In this 2019 episode, John interviews the celebrated British writer Zadie Smith. The conversation quickly moves through Brexit (oh, the inhumanity!) and what it means to be a London–no, a Northwest London–writer before arriving at her case against identity politics. That case is bolstered by a discussion of Hannah Arendt on the difference between who and wha ... Show More
Yesterday
Tom White, "Bad Dust: A History of the Asbestos Disaster" (Repeater, 2025)
Once used extensively in schools, hospitals, and housing, asbestos has taken the lives of millions. Bad Dust: A History of the Asbestos Disaster (Repeater, 2025) by Tom White traces the international history of the asbestos disaster — from mining operations in apartheid South Afr ... Show More
39m 40s
Nov 20
Karen Auman, "The Good Forest: The Salzburgers, Success, and the Plan for Georgia" (U Georgia Press, 2024)
The Good Forest: The Salzburgers, Success, and the Plan for Georgia (U Georgia Press, 2024) explores some of Georgia’s earliest settlers, the Salzburgers.
Georgia, the last of Britain’s American mainland colonies, began with high aspirations to create a morally sound society ba ... Show More
50m 12s
Nov 18
Max Adams and Colm O’Brien, "Northumbria AD 367-867: Earth Hall, Ring Gift and Heaven’s Field" (Birlinn, 2025)
The story of the lands between the Forth and Humber from the end of the Roman period to the Viking kingdom of York is one of the most richly fascinating in British history. This the age of Lindisfarne and of Bede; of the dramatic hills, valleys and ancient routeways that link the ... Show More
1h 8m
Apr 2024
Kant today, Spice Girls Reunited, Impersonating an Animal
Marshmallows and Kant, ideas about girl power from Mary Wollstonecraft (born April 27th 1759) to the Spice girls; and galloping horses, sea-gull sounds and life as a goat. On today's Free Thinking Shahidha Bari is joined by literary historian Alexandra Reza, philosophers Angela B ... Show More
57m 4s
Jun 2022
Reviews of the film All My Friends Hate Me and the play Cancelling Socrates; the Women's Prize for Fiction nominee Ruth Ozeki
On our Thursday review panel this week: the film critic Leila Latif and Simon Goldhill, Professor of Greek Literature and Culture at the University of Cambridge, review the British comedy horror film All My Friends Hate Me, directed by Andrew Gaynord and Howard Brenton's play Can ... Show More
42m 27s
Oct 2021
Chloe Zhao, Thomasin McKenzie, Last Night in Soho and Antlers
Chloe Zhao talks about her new film Eternals, Thomasin McKenzie tells us about starring in Edgar Wright’s new film.Plus we have reviews of Harry Potter & The Philosopher's Stone on its 20th Anniversary re-release; Antlers, set in an isolated Oregon town, about a middle-school tea ... Show More
1h 46m
Jan 2016
The Danish Girl, War and Peace, Deutschland 83, Angela Clarke Follow Me, Fallout 4 and Her Story
The Danish Girl is the remarkable love story inspired by the lives of Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener, portrayed in the film respectively by Academy Award winner Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything) and Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina), and directed by Academy Award winner Tom Hoope ... Show More
41m 43s