But that's unlikely to be the end of the matter. All eyes are on what happens next. What would be the most moral course of action to take? Should the UK pursue the strongest possible sanctions and perhaps even refuse to compete in this year's World Cup in Russia? Some believe that unless we take a firm moral stand we put our own citizens at risk and we let down the Russian people. Others urge caution, believing sanctions will mostly hurt ordinary people and will do little to change the regime's behaviour. Aside from tit-for-tat punishment, it has been suggested that Putin's alleged antics with chemical weapons are bringing us closer to a "Cold War 2.0". After the Berlin Wall fell almost thirty years ago, we hoped for progress towards a more peaceful world. Was that a delusion? It could be argued that the world is more dangerous now than it was when power-blocs followed the rules of realpolitik, and everyone knew where they stood. Even then, we came perilously close to mutual destruction - so should we press on now with the search for a new and better kind of international moral order? Witnesses are Simon Jenkins, Dr Rebecca Johnson, Mark Rice-Oxley and Prof Robert Service.

Producer: Dan Tierney.

(4/17)
In this week's contest the questions cover human anatomy, Danish literature, palaeontology, the moons of the solar system and the writers of broadsheet arts coverage - and these are just the first five questions. As always Russell Davies brings friendly rigour to the competition, with another guaranteed semi-final place awaiting the winner today.

Today's competitors are:

Mark Eves, an accountant from Bexley in London
Andrew Fanko, a freelance translator from Market Harborough in Leicestershire
Gillian Ledwick, a retired college admin officer from Brentford in Middlesex
John Robinson, an English teacher from Birmingham.

A Brain of Britain listener also stands a chance of winning a prize if the questions he or she has devised outwit all four competitors.

Producer: Paul Bajoria.

Johannesburg-based performance poet Thabiso Mohare talks to poets in South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya who have embraced the digital space to disseminate their work, and looks at how it has served them in continuing a tradition of the poet expressing resistance and representing the conscience of a people.

The role of the court poet or griot was to point out to the powers-that-be that they were messing up. Some of the most vital work being produced and performed now still reflects that role, as poets carve their own path, tackling issues as they see fit, or as part of protest movements such as Fees Must Fall in South Africa.

Thabiso talks to poets who write to agitate, and assesses how much the digital age is influencing the way emerging poets write and perform their work. The phenomenon of certain poems going viral (by Warsan Shire and Suli Breaks for example), and the Def Poetry Jam shows available online, drew several of South Africa's most prominent young performance poets to their chosen craft. But with the development of digital across Africa, their focus is shifting: they're not just looking to the West any more. Although US influence is strong in spoken word poetry, digital is allowing emerging poets to look instead to their home-grown talent for inspiration, and to foster Pan-African approaches. As well as enabling African narratives, some digital platforms are also affording more chances for people to use their mother tongue to speak to their own communities, which mainstream print publishers have rarely been interested in, or able to support.

Thabiso Mohare ('Afurakan'), a spoken word poet based in Johannesburg, is one of the poets and entrepreneurs spearheading developments in spoken word poetry in South Africa, and exploring the possibilities of what the digital space can offer poets in countries where publishers are pulling back from poetry. Thabiso talks to the digital pioneers who, as part of the broader tech revolution in a mobile-first continent, are offering poets across Africa a new outlet for presenting their work in a digital age.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.

An original short story commissioned by BBC Radio 4 from the bestselling writer of 'Room', and its recent Academy Award nominated screen adaptation, Emma Donoghue.

When a mother becomes separated from her children during a hike, the police begin the search for the missing children. However the outpouring of support on social media soon turns ugly when contradictions in the statements given to police come to light.

Emma Donoghue is an Irish-Canadian playwright, novelist, and screenwriter. Her novels include 'The Wonder', 'Frog Music' and the best-seller 'Room' which was also a finalist for the Man Booker Prize.

Writer ..... Emma Donoghue
Producer ..... Michael Shannon.

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This week's 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 hear them ringing, Bristol Surprise Royal.

As someone who witnessed the sexual abuse of her teenage friends in the 1990s, Katie Edwards wonders whether she - and they - might have spoken out more readily if they had not been taught that silence in the face of suffering is a virtue.

Producer: Rosie Dawson.

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Journalist Remona Aly explores what it truly means to be weak. All too often, society encourages us to strive for unrealistic goals of perfection, with no room for flaws or failure. Remona considers the unexpected strengths that can arise from positions of vulnerability.

She argues that occupying a position of weakness offers an opportunity from which we can learn from our mistakes, develop resilience, and nurture our faith. Those that wilfully occupy a lowly stance can often find unexpected strength - their humility can cause others' anger to cease. According to Remona, the weakest members of society can radically affect the attitudes of those around them.

Music from Bruce Springsteen and Stormzy contribute to Remona's exploration of weaknesses' hidden strengths. She also draws upon verse from Shakespeare and Homer. "If we remove weakness from our experience," she concludes, "we remove the opportunity to survive and evolve."

Presenter: Remona Aly
Producer: Jonathan O'Sullivan
A TBI Media production for BBC Radio 4.

High in the hills of the Snowdonia National Park in Wales, can be found a rare and fascinating habitat. We all know of the importance of the Tropical Rainforests, however these Celtic Rainforests are in a way even rarer, with Britain being home to most of the best preserved examples in the World. The Valley is changing and time could possibly be running out for these remarkable and sensitive habitats, which have been suffering from pollution and climate change since the dawn of the Industrial Age.

Brett Westwood relives programmes from The Living World archives, this episode from 2011. Wales is home to a remarkable and rare forest. Paul Evans joins Ray Woods from Plantlife Cymru in Snowdonia.

In an area where 200 days of rain each year is normal, Paul and Ray don their waterproofs and venture up the valley of the Rhaeadr Ddu, the Black Waterfall. The landscape in this valley is dominated by water, not only from the exceptional rainfall this area is known for, but from the river thundering along many rapids and waterfalls providing a constant mist of high humidity within the Atlantic wood enveloping the valley. Linked to a mild climate in this part of Wales, everything in the woodland is a carpeted in a magical sea of emerald green moss, fungi and lichen.

This valley is home to some rare and exotic plants, the filmy ferns are however special in this landscape. Ray and Paul eventually make it to the side of the huge Rhaeadr Ddu waterfall itself, where, as the roar of the water almost drowns their voices, there on a single rocky outcrop, bathed in constant spray they discover the rare, minute and exotically beautiful Tunbridge Filmy-fern. Nearby a Wilson's Filmy-fern is found on a single boulder of an ancient moss encrusted dry stone wall. How did this Filmy-fern get here is a point of discussion.

Producer : Andrew Dawes.

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The Independent inquiry into child sexual abuse in the Anglican Church concluded three weeks of hearing this week. Phil Johnson, abuse survivor, talks to Emily Buchanan about what the hearings have meant to him. Bishop Alan Wilson, long term critic of the Church on its handling of clerical sex abuse cases, discusses the positives and negatives to have emerged. And Bishop Mark Sowerby, the deputy lead bishop for Safeguarding responds. Martin Bashir BBC Religion Correspondent provides analysis.

An anti-radicalisation programme billed as an alternative to the government Prevent strategy has been launched in British mosques.
Safe and Secure has the backing of the Muslim Council of Britain. We speak to one of the people behind it, Dal Babu, a former Chief Superintendent with the Met Police and critic of Prevent.

Cardinal O'Brien died on Monday - former Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh and one of the most senior Catholics in Britain. He fell from grace in 2013 when it was revealed that O'Brien himself had had a homosexual relationship. His funeral will take place in Newcastle next month and Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster, will lead the service. We speak to Christopher Lamb.

