logo
episode-header-image
Jan 2025
28m 16s

Book Club Meets: Women speaking their mi...

Fearne Cotton
About this episode

Do you find yourself keeping quiet when you have plenty to say? Dame Harriet Walter – who has played 21 of Shakespeare’s female characters – has written She Speaks, which goes between the lines and imagines what Shakespeare’s women might really have wanted to say.

 

She Speaks was our Happy Place Book Club read for December. In this chat with Fearne, Harriet explains why she felt it was so important to finally let these female characters speak their minds. Harriet also expands on the characters in order to comment on modern day issues like the way ageing women are treated.

 

Fearne and Harriet chat about whether art mirrors the social hierarchy of its day, or perhaps offers an alternative worldview. Plus, Harriet reveals how female actors keep themselves in character when they’re waiting (often a long time) to speak on stage...

 

Thank you to Little Brown Audio for the use of She Speaks audiobook, narrated by Harriet Walter.

 

Listen to Book Club Meets: Liane Moriarty

 

Listen to Book Club Meets: Miranda July 

 

Listen to Book Club Meets: Gillian Anderson

 

Listen to Book Club Meets: Patric Gagne



Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Up next
Today
Your mental state manifests physically! How your body impacts your brain
Do you notice your body telling you when your brain is struggling? We’re headed back to this year’s Happy Place Festival in Gunnersbury Park, where loads of our guest speakers took to the Talk Stage to talk about the power of the mind-body connection... In this episode – - Breath ... Show More
41m 5s
Aug 21
Sara Cox: I need to be left alone! How to take your holiday reading seriously
Are you obsessed with finding the best books – yes, multiple – to read on holiday? Broadcaster Sara Cox is!Welcome to The Happy Place Guide To Holidays! In this chat – brought to you by British Airways Holidays – Fearne and Sara share their thoughts on how to take your holiday re ... Show More
40m 30s
Aug 18
Why don’t you like yourself? Gabby Bernstein: How to stop numbing difficult emotions
Getting lost in anxiety, shame, or self-loathing? Spiritual leader Gabby Bernstein wants you to acknowledge all the messy parts of your true character. Spoiler: you’re not going suddenly to like yourself overnight, but acknowledging the uncomfortable bits will get you there soone ... Show More
57m 38s
Recommended Episodes
Dec 2024
Weekend Woman’s Hour: Keira Knightley and Sarah Lancashire, Sutara Gayle, Uterine fibroids, Surviving grief, Josie Lloyd
Powerhouse actors Keira Knightley and Sarah Lancashire are starring alongside Ben Wishaw in new Netflix spy drama Black Doves. It follows the story of a female spy seeking revenge for the murder of her lover – whilst outwardly being married to a high-ranking politician. Keira and ... Show More
54m 38s
Jun 27
Book Club: Let's Talk About 'Mrs. Dalloway" at 100
“Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself”: So reads one of the great opening lines in British literature, the first sentence of Virginia Woolf’s classic 1925 novel, “Mrs. Dalloway.”The book tracks one day in the life of an English woman, Clarissa Dalloway, living in ... Show More
42m 38s
Mar 2025
Ep 469: Book Club is for discussing, discovering, and dissenting
Readers, we often receive questions from you about our Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club and what actually goes on in our online reading community, and today's guest is here to help Anne take you behind the scenes! You may already know Ginger Horton, our MMD Book Club Community Manager, ... Show More
1h 8m
Sep 2024
CZM Book Club: "The Sapling Cage" by Margaret Killjoy
Audiobook narrator Jackie Meloche reads Margaret the first chapter of her own upcomin book!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. 
46m 32s
Nov 2024
CZM Book Club: The Free Orcs of Cascadia by Margaret Killjoy
It's a Book Club Rerun! Margaret Killjoy reads her short story, The Free Orcs of Cascadia.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. 
42m 49s
Apr 2024
Weekend Woman's Hour: Ruth Wilson, Young women and voting, Jing Lusi
This week, Ruth Wilson explains why she’s running this year’s London Marathon for an Alzheimer’s research, following in the footsteps of her father who ran the first London Marathon in 1981.Tuesday was the deadline to register to vote in the local elections on May 2nd. The most r ... Show More
55m 58s
Jun 29
TED Talks Daily Book Club: A Little Daylight Left | Sarah Kay
Sarah Kay is a spoken word poet and the author of the new poetry collection "A Little Daylight Left." In this TED Talks Daily Book Club interview with host Elise Hu, Kay reflects on her relationship with poetry — from reading the poems her parents left in her lunchbox to frequent ... Show More
47m 20s
Jun 25
The Best-Paid Woman in NYC
As J.P. Morgan's personal librarian, entrusted with building his collection, Belle da Costa Greene could ‘spend more money in an afternoon than any other young woman of 26’, as the New York Times put it in 1912. In the latest LRB, Francesca Wade reviews a new biography of Greene ... Show More
40m 30s
Sep 2024
Dame Tracey Emin, Doreen Soulsby, Dame Maureen Lipman, Young Adult Fiction
Dame Tracey Emin, one of the most famous artists and leading figures of the Young British Artists movement of the 1990s. Hers is a uniquely provocative, confessional style which confronts issues such as trauma of abortion, rape, alcoholism and sexual history. In recent years Trac ... Show More
56m 40s