Unearthed Americana
Monday morning’s unearthed Americana comes via the airwaves. I feel slightly better about my pastiche-Americana piece for the July writers’ group session. …
Radio
Review: ‘Read’ Just One Thing
Veteran BBC presenter Michael Mosley invites your to ‘Read’ Just One Thing. This episode of Mosely’s light-weight, feel-good, pop-lifestyle advice show promotes the benefits of reading fiction. …
Listening to The Everywoman (BBC Radio 4)
We’re currently listening to The Everywoman (BBC Radio 4) and BBC Sounds. This neat, two-part documentary poses the question:
If there is an ‘Everyman’ in literature, can the experiences of a female character also be universal?
Novelist Sarah Hall (Burntcoat, Sudden Traveller, Madame Zero, The Wolf Border and others) goes in search of the Everywoman. …
Currently Listening to ‘What is a Story’
Thanks to a seasonal re-run we’re currently listening to What is a Story? on BBC Radio 4, first broadcast in 2015. Starting with an examination of our early experiences of stories, Marina Warner looks at contemporary fiction in this ten-part documentary.
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Review: The History of the Future BBC Radio4
The History of the Future is a ten-part documentary on BBC4 Extra.
Juliet Gardiner looks at how cultures of the past viewed the possibilities of the future, and what these visions say about the pre-occupations of the time.
Or as I like to call it – Where’s My Jetpack? …
Review: The Man Who Saves Life Stories
“Irving Finkel collects ordinary people’s lives. He hoards their life stories in diary form and has amassed a collection of hundreds of handwritten volumes. But Irving has a problem. What should he do with them? The diaries are crammed onto shelves and piled up in corners of his small office. Irving’s day job is Assistant Keeper in the Department of the Middle East at the British Museum.”
The Man Who Saves Life Stories was one of those little gems that Radio 4 produces; the story of a museum curator and British eccentric who fell into collecting diaries and is now trying to house that collection as a ‘people’s history’ thing. …