On Good Friday 1998 - a political agreement was reached that ended 30 years of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland. The role of Catholic and Protestant clergy during the Troubles is well known, but the stories of the daily lives and struggles of Catholic Religious Sisters has not been heard. It was to address this silence that Belfast academics along with the University of Winchester launched the "Witness Seminars." Around twenty nuns gathered over a two year period to record their memories of the Troubles, and several have now contributed to a World Service documentary - Sisters of the Troubles - which airs this weekend ahead of the 20th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement on 10th April. Rosie Dawson has a special report.

It's the final week of Lent - which means for many Christians the final few days of going without meat perhaps, or chocolate. But Christians in Pakistan commemorate Lent by fasting for 24 hours, with only one meal at sunset - similar to the fasts their Muslim neighbours do in Ramadan. Secunder Kermani reports on how this approach to Lent is bringing communities together.

And Bob Dylan's Christian years: David Gaines, Professor of English at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, talks to us about how Christianity affected Dylan's music, ahead of a new BBC 4 film titled: Arena: Bob Dylan - Trouble No More to be shown on Good Friday on BBC Four.

Producers:
Louise Clarke-Rowbotham
Catherine Earlam.

Nick Christian and his daughter Rachel make the Radio 4 Appeal on behalf of Epilepsy Research UK.

Registered Charity Number: 1100394
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 'Epilepsy Research UK'.
- Cheques should be made payable to 'Epilepsy Research UK'.

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On Palm Sunday, Christians remember Jesus' entry to Jerusalem, riding in to shouts of joy from the crowd but heading towards a painful death. The crowd were said to have cut palm branches from the trees as Jesus rode a donkey into the Holy City. The celebratory atmosphere was not to last as soon Jesus' disciple, Judas, would hand him over to the authorities to face trial, torture and crucifixion.

The Revd Canon Joseph Hawes, vicar of All Saints Fulham, leads a service contemplating on Palm Sunday and the events of Holy Week, exploring the complex character of Judas and how he has been depicted through the ages. Associate Vicar, the Revd Penny Seabrook and Curate, the Revd Will Levanway lead reflections on themes found within the Passion.

Jonathan Wikeley directs music for Passiontide, including works by Orlando Gibbons and Giovanni Croce, sung by All Saints Parish Choir.

Producer: Katharine Longworth.

There was Chick Lit, then Grit Lit....now it's "Up Lit" - uplifting stories about kindness and community that we all seem to be reading.

Kamila Shamsie says she, too, has been carried along with this wave of escapism from "dark times".

But she says the idea that "upliftment" should be marketed to the reading public as the only fictional response to difficult times strikes her as problematic. "The best fiction always makes us look at - rather than away from - the world".

Producer: Adele Armstrong.

Poet and editor of British Birdwatching magazine revels in sounds of approaching spring as the call of the curlew once more fills the air in this Tweet of the Day.

Producer Maggie Ayre
Photograph: Anthony Pope.

Sunday morning magazine programme with news and conversation about the big stories of the week. Presented by Paddy O'Connell.

Alice goes too far, and Brian's nightmare continues.

Anne-Marie Duff is a stage and screen actor.

Born in 1970 to Irish parents, she grew up in a working class household in west London. A shy child and a voracious reader, she took acting classes from the age of 11, but failed to get into drama school on her first attempt. Her second application to the Drama Centre in London was successful and she's barely been out of work since.

She started off on stage, but gained more widespread recognition when she took the role of Fiona Gallagher in Shameless, the acclaimed Channel 4 comedy drama.

She has since played dozens of roles, both in the theatre and on screen, which range from Queen Elizabeth I to John Lennon's mother, from a penniless suffragette to a retired police officer with skeletons in the cupboard, and from Joan of Arc to Lady Macbeth on Broadway and at the National Theatre. Her performances have been described as having a "multi-faceted, diamond-hard intensity".

Presenter: Kirsty Young
Producer: Sarah Taylor.

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Nicholas Parsons invites Shappi Khorsandi, Jo Caulfield, Julian Clary and Paul Merton to speak for 60 seconds on the subjects like Superfoods, Cairo and Hercule Poirot.

Hayley Sterling blows the whistle.
Produced by Victoria Lloyd.
A BBC Studios Production.

The NHS is at crisis point. Despite the diet books, the fitness videos, the health bloggers, in 2016, Public Health England estimated that Illness associated with lifestyle costs the NHS £11 billion every year.

But are we missing something obvious? Could we bring down the cost to the taxpayer, reduce pressure on the health system, with simple advice on what we should eat and drink when we go to see our GP?

A growing group of medical professionals think so. Meet the doctors demanding better training on food and nutrition for students at medical school; Dr Rangan Chatterjee (BBC One's Doctor In The House), Dr Michael Mosley, (BBC Two's Trust Me I'm a Doctor) and Dr Rupy Aujla (The Doctor's Kitchen) and many more, all believe that if tomorrow's doctors were taught more about nutrition and diet, it could have a transformative effect on the health of the UK.

In this programme Professor Sumantra Ray, doctor and founding chair of NNEdDPro Global Centre for Nutrition and Health describes a decade of work which could soon see widespread training for trainee doctors. And Sheila Dillon meets the students taking the conversation about food and health into their own hands.

Presented by Sheila Dillon
Produced by Clare Salisbury

Photo credit Neil Macaninch (above).

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In this monthly series, broadcaster and acclaimed historical novelist Sarah Dunant, delves into the past to help frame the present, bringing to life worlds that span the centuries.

Taking a different modern day anxiety, hope or idea as its starting point, each programme considers how certain questions are constant, but change their shape, over time.
The programme takes its name from the industrialist Henry Ford who, in 1921 reportedly told the New York Times, "History is Bunk" and asked "What difference does it make how many times the ancient Greeks flew kites?"

Presenter: Sarah Dunant
Producers: Katherine Godfrey and Nathan Gower
Executive Producer: David Prest
A Whistledown production for BBC Radio 4.

Eric Robson and the panel are in Leicestershire. Matthew Wilson, Christine Walkden and Matt Biggs answer the horticultural questions.

This week the panellists discuss a dying Tree Peony, pruning a Winter Honeysuckle, and rescuing an ailing goosberry bush.

They also help an audience member with a non-flowering Garrya, offer tips on how to get the best out of an olive tree, and advise on what to do with cuttings from a Wedding Cake tree.

Matt Biggs visits the Linneun Society to investigate the intricate world of plant naming conventions.

Producer: Dan Cocker
Assistant Producer: Laurence Bassett

A Somethin' Else production for BBC Radio 4.

Fi Glover introduces three conversations between couples about the interests they share, and the changes they have made to each others' lives. All in the Omnibus edition of the series that proves it's surprising what you hear when you listen.

The Listening Project is a Radio 4 initiative that offers a snapshot of contemporary Britain in which people across the UK volunteer to have a conversation with someone close to them about a subject they've never discussed intimately before. The conversations are being gathered across the UK by teams of producers from local and national radio stations who facilitate each encounter. Every conversation - they're not BBC interviews, and that's an important difference - lasts up to an hour, and is then edited to extract the key moment of connection between the participants. Most of the unedited conversations are being archived by the British Library and used to build up a collection of voices capturing a unique portrait of the UK in the second decade of the millennium. You can learn more about The Listening Project by visiting bbc.co.uk/listeningproject

Producer: Marya Burgess.

