Free Thinking Episodes Episode guide
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William Stukeley
The English antiquarian (1687-1765) who may be the father of modern archaeology.
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Aztecs and Otherness
Caroline Dodds Pennock discusses how Aztecs, Inuit, Mayans and others discovered Europe.
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Audrey Hepburn
Matthew Sweet marks the 30th anniversary of the death of this icon of film and fashion.
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Higher education for women and working-class students
Anne McElvoy hosts a conversation about higher education and the history of its expansion.
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The Wife of Bath
Shahidha Bari is joined by Professor Marion Turner, poet Patience Agbabi and Hetta Howes.
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Language Loss and Revival
John Gallagher is joined by Gwenno, who writes and sings in Cornish, and others.
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Anna Kavan
Matthew Sweet looks at the writer of a dystopian psychodrama, Ice, who died in 1968.
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Phillis Wheatley
Christienna Fryar explores the life and writing of the enslaved American poet (1753-1784).
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Wilkie Collins and disability
How the Victorian author鈥檚 own pain and drug dependency fed into his sensational novels.
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Am铆lcar Cabral
Rana Mitter and guests discuss the pan-Africanist poet and anti-colonial leader.
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Katherine Mansfield and Mavis Gallant
Claire Harman, Kirsty Gunn, Laurence Scott and Shahidha Bari discuss short story writing.
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Landladies
Historical accounts and fictional depictions of the women who ran boarding houses.
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Beasts and animals
Shahidha Bari investigates the human invention of animals.
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Lists
Are lists a good way of organising chaos? Lisa Mullen and guests discuss
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Depicting AIDS in Drama
Russell T Davies, Jill Nalder, Sabina Dosani and Matthew Sweet, recorded with an audience.
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Trapeze acts and circus celebrities
Shahidha Bari hears about aerialists Lillian Leitzel and Pablo Fanque.
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Language, the Victorians, and Us
From Lancashire dialect protest poetry to Hardy's Dorset vowels. John Gallagher hosts.
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Star Trek
Matthew Sweet with George Takei, Naomi Alderman, Una McCormack and Jos茅-Antonio Orosco.
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How do we look at art?
Turner Prize shortlist, the vogue for surround-sound projections, and shows about sight.
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Soil, Chickens and City Farms
Ahead of world soil day, Anne McElvoy looks at changes to both rural and urban farming.
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Morgan 鈥� A Suitable Case for Treatment
Stephen Frears, Matthew Reisz, Lucy Bolton and Matthew Sweet look at this 1966 film.
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Arabian queens, Bangladeshi mothers and women's tales
From the Arabian nights to refugee stories - female voices fictional and real.
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St Teresa/Vivekananda/Nietzsche
Rana Mitter discusses three major philosophers of religion and self-development
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George Bernard Shaw
Anne McElvoy and guests look at the arguments explored in the plays of Shaw (1856-1950).
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Experimentation in the arts
Shahidha Bari talks to the winner of the Goldsmiths Prize, awarded for creative daring.
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Breakthroughs at Being Human 2022
New research on Benjamin Franklin in Cumbria, the Kenwood, lightbulbs and ganzflicker.
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Plastic and Clay
Lisa Mullen and guests compare the extraordinary uses of two contrasting materials.
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The Imperial War Museum Remembrance Discussion 2022
Video game designers, a former soldier, and curator of War Games at IWM join Anne McElvoy.
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John Knox
A life of great drama and religious controversy explored by Matthew Sweet and guests.
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Goethe, Schiller and the first Romantics
Andrea Wulf, author of a new group biography set in 1790s Jena, joins Anne McElvoy.