John Milton was a successful poet and political activist. By the time he began writing Paradise Lost in the 1650's he had become blind . Poet Michael Symmons Roberts has turned Paradise Lost into a vital gripping piece of storytelling broadcast in two parts , that will ricochet off the events that are turning our own political and social landscape upside own .

Milton wrote scathing pamphlets against corruption in the Anglican Church and its ties to King Charles. At one point Milton was jailed for recording his thoughts on paper. Paradise Lost, as much as anything, is a series of arguments put forth by the characters.

It follows the exploits of a hero (or anti-hero); it involves warfare and the supernatural; it begins in the midst of the action, with earlier crises in the story brought in later by flashback; and it expresses the ideals and traditions of a people. The poem is in blank verse, that is, non-rhyming verse.

The central story line is built around a few paragraphs in the beginning of Genesis-the story of Adam and Eve. The epic also uses elements from many other parts of the Bible, particularly involving Satan's role. Focusing his poem on the events surrounding the fall of Adam and Eve, Milton intended, in his words, to "justify the ways of God to men," by tracing the cause and result for all involved.

Directed in Salford by Susan Roberts

Milton's mission was to show not only what caused man's fall, but also the consequences upon the world, both bad and good. A concept central to this tale is that of the "felix culpa" or fortunate fall. This is the philosophy that the good which ultimately evolves as a result of the fall eaves us in a better place, with opportunity for greater good than would have been possible without it. The characters in Paradise Lost find themselves in situations which genuinely are political. In directing the Son to create earth, God the Father is conducting an act of ruler ship, which is inescapably political.

Likewise, Satan's attempts to rouse the fallen angels in Book I really are reminiscent of Milton's desire to rally support for the Cromwellian government. Mid 17c was a time of great social and cultural turmoil. A series of political and military conflicts, the English Civil War or the English Revolution raged intermittently between Parliamentarians and Royalists from 1642 to 1651. Many factors contributed to the tensions between Crown and Parliament - Charles' marriage to a Catholic, his desire to be involved in wars with Europe and ideological questions that were being raised about the nature of government and authotiry . Sounds familiar ?

Milton's response to what he percieved as the disintegration of society and turmoil around him was to reach back to the very beginning of time to search for the events that had led to this political and social upheaval to look for answers and ask questions abiut how society had arrived at a place of dysfunction .Staying true to the blank verse, the adaptation will include a blind narrator - Milton , played by Ian McKellen , whose eyesight worsens throughput the development of the drama.

Uzodinma Iweala won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize for his debut Beasts of No Nation in 2006, which was later turned into a film. Mariella Frostrup talks to him about his long awaited new novel, Speak No Evil

And Abir Mukherjee takes fellow crime writers Val McDermid and Graeme Macrae Burnet on a tour of Kolkata.

A collection of poems to celebrate the arrival of spring, longer days and new beginnings.

With poems by Robin Robertson, Stevie Smith, Louise Gluck, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Charlotte Mew, Ben Jonson, A E Housman and Patrick Kavanagh.

Radio 4's poet-in-residence, Alice Oswald reads a new poem written specially for the vernal equinox, Jackie Kay reads Life Mask and London's Young People's Poet Laureate, Caleb Femi reads his poem about how spring arrives in a concrete environment, Anti-Winter.

Readers include, David Calder, Clark Peters, Noma Dumezweni, Harriet Walter, Simon Russell Beale, Siobhan Redmond, Bill Patterson and Anton Lesser.

Producer: Sarah Addezio.

Simon Cox investigates a series of failures in a mental health trust. Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust was formed last year from two former trusts.

It provides mental health and community services to patients. Some of whom say there are serious problems at the trust. Some say they don't feel safe on wards, there have been a series of suicides and now there are serious new allegations emerging.

The trust says safety is its top priority and its making progress and improving.

But the programme hears from patients and their families who feel they are being let down.

Reporter: Simon Cox
Producer: Anna Meisel
Editor: Gail Champion

Assistance for Patients:
The Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust has set up a helpline for any patients or concerned families. The number is is 01268-739182. It will be available from 8pm on Tuesday 20 March 2018.

There are also other organisations which can assist via the BBC Actionline:

Addiction:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/1kS7QTDB16PWkywhsXJLzxz/information-and-support-addiction-alcohol-drugs-and-gambling

Emotional distress / suicide:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4WLs5NlwrySXJR2n8Snszdg/emotional-distress-information-and-support

Mental health:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/1NGvFrTqWChr03LrYlw2Hkk/information-and-support-mental-health

Sexual abuse:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/22VVM5LPrf3pjYdKqctmMXn/information-and-support.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest weather forecast.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

Its an on-going conversation going forward on this week's programme.

A conversation between mothers and their premature babies. A global online conversation around the Metoo hashtag.

A dialogue between the former French president's wife and her son about Heavy Metal. Plus a German archaeologist - at least. we think he is - taking Agatha Christie on a merry dance.

Take your partners and join Simon Parkes for Pick of the Week.

Producer: Stephen Garner
Production Support: Tim Fernley.

Brian is put on the spot, and Shula's mind is made up.

Damien is forced to confront his hatred of barbecues, when Anthony organises one for some work colleagues. Meanwhile, Mr Mullaney is putting the finishing touches to the 'shoffice'.

Three specially commissioned stories that explore men's relationships with their homes:

3. The Middle Of by James Meek.
A man returns to his former marital home and discovers subtle changes
have taken place. In every room, it seems.

Reader Ben Miles

Producer Duncan Minshull.

Roger Bolton with listener views on BBC radio. This week, the BBC World Service has made an unprecedented complaint to the UN, a drama divides the audience for its treatment of immigration and Brexit, the BBC puts a brake on plans to abandon FM transmitters and Fi Glover's emotional documentary.

According to a complaint the BBC has registered with the UN, Iran has been harassing the families of BBC Persia journalists. The Director of the BBC World Service Group, Jamie Angus, sits down with Roger to discuss the grounds for complaint, what the BBC hopes the UN will do and the broader questions of impartiality and soft power facing the World Service.

In The Expressing Room, Fi Glover heard the stories of mothers as they expressed milk for their premature or sick babies in the neonatal unit of St. Thomas' Evelina hospital. Many listeners contacting the Feedback inbox were overcome by these women's powerful stories. Fi and Roger discuss the challenges of making such a sensitive documentary.

The BBC's Director of Radio Bob Shennan has given a speech addressing the future of radio in the internet age. He dropped in a key detail - the BBC is no longer in a hurry to turn off FM transmitters and switch to DAB. We hear from listeners who welcome the decision, and radio futurologist James Cridland helps Roger pick over the speech in more detail.

And, an episode of The Ferryhill Philiosophers addressed questions of refugees and immigration. While some loved it, others thought it was patronising and anti-Brexit. Roger hears a selection of audience views.

Presenter: Roger Bolton
Producer: Will Yates
Executive Producer: Katherine Godfrey
A Whistledown production for BBC Radio 4.

Photo: Lady Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde

Matthew Bannister on

Lady Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde who, as Brenda Dean, was the leader of the print union Sogat during the bitter Wapping dispute of 1986.

Sir William McAlpine who combined running the family construction business with a passion for saving the UK's railway heritage, including the Flying Scotsman.

Cardinal Keith O'Brien who resigned as Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh after apologising for sexual misconduct.

Katie Boyle, the TV and radio broadcaster who presented the Eurovision Song Contest.

Garech Browne, who devoted himself to recording and promoting Ireland's traditional music.

Archive clips from: WOMAN'S HOUR, RADIO 4 23/08/1981; A LIFE IN QUESTION, RADIO 4 21/12/2003; BBC NEWS, RADIO 4 24/02/2010; SUNDAY, RADIO 4 19/03/2012; THE REUNION, RADIO 4 25/08/2017; LEGENDS:THE CHIEFTAINS, BBC TV 14/03/2008; FRANCIS BACON: A BRUSH WITH VIOLENCE, BBC TV 28/01/2017.

Do we need to "do something" about the effects of smartphones on teenage children? The backlash against the omnipresent devices has begun. Parents on both sides of the Atlantic are increasingly worried that smartphones pose a threat to the current generation of teenagers, who have grown up with a phone almost constantly in their hand. Smartphones make our teenagers anxious, tired narcissists who lack empathy and the ability to communicate properly in person. Or so the story goes.

David Baker examines the evidence behind the case against smartphones. He hears from the academics calling for action to curb the addictive pull of the screen and from a former Silicon Valley developer who won't let his children have a smartphone. But he also speaks to experts convinced this is just another moral panic about technology's effect on the young. Could there be a danger in blaming smartphones for the rise in teenage anxiety, especially among girls, at the expense of finding the real cause?

What, if anything, should we be doing to protect our kids? And who can we look to for guidance in fashioning a healthy relationship with this incredibly powerful piece of kit?

Producer: Lucy Proctor.

Weekly political discussion and analysis with MPs, experts and commentators.

Ava DuVernay talks to Francine Stock about her new pre-teen, sci-fi fantasy film A Wrinkle In Time based on the award winning novel by Madeleine L'Engle.

There's another episode of Pitch Battle and the search for a hidden figure of history who might be a suitable candidate for a bio-pic. Greg Jenner Horrible Histories writer and public historian makes the case for the celebrated Shakespearean actor Edmund Kean.

In this week's A to Z of film-makers Y is for Edward Yang and Yuen Woo-Ping. Tim Robey of The Telegraph and Scott Jordan Harris, Roger Ebert's UK correspondent discuss the work of these two iconic film makers.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.

Sacrifice - Laurie Taylor explores the many meanings of the term. Terry Eagleton, Distinguished Professor of Literature at the University of Lancaster, argues that sacrifice has a bad press in the modern age. The notion of giving anything up fails to appeal in a world devoted to self-fulfilment. But is there more to sacrifice than burnt offerings and self-denial? Can it ever be radical? Also, Chetan Bhatt, Director for the Centre on Human Rights at the LSE, examines the idea of sacrifice as invoked by Salafi-Jihadist suicide bombers. Does the inherently de secular nature of sacrifice inevitably pose the risk of promoting political violence?
Producer: Jayne Egerton.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest news from BBC Radio 4.

A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Sarah Teather, Director of the Jesuit Refugee Service UK.

Helping the nation eat well and stay healthy are among the UK Government's ambitions for farming post-Brexit. The First Steps Nutrition Trust, which campaigns for healthy food for under five-year olds, has told Farming Today that a new campaign promoting British fruit and vegetables should be a priority.

Scientists at Rothamsted Research in Hertfordshire believe they have made a breakthrough in understanding how bee-friendly insecticides could work. The research surrounds how bees react to a Neonicotinoid called thiacloprid which appears to be non toxic to some pollinators.

As farmers are told that future Government subsidies will be linked to the environmental work they do on the land, one Scottish livestock farmer is leading the way. Jim Simmons has won a conservation award from the RSPB for his success in attracting curlew, snipe, peewits and oyster-catchers to his farm in Banffshire.

Presented by Sybil Ruscoe.
Produced by Vernon Harwood.

The latest weather forecast for farmers.

Nature writer Mark Cocker is in Derbyshire where he revels in the windblown melancholy of the meadow pipit's song, on these wild moorland landscapes he knew as a child.

Producer Tim Dee
Photograph: Jenny Brewster.

News and current affairs. Including Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.

Sue Black spends much of her time with dead bodies. As one of the world's leading forensic anthropologists she has encountered death in many forms, leading British expeditions to Kosovo and to Thailand following the Boxing Day Tsunami. She tells Andrew Marr what ancient cadavers and recent corpses can teach us about mortality.

Medieval depictions of death and injury don't shy away from the grotesque, says art historian Jack Hartnell. The mutilated bodies of saints and martyrs were often on display in medieval buildings, but these blood-spattered images were meant to inspire hope and faith.

A devastating loss divides a couple in award-winning novelist Kit de Waal's new book, The Trick to Time. As an expert in fostering and adoption, she has also helped both adults and children cope with the lifelong impact of tragedy.

A courageous child sits at the heart of composer Mark-Anthony Turnage's latest opera, Coraline, a dark fantasy based on Neil Gaiman's tale. The heroic Coraline finds a magical world in her attic and steps inside. But this world's Other Mother is not to be trusted and Coraline must fight to restore her real family.

Producer: Hannah Sander.

Professor Sanjeev Gupta of Imperial College London goes back 450,000 years, to a time when our ancestors could walk across a rock ridge from the chalk cliffs near Calais to our own at Dover. At the British Museum, Nick Ashton, Curator of Palaeolithic and Mesolithic collections, shows him artefacts that provide evidence they did.

The Channel is a reflection on the stretch of water that both separates us from and connects us to Europe. The series examines how this waterway has affected our British identity through time, and continues to do so.

Music composed by Phil Channell

Producer: Marya Burgess.

In the new play, based on a true story, A Necessary Woman, a parliamentary maid discovers, suffragette, Emily Wilding Davison hiding in a broom cupboard on census night, 1911. What follows is the meeting of two very different minds - Emily, who vehemently believes in votes for women, and Mary, the maid, who wonders if maybe the suffragettes ought to just give it up. Co-writers Philippa Urquhart and Deborah Clair, who also play Mary and Emily, join Jane.

Hospital returns to BBC 2 on 26 March. Filmed in January and February this year, the series shows Nottingham University Hospitals, one of the UK's biggest and busiest Trusts, at an unprecedented time in its history when NHS England advise every hospital in England to suspend all routine operations. The hospital's Chief Operating Officer, Caroline Shaw talks about the challenges the health service faces with funding, staffing and an aging population who need more care.

It's 100 years since the first women were given the opportunity to join the British armed forces. Initially their roles were in cooking and mechanical work, but today they can take on the most senior roles and see active combat. Woman's Hour speaks with Lieutenant Colonel Ami Jones MBE from the Army, Captain Ellie Ablett MBE of the Navy, and the Royal Air Force's Flight Sergeant Claire Bullen to investigate their personal experience of working in the armed forces. How has the presence of women influenced the armed forces in the UK?

Presenter: Jane Garvey
Producer: Kirsty Starkey.

Broadcast daily across the week leading up to Easter, this powerful drama traces the days leading up to Jesus's death, from the perspective of the young man you never hear from: Judas.

Multi award winning writer Lucy Gannon (SOLDIER SOLDIER, PEAK PRACTICE), gives us a very personal take on these tempestuous days.

Judas of Kerioth followed Jesus all through His ministry, hearing revolutionary and inspiring teaching, seeing miracles, and part of an intimate team. Like the other apostles, he gave up everything to follow this simple teacher, and yet, with the kiss of friendship, he betrayed the man he loved and who loved him.

It's poetic, and punchy, and grabs you by the heart. Judas, always an outsider, struggles to weigh his love for his brothers against growing rage and resentments, and ultimately - of course - loses everything.

STARRING: Damien Molony as Judas, Jimmy Akingbola as Jesus, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith as John and Clive Hayward as Peter.

Written by Lucy Gannon
Directed by Allegra McIlroy

Sound design: Wilfredo Acosta.

Winner of this year's prestigious BBC/RGS dream journey award is Nina Plapp who sets off from the Isle of Wight with her cello 'Cuthbert' en route to India via Transylvania in a search for the roots of gypsy music.

Nina is a cellist from a large musical family and the energy and rhythms of gypsy music have always mesmerized her. Cuthbert, now 167 years old, has played in many an orchestra and was most recently under the guardianship of Nina's great aunt Bebe.

After a family send-off, Nina and Cuthbert head east on an adventure into the rich musical landscape of the gypsies. They first visit a family in Romania where she immerses herself in the wild rhythms and melodies of the Roma in rural Transylvania. Then they continue to India to seek out the original gypsies. On their way they join a chorus on the train through the desert, get locked inside a cupboard with singing girls in a Rajasthani village and play with the gypsy musicians at a wedding.

If you'd like to apply for next years Journey of a Lifetime Award and make a feature fore Radio 4 about your adventure you have until 2nd November. Look for Journey of a Lifetime on the Royal Geographical Society website. www.rgs.org/journeyofalifetime

Producer Neil McCarthy.

Much-loved poet and entertainer Pam Ayres returns to BBC Radio 4 with four new shows packed with poems, sketches and anecdotes that will make you laugh out loud.

Today's theme is 'Home'.

Today there are sketches about the trials of recycling, the difficulty of throwing stuff away when you move house, and the disappointment of visiting your childhood home. Also Pam performs poems including 'Up in the Attic' about that other-worldly part of your home; 'Pitiful' about watching the unsuccessful attempts of a DIYer; 'Worm Farm' about embracing being green and 'Ere Come the Bastards Now' about passionately regretting inviting people round to your house for a dinner party.

Over the course of this series, Pam also regales the audience with stories and poems on the subjects of getting older but not giving in, about holidays and about being a grandparent.

She is joined for the sketches by actors Felicity Montagu (Lynn in I'm Alan Partridge) and Geoffrey Whitehead (Not Going Out, Still Open All Hours).

Written by: Pam Ayres, Jan Etherington, Claire Jones, Bryce Hart and Peter Reynolds.
Starring Pam Ayres, Felicity Montagu and Geoffrey Whitehead.
Producer: Claire Jones
This is a BBC Studios Production.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

On this day in 1918, Married Love by Marie Stopes was published, and in Folkestone, Alice isn't feeling enamoured with Bill.

Written by Katie Hims
Story-led by Sarah Daniels
Directed by Ciaran Bermingham
Editor: Jessica Dromgoole.

News and discussion of consumer affairs.

The latest weather forecast.

Analysis of news and current affairs.

Does no always mean no?

Two people come together to swap one story which helped shape their views. They each listen to the other then they retell the story as if it had happened to them. Does this attempt at understanding one another bring new empathy? Can you really step into another's shoes and see the world from their perspective?

In the first programme, Luke, a 34 year-old musician, meets Ellie, a 24 year-old masters student to talk about sexual politics.

Earlier this year, Luke performed a very public romantic gesture to try and tell a girl who had dumped him how he felt. He bought a piano, set it up in central Bristol and said he was playing to let a girl know that he loved her. He received a huge backlash on social media - people said "no means no", that he was pressurising her. Hurt and confused, Luke wants to understand what makes actions acceptable or unacceptable today. He doesn't think no always means no - when someone is hurting they push those around them away. It should be okay to try and stick around in those situations. He wants others to understand that it's unfair to cut off relations with someone you've got close to without a proper explanation.

Eight years ago, Ellie broke up with her boyfriend of three years, and after declaring his love for her, he became more persistent. For a year he pursued her. He'd wait outside her house in his red car. To this day she still thinks of it whenever she sees a red car on the road. As a result of her experience, she thinks that a gesture isn't romantic unless you're absolutely sure it's reciprocated and that persistence and entitlement are male phenomena. Every woman she has ever spoken to has had an experience of a man not taking no for an answer.

Producer: Polly Weston.

by Sarah Wooley

In 1977 the bestselling children's novel Watership Down was made into an animated film. Malcolm Williamson, Master of the Queens music, had been hired as the film's composer. But all was not well. Williamson, a notoriously difficult and complicated man, was under extreme pressure; it was the Queens jubilee year and he was over commissioned. When the film's conductor, Marcus Dods, arrived looking for the film's score he found to his horror that all that existed were two small sketches of music which amounted to no more than seven minutes of screen time. With an expensive orchestra and recording studio booked for the following week, the film's future looked to be in jeopardy. In desperation he turned to the one person he knew could help; composer and arranger Angela Morley. But she, for her own reasons, was going to need some persuading...

Directed by Gaynor Macfarlane.

(5/17)
Russell Davies welcomes another four contenders for the title of Brain of Britain 2018, this time at MediaCityUK in Salford. The unpredictable questions take in everything from mythology and etymology to literature, astronomy and popular television. Today's winner will take another of the automatic places in the semi-finals which begin in May - and there may be a semi-final place awaiting a runner-up too, if he or she gets a high enough score.

Today's competitors are:
Jim Cross, a horticulturalist from Wrexham;
Colin Daffern, a data analyst from Salford;
Joanna Munro, a civil servant from Liverpool;
Paul Prior, a retired instrument technician from Ormskirk in Lancashire.

Producer: Paul Bajoria.

Join Natalie Haynes and guests for half an hour of comedy and the Classics from the BBC Radio Theatre in London.

Natalie is a reformed comedian who is a little bit obsessive about Ancient Greece and Rome.

Today she stands up in the name of Greek poet, Sappho, about whom we know so little, and most of what we think we know is made-up. But one thing is certain: her poetry is scorching, and unforgettable. There will also be a lot of gossip from over a thousand years ago.

With special guests novelist Stella Duffy, classicist Professor Edith Hall and music from LiTTLe MACHiNe.
Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery.

From the dawn of the civilisation, human beings have yearned to predict the future. In the past you might have consulted the Oracle at Delphi or sat down for a tarot reading to steer you through life.

Today, the internet offers amazing potential for predictive technology. There isn't a part of the natural world or human existence that isn't recorded and quantified, even the most mundane aspects of our lives are broadcasted into the universe thanks to our prolific use of social media.

By analysing the cornucopia of data we can detect patterns, understand behaviour... but can we really predict the future? Developers claim yes we can, from what movie will be a breakout hit, to when there will be a run on cold and flu medicine, even to the outcome of a child's' entire life - all we need is the right data. But do we want that?

In today's Digital Human Aleks Krotoski explores why it is we feel the need to predict the future to find out place in the present world, and discovers that prediction could end up being a cursed crystal ball if handled incorrectly.

Eddie Mair with interviews, context and analysis.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

Nicholas Parsons invites Stephen Fry, Jan Ravens, Gyles Brandreth and Paul Merton to speak for 60 seconds on the subjects like Elephants and Office Politics.

Hayley Sterling blows the whistle.
Produced by Victoria Lloyd.
A BBC Studios Production.

Ruth faces a dilemma, and Pat makes a new acquaintance.

Arts news, interviews and reviews.

Journalist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown gives a personal account of her life in the country where she was born and calls for a more honest assessment of what actually took place before, during and after the turbulent years of General Amin's regime. The romantic story of the all-conquering Asian families being thrown out of Uganda on the whim of a an evil dictator was not all that it seemed. The mass murder of Amin's own people is largely forgotten. One of the reasons Amin gave for the expulsion was that Ugandan Asians had consistently exploited the local economy and refused to integrate with black African people- after decades of living in the country. And according to Yasmin, this is the uncomfortable truth. East African Asians were part of the British Empire and loyal to it. Even after Uganda gained independence on October 9, 1962, Asians were slow to change their ways and embrace the new order. Many continued to hold racist views about black Ugandans and were racist towards them. The black Ugandans in turn, resented them and saw them as symbols of colonial oppression-which is why their expulsion was so popular among them. But hundreds of thousands of black Ugandans were killed by Amin too or were forced into exile. Only a handful of Asians were ever killed. Yasmin returns to Uganda to gauge the extent to which black suffering has been disregarded by history, and talks to those who witnessed it and the descendants of those who lost their lives. The programme examines the reaction of native Ugandans to the expulsion, the relationship between Asians and black Ugandans before the expulsion, what happened after the Asians left and after Amin's regime fell.

.Producer: Mohini Patel.

Existing arms control treaties are under threat - at the same time that new types of weapon emerge, with nothing to regulate them. There is a growing crisis in the arms control regimes inherited from the Cold War era, which threatens to undermine existing agreements. At the same time, new technologies are emerging like drones, cyberwar, biotech and hypersonic weapons, which are not covered by existing rules. BBC Defence and Diplomatic Correspondent Jonathan Marcus asks if a new era of chaos beckon or might the whole idea of arms control and disarmament be revived?
Producer: Matthew Woodcraft.

In 1971 at a game between Rangers and Celtic, 66 people were killed in a crush, trying to leave Ibrox stadium. Over 45 years on, Alan Dein asks what the impact has been for those closely involved in this tragedy, for Rangers, and for the wider football community.

Producer: Melvin Rickarby

If you've been affected by bereavement, or child bereavement, help and support is available.

BBC Action Line
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4MmhHDSbdDmTpVJhBs2v4Py/information-and-support-bereavement.

In-depth reporting and analysis from a global perspective.

Lee Ingleby continues Jon McGregor's multi award-winning novel.

It's four years since the disappearance of 13-year-old Becky Shaw on a family walk in the Peak District. Now, although the investigation is still open, few people expect that she'll ever be found. But as the seasons continue to turn, life goes on in the village, often behind closed doors. And stories begin to emerge as to what the missing girl was really like...

Reservoir 13 is one of the most acclaimed novels of the 2017. It won the Costa Novel Award, was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize, and was longlisted for the Man Booker.

Reader: Lee Ingleby is an acclaimed British actor, known recently for starring in the BBC dramas The A Word, and Line of Duty.
Writer: Jon McGregor
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Justine Willett.

Writer Tracy Chevalier; fitness trainer and charity worker Moses Adeyemi and actor Jason Watkins join Libby Purves for live, late night conversation.

Tracy Chevalier is a writer, best known for her novel Girl with a Pearl Earring. As part of her research for her novel, The Last Runway, she took up quilting which led her to the work of the charity Fine Cell Work. Fine Cell Work trains prisoners to do high-quality needlework in the long hours spent in their cells and Tracy commissioned a group of inmates to make a quilt for the show she curated called What We do in Bed. Called the Sleep Quilt, it is entirely stitched and quilted by prisoners in some of Britain's toughest jails. Each of the 63 squares explores what sleep means in prison. For some sleep is a moment of escape for others it means a time of anxious thoughts and a restless night. The story of the quilt is told in the book the Sleep Quilt by Tracy Chevalier and Fine Cell Work, published by Pallas Athene Books.

Moses Adeyemi is a fitness trainer who set up the Silver Line Project which helps vulnerable people cope with their problems through a programme of personal training and coaching. Beneficiaries of the project include people with mental health issues and those in the process of criminal rehabilitation. Moses himself spent time in prison before turning his back on his criminal past and turning his life around. When he was on the wrong side of the law, night time was when he conducted his criminal activities and, during a spell of homelessness, was also when he felt most alone. In 2016 he won SAS: Who Dares Wins, a gruelling reality show in which contestants undergo a training bootcamp process similar to the one used by the British Army's Special Air Service.

Jason Watkins is an actor who is currently playing Ralph in the play Frozen. a psychological thriller about a mother whose child goes missing. He is best known for his performance in the title role in the drama The Lost Honour of Christopher Jefferies, for which he won Best Actor at the 2015 BAFTA Television Awards. He also played Gavin Strong in the comedy series Trollied, and Simon Harwood in the BBC comedy W1A. Frozen is at the Theatre Royal Haymarket until May 5th.

Producer: Paula McGinley.

Sean Curran reports from Westminster.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest news from BBC Radio 4.

A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Sarah Teather, Director of the Jesuit Refugee Service UK.

The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.

Nature writer Mark Cocker recalls seeing twite feeding between the goalposts at his school in Derbyshire, however twite and its trilling song are a rare sound today in the uplands.

Producer Tim Dee
Photograph: Simon Stobart.

News and current affairs. Including Yesterday in Parliament, Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.

Harvard philosopher Michael Sandel comes to St Paul's Cathedral to take on some of the hardest questions raised by the public discontent that characterises much of global politics today. With the help of a live audience, he asks whether globalisation and deepening inequality have eroded the bonds that hold communities together. He enquires if the continuing debate over Brexit reveals competing notions of political identity. Should we aspire to be citizens of the world, or is a citizen of the world a citizen of nowhere? He wonders if patriotism is a sentiment we should encourage or a prejudice we should overcome and whether, in diverse societies such as ours, a politics of the common good is even possible. Michael and his audience engage in a searching discussion of the contending visions of moral and civic identity that lie just beneath the surface of our fiercest public debates.
Producer: Tim Mansel.

Dominic Rainsford, Professor of Literature in English at Aarhus University, Denmark, explores how the writings of Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo and Julian Barnes expose our relationship with the Channel. In the company of Dr Cindy Sughrue OBE, Director of the Charles Dickens Museum, he examines the artefacts that reveal the novelist's extreme familiarity with the Dover Strait.

The Channel is a reflection on the stretch of water that both separates us from and connects us to Europe. The series examines how this waterway has affected our British identity through time, and continues to do so.

Music composed by Phil Channell

Producer: Marya Burgess.

Programme that offers a female perspective on the world.

Judas, always an outsider, struggles to weigh his love for his Master against growing impatience and doubts. While Jesus preaches submission, Judas longs to rise up and overthrow Rome

Written By Lucy Gannon
Directed by Allegra McIlroy

Sound Design: Wilfredo Acosta.

Radio 4 documentary.

Performance art occupies a marginal space in the cultural landscape, rarely attracting large audiences and often baffling those who encounter it. Even defining what performance art is remains contentious among those working within it.
Nonetheless, artist Deborah Coughlin believes it has a major influence on popular culture, providing a radical workshop in which new ideas are forged and acted out. Sometimes that influence is explicit and publicly declared, as when Lady Gaga approached world leading performance artist Marina Abramovic to help her generate ideas. Sometimes, Deborah suggests, ideas are appropriated without due credit being given. Either way, those original cutting edge ideas percolate into the mainstream, and for that the culture owes performance art a debt of gratitude.
Deborah interviews Abramovic as well as fellow performance art giant Laurie Anderson, then uses the interviews to create an original piece of performance art which she takes to the Whitworth Gallery in Manchester as well as Porthcawl seafront, with these performances becoming an integral part of the show.
Deborah also speaks with the New York band 'Sound of Ceres' who talk about the enthusiasm they have for performance art and the desire young musicians have to find inspiration outside their own field. We also hear from artist The Famous Lauren Barri Holstein, and Deborah visits her parents to find out whether they understand the artistic world she now inhabits.

Presenter: Deborah Coughlin
Producers: Claire Press and Geoff Bird.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

On this day in 1918, Winston Churchill called for munition workers to forego an Easter break, and in Folkestone, Adeline is distracted by something else in the newspaper.

Written by Katie Hims
Story-led by Sarah Daniels
Directed by Ciaran Bermingham
Editor: Jessica Dromgoole.

Consumer phone-in.

The latest weather forecast.

Analysis of news and current affairs.

Two people with different views on a difficult subject come together to see if they can empathise with each other.

A shortage of housing and soaring property prices mean that more people than ever are renting their home. For this second episode of Encounters a landlord and a tenant swap one story which has helped shape their view on who holds the power in a tenant and landlord relationship. They each listen to the other's story, and then retell it as if it had happened to them. Does this attempt at understanding one another bring new empathy?

Produced and presented by Viv Jones.

By Oliver Emanuel

A man goes through a cardboard box. Each piece of paper he picks out holds a memory. Pieced together the memories tell the story of an everyday and extraordinary love affair.

Folded into that is a brief, and sometimes fictional, history of paper.

Starring Mark Bonnar and Lucy Gaskell

Directed by Kirsty Williams.

Josie Long hears stories drawn from the silver screen. Luke Skywalker helps Joe Dunthorne reckon with his own mortality, the writer Ross Sutherland explores the hidden history of the audience and Amanda Foster offers an insight into the life of a stuntwoman.

Luke Deathbringer
Featuring Joe Dunthorne

Body Double
Featuring Amanda Foster
Produced by Andrea Rangecroft

Hollywood Forever
Featuring Ross Sutherland

Series Producer: Eleanor McDowall
A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4.

Around two thirds of fibres produced globally are synthetic material - many used in our clothing. It's emerged that plastic microfibres are being shed when we wear and wash these items - which ironically include fleeces and kit worn by 'outdoorsy types' like Tom Heap. With microplastics in the marine environment now high on the agenda, Tom hears how these tiny invisible strands can be a major contributor to the scale of plastics in the oceans. They also pollute land and freshwater and are being consumed by creatures in our rivers as well as the seas.

Tom takes his 'blue fleece of doom' to the experts - Professor Richard Thompson has been leading research on marine plastics for many years. He and Imogen Napper at the University of Plymouth have offered to wash his fleece to show how much it's shedding, where the fibres go and to discuss how much of a threat they might be to animals and humans.

Is Tom to purge the plastics and pursue a life of naturism...or natural fibres only?

Sophie Mather from Biov8tion hopes not. She says plastics have 'many beautiful benefits' and it's just a case of developing 'good' synthetic yarns. After being frustrated by the pace of microfibre research she crowdfunded to commission research form the University of Leeds to assess which factors affect breakage. Her years in textile innovation for some of the world's largest brands makes her believe fabrics can be designed to shed less and she is sharing the research with industry. Can she help save the synthetics and the fish?

Presented by Tom Heap
Produced by Anne-Marie Bullock.

Reverend Kate Bottley investigates the increasing demand for professional funeral singers in Britain.

Live music has long accompanied the religious and secular farewells to our dear departed but, in the past, was more likely to be a reserved for a select few - Kings, Queens and Archbishops with a cathedral choir singing a requiem mass to send them on their way.

In the 19th Century, some ordinary people decided that what was good enough for the gentry was good enough for them and a diluted version of this practice spread to churches, with a choir singing a favourite hymn or two.

In more recent times, sophisticated sound equipment has meant that any song - usually performed by the artist that wrote it or made it famous - could be played at a church service or crematorium funeral. Favourites include My Way, Wind Beneath My Wings and Always Look On the Bright Side of Life.

But today, a simple CD is not enough for an increasing number of mourners. Only a live singer will do to mark the passing of their loved ones. Funeral singer websites and booking agencies - often a spin off from wedding singer providers - are proliferating.

Kate Bottley talks to agencies catering for this growth in demand, the singers, bereaved family members, funeral directors, clergy, academics and others - to discover why it seems that, increasingly, only live music is good enough to say a memorable farewell to people who cannot hear the performance, and what this says about death in Britain today.

A Butterfly Wings production for BBC Radio 4.

Comedians Phill Jupitus and Robin Ince talk to Harriett Gilbert about books they love. Phill's is Dada: Art and Anti-Art by Hans Richter, the founder of the punk art movement. Robin's is Soviet-era science fiction: Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, the book on which Andrei Tarkovsky's film Stalker was based. Lastly, Harriett introduces them to a dark and compelling new crime novel in which the protagonists are children: Dodgers by Bill Beverly.
Producer Beth O'Dea.

Eddie Mair with interviews, context and analysis.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

Second series of the award-nominated comedy drama set in Alcoholics Anonymous, written by Pete Jackson and inspired by his own road to recovery. Stars Sue Johnston, John Hannah, Eddie Marsan, Rebecca Front, Paul Kaye and Julia Deakin - with Samantha Bond.

Love in Recovery follows the lives of five very different recovering alcoholics. Taking place entirely at their weekly meetings, we hear them moan, argue, laugh, fall apart, fall in love and - most importantly - tell their stories.

In this second episode of the series, the group have a visitor with a story to tell. Gillian (Samantha Bond) doesn't want to join their group, she doesn't want to wait her turn, she doesn't even want a biscuit - she just wants to be listened to.

Writer Pete Jackson is a recovering alcoholic and has spent time in Alcoholics Anonymous. It was there he found support from the unlikeliest group of disparate souls - with one common bond. As well as offering the support he needed throughout a difficult time, AA also offered a weekly, sometimes daily, dose of hilarity, upset, heartbreak and friendship.

There are lots of different kinds of AA meetings. Love in Recovery is about meetings where people tell their stories. There are funny stories, sad stories, stories of small victories and milestones, stories of loss, stories of hope, and those stories that you really shouldn't laugh at - but still do, along with the storyteller.

Written and created by Pete Jackson

Producer/Director: Ben Worsfield
A Lucky Giant production for BBC Radio 4.

Will takes a step backwards, and Susan is not happy.

Arts news, interviews and reviews.

How could Britain change after Brexit? With a year to go before the UK leaves the European Union, much of the current debate is focussed on the fate of the negotiations. But are we thinking hard enough about what might come after any deal with the EU? This programme will explore the opportunities for policy experimentation post-Brexit.

Iain Martin talks to policy-makers, experts and campaigners about the ideas which could come to fruition after 29 March 2019 - both in the short and long term. From the way we work to the environment, he asks how we could do things differently once the UK is no longer bound by EU rules and asks how much appetite is there for new ideas across the political spectrum. He finds some surprising alliances being forged and hears from those who are enthusiastic or sceptical about the scope for innovation.

Producer: Peter Snowdon.

News, views and information for people who are blind or partially sighted.

Dr Mark Porter presents a series on health issues.

In-depth reporting and analysis from a global perspective.

Lee Ingleby continues Jon McGregor's acclaimed new novel.

It's five years since the Becky Shaw went missing up on the moors. Now, as the teenagers who met her grow up and start to leave, they discover it's not as easy to escape the shadow of Becky's disappearance as they'd expected...

Reservoir 13 is one of the most acclaimed novels of the 2017. It won the Costa Novel Award, was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize, and was longlisted for the Man Booker.

Reader: Lee Ingleby is an acclaimed British actor, known recently for starring in the BBC dramas The A Word, and Line of Duty.
Writer: Jon McGregor
Abridger: Sara Davies
Producer: Justine Willett.

Bobby (GEMMA WHELAN) has the usual problems that afflict London singletons.

Like - how long should you wait to ask your boss out when his wife walks out on him? Without anyone else in the office finding out? While keeping your affair with the fire alarm maintenance guy under wraps?

The usual sort of thing.

But that was before her Mum, Veronica (SHERRIE HEWSON), decided to unceremoniously dump her husband of forty years and show up on Bobby's doorstep with a glint in her eye and a determination to "live the Sex And The City lifestyle". Which might prove difficult in a flat above a chicken shop in Forest Gate.

Bobby is about to find out that there's no situation that can't be made more awkward by your mother showing up in four inch heels, three mojitos to the good.

An Objective Media production for BBC Radio 4.

Susan Hulme reports from Westminster.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. Followed by Weather.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest shipping forecast.

The latest news from BBC Radio 4.

A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Sarah Teather, Director of the Jesuit Refugee Service UK.

The latest news about food, farming and the countryside.

Nature writer Mark Cocker heard his first wood warbler at the age of thirteen. Now in middle age spring has not truly begun until he has heard the first wood warbler of the year singing explosive song, likened to a coin spinning on a metal top..

Producer Tim Dee
Photograph: Gray Clements.

Morning news and current affairs. Including Yesterday in Parliament, Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day.

The actor and writer Maxine Peake meets the musician and performance artist Cosey Fanni Tutti.

Maxine Peake was born just outside Bolton. Her television credits include leading roles in the series Dinnerladies, Shameless and Silk. In 2014 she played Hamlet at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester. She has written for radio and the stage, and her play about Lillian Bilocca - who campaigned for better safety in the fishing industry - was part of Hull's City of Culture celebrations.

Cosey Fanni Tutti was born in Hull, and began her artistic career there in 1969, when she joined a subversive art collective called COUM Transmissions. Founded by Genesis P-Orridge, the group staged surreal events or interventions around Hull and beyond. Cosey worked for two years as a model for sex magazines and films to create a show about pornography and the sex industry called Prostitution. When it opened at the Institute of Contemporary Art in 1976, it prompted walkouts, made headlines, and provoked questions in Parliament. Cosey co-founded the industrial music band Throbbbing Gristle with Genesis P-Orridge, Peter Christopherson and Chris Carter. Chris and Cosey later created their own band and now perform under the name Carter Tutti.

Producer Clare Walker.

Mum, Dad and 2.4 children... how old-fashioned. Single parent families, multi-parent households, step-brothers and half-sisters and the rest - it's old news that the 'nuclear family' model is outdated. So why does society keep on telling us it's the only way to be? Single-mother stigma is still alive and well, and unmarried people in their 40s and over are universally assumed to be sad, lonely, and yearning for a partner.

Adam Buxton wonders how our ideas about family came about, and whether there might be a better way to organise things. Is the 'decline of family' really such a bad thing?

Produced in Bristol by Emily Knight.

Writer Alba Arikha, born in Paris and living in London, reflects on her own experiences of crossing the Channel and compares them with the accounts of others.

The Channel is a reflection on the stretch of water that both separates us from and connects us to Europe. The series examines how this waterway has affected our British identity through time, and continues to do so.

Music composed by Phil Channell

Producer: Beaty Rubens.

Programme that offers a female perspective on the world.

A fierce young rebel desperate to overthrow Rome, Judas begins to doubt his Master's teaching, and an idea begins to take hold of him, to raise money for the cause. At least, that's what he tells himself.

Written by Lucy Gannon
Directed by Allegra McIlroy

Sound Design: Wilfredo Acosta.

A mother and daughter share the loss and the joy of now being in touch with the son and brother they never knew. Fi Glover presents another conversation in the series that proves it's surprising what you hear when you listen.

Producer: Marya Burgess.

Following the lives and stories of those who live along the rail network that fans out from Cardiff up into the South Wales Valleys.

Broadly covering the ex-coalfield of South Wales, the Valleys is a collection of towns and villages ranged along, and separated by, hills and mountains. Running roughly north to south, the Valley Lines connects these towns and villages to each other - and to the growing city of Cardiff on the south coast.

Trains can offer up a slice of life, a window onto a world - glimpsed back gardens, frozen street scenes, snatches of lives and overheard conversations - and the Valley Lines provide an opening onto the people and places - and the culture and economics - of this region, defined by its geography.

As resistant to generalisations as any place, the meaning of the Valleys depends upon who you ask: a collection of deeply rooted communities with an enviable sense of cohesion and identity; a cradle of industrial and socialist history; a sublime natural resource and increasingly a rural playground; a predicament to be confronted, a problem to be solved.

And certain statistics do seem to back up this last concern: according to metrics of deprivation and economic inactivity, of educational attainment, health and life expectancy, the problems in the Valleys seem very real.

It's easy to be blinded by these statistics. And one proffered solution to 'the problem of the Valleys' that surfaces from time to time calls for, effectively, a managed clearance of large parts of the area, to rewild them, creating a tourist-focused region comparable perhaps to the Lake District.

One response to these intentions can stand as a premise for these programmes: what about the people?

It's a story usually told in a current affairs context, but these programmes hope to loosen that form to tell part of the story of the Valleys through the Valley Lines railway, its passengers and passers-by.

by Jon Canter

Produced by Sally Avens

Comedy as James Boswell becomes a time travelling biographer doing for other celebrities what he did for Dr Johnson. Today he meets Ghandi, and Boswell attempts for not entirely selfless reasons to become a better man under Ghandi's guidance, but abstinence drives Boswell to distraction and worse.

Phaldut Sharma is best known for his role as AJ in EastEnders. He also appeared in Cucumber on C4 and the film Gravity.
He has recently written and starred in his own web series 'I Gotta Be Me' based on his own experience as a Sammy Davis tribute act.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.

On this day in 1918, a woman in Folkestone was prosecuted for running a so-called "house of ill fame", while Marion feels far from home.

Written by Katie Hims
Story-led by Sarah Daniels
Directed by Ciaran Bermingham
Editor: Jessica Dromgoole.

Consumer affairs programme.

The latest weather forecast.

Analysis of news and current affairs.

How do you judge whether a dog is dangerous enough to be destroyed?

Two people come together to swap one story which helped shape their views. They each listen to the other then they retell the story as if it had happened to them. Does this attempt at understanding one another bring new empathy? Can you really step into another's shoes and see the world from their perspective?

Postlady, Sharon was seriously injured when she endured an attack by two dobermans on her mail-round. The owner was prosecuted but the court didn't order the destruction of the dogs. Sharon fears that another innocent person could be attacked by the same dogs.

Michelle's boyfriend owns a cane corso, an Italian hunting dog. Michelle and her children adore 'soppy git', Reggie but last May her son ran to her with blood pouring from his head. She insists that the dog didn't bite, but just grazed her son as he squirmed free from an over-enthusiastic cuddle. The police seized Reggie but Michelle and her boyfriend fought to have him returned to the family.

Can Sharon and Michelle agree on how to define a dangerous dog? What should happen if they injure a person? When should a dog's life become forfeit?

Presented and Produced by Polly Weston.

As the British Army's retreat in the face of the unexpected German advance escalates, the women of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps based at Flixecourt have to decide whether to assert their independence and stay or head towards the coast.

Series created by Jonathan Ruffle
Written by Nick Warburton
Producers: David Hunter, Jonquil Panting, Jonathan Ruffle
Director: David Hunter.

Financial phone-in.

Sociological discussion programme, presented by Laurie Taylor.

Topical programme about the fast-changing media world.

Eddie Mair with interviews, context and analysis.

The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4.