Freedom, Books, Flowers & The Moon

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Miranda France, the TLS’s Hispanic editor, to discuss the Mexican writer Fernanda Melchor and two new works that approach brutal and brutalized lives in innovative ways; Michael Caines, also of the TLS, considers a collection of essays that sets out to complicate stereotypes of East and Southeast Asian identity in Britain; and there’s focus on film, including Nosferatu at 100, unsung heroines of the big screen, and a fresh look at Marilyn Monroe’s difficult stay in London.‘Paradais’ by Fernanda Melchor, translated by Sophie Hughes‘Aquí no es Miami’ by Fernanda Melchor‘East Side Voices: Essays celebrating East and Southeast Asian identity in Britain’, edited by Helena Lee‘When Marilyn Met the Queen: Marilyn Monroe’s life in England’ by Michelle Morgan ‘The Performer’s Tale: Nine lives of Patience Collier’ By Vanessa Morton‘Forever Young: A memoir’ by Hayley Mills‘The Great Peace: A memoir’ by Mena Suvari‘Movie Workers: The women who m

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the critic Nelly Kaprièlian and the TLS’s French editor Russell Williams to discuss ‘Anéantir’, the latest novel by France’s best-known and maybe most controversial writer, Michel Houellebecq; the TLS’s Toby Lichtig talks us through a new memoir by the ‘pre-eminent author of British Jewish novels’, Howard Jacobson, and we consider a masterclass in sympathy from Anne Tyler, a tale of revenge by Japan’s ‘Queen of mysteries’, and a wartime reckoning in Finland.‘Anéantir’ by Michel Houellebecq‘Mother’s Boy: A writer’s beginnings’ by Howard Jacobson‘French Braid’ by Anne Tyler‘Lady Joker: Volume one’ by Kaoru Takamura, translated by Marie Iida and Allison Markin Powell  ‘Land of Snow & Ashes’ by Petra Rautiainen, translated by David HackstonProduced by Sophia Franklin See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the writer and critic Mary Norris to discuss the phenomenon that is Margaret Atwood – surely her kind of success requires a method? A new collection of essays and talks sheds some light; Sujit Sivasundaram, the author of ‘Waves Across the South: A new history of revolution and empire’, considers a work of non-fiction by the novelist Amitav Ghosh which paints a compelling picture of how the trade in nutmeg prefigured today’s environmental crisis‘Burning Questions: Essays and occasional pieces 2004–2021’ by Margaret Atwood‘The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a planet in crisis’ by Amitav GhoshProduced by Sophia Franklin See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the critic Muriel Zagha to discuss a new play by Florian Zeller, ‘the most successful representative of contemporary French theatre’; Kathryn Hughes, the author of ‘Victorians Undone: Tales of the flesh in the age of decorum’, explores the cultural significance of passing out, from ‘Troilus and Criseyde’ to ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’, via Shakespeare and Bram Stoker; plus, a poem by Ange Mlinko, ‘Storm Windows’ ‘The Forest’ by Florian Zeller, translated by Christopher Hampton, Hampstead Theatre, until March 12‘Swoon: A poetics of passing out’ by Naomi BoothProduced by Sophia Franklin See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Jeremy Mynott, the author of ‘Birdscapes: Birds in Our Imagination and Experience’ and ‘Birds in the Ancient World’, to ponder 12,000 years of human–bird relations. ‘How is it that, despite a historically deep-rooted veneration, we could also have predated, exploited and depleted bird populations to the point where more than one in ten species is now threatened with extinction?’; and Janet Montefiore, Chair of the Sylvia Townsend Warner Society, asks whether this vivid and varied satirical novelist might finally take her place alongside Virginia Woolf and Elizabeth Bowen among the canon of accepted classics? Plus, a Life of the poet Valentine Ackland, still best known as Warner’s partner‘Flight From Grace: A cultural history of humans and birds’ by Richard Pope                                &nbs

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Alex Clark are joined by Ann Hallamore Caesar, Professor Emerita in Italian Literature at the University of Warwick, to discuss the birth and legacy of Pinocchio, the world’s most famous (and most insolent) puppet – is his story really only for children? And do we need another English translation?; George Berridge, a TLS editor and restaurant-kitchen survivor, considers two close-ups on the troubled life of the chef, restaurateur and TV presenter Anthony Bourdain ‘The Adventures of Pinocchio’ by Carlo Collodi, translated and edited by John Hooper and Anna Kraczyna‘Bourdain: In stories’ by Laurie Woolever'In the Weeds: Around the world and behind the scenes with Anthony Bourdain’ by Tom VitaleProduced by Sophia Franklin See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Lucy Dallas and Alex Clark are joined by Sara Hudston to talk about how to write about our environment, who gets to write about it, why it is so crucial - and "horsey" books; and James McConnachie, himself a keen player, discusses the future of strategy games, given that the computers are increasingly beating the humansWomen on Nature, edited by Katherine NorburyWild Isles, edited by Patrick Barkham Gifts of Gravity and Light, edited by Anita Roy and Pippa MarlandOut of Time: Poetry from the climate emergency, edited by Kate SimpsonSeven Games: A Human History by Oliver RoederProduced by Sophia Franklin See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, to mark 100 years since the publication of ‘Ulysses’, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the novelist Audrey Magee to discuss how James Joyce wrestled with the demands, political and personal, of the Irish language; the anthropologist and science writer Barbara J. King reviews Andrea Arnold’s film ‘Cow’, which attempts to show life from an animal’s perspective; plus, Mary Beard shares a few thoughts on Roman kissing.'Cow', directed by Andrea ArnoldProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Benjamin Markovits, the novelist, critic and teacher of creative writing, to discuss 100 American essays spanning 300-odd years (‘have we got any better at it?’); the sinologist Rana Mitter discusses the supremely difficult, and controversial, job of adapting the Chinese script for the modern age; plus, ‘Edelweiss’, a poignant new poem by Fiona Benson‘The Glorious American Essay: One hundred essays from colonial times to the present’, edited by Phillip Lopate‘Kingdom of Characters: A tale of language, obsession, and genius in modern China’ by Jing TsuProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the writer and broadcaster Muriel Zagha to discuss 'Nightmare Alley', an unsettling vision of delight and deceit from the Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro; the historian Abigail Green explores the untold stories of the women behind Europe’s premier banking dynasty, the Rothschilds; plus, a dinosaur poem of note'Nightmare Alley', various cinemas'The Women of Rothschild: The untold story of the world’s most famous dynasty' by Natalie LivingstoneProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the poet A. E. Stallings to reconsider the ground-breaking work of Edna St Vincent Millay, a modern but not modernist poet, once judged 'the most glamorous, sexually-dangerous since Byron'; Thomas Morris, the author of medical and crime histories, delves into the often-troubling history of medical transplants; plus, a new poem by Ben Wilkinson, ‘What We Were’'Poems and Satires' by Edna St Vincent Millay, edited by Tristram Fane Saunders 'Spare Parts: A surprising history of transplants' by Paul CraddockProduced by Sophia Franklin.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by the writer and translator Chiara Marchelli to revisit the work of Antonio Tabucchi, a master of the uncanny, ten years after his death; and the multilingual critic Irina Dumitrescu discusses a poignant study of bilingualism that considers how mother tongues are lost and found and at what cost‘Little Misunderstandings of No Importance: And other stories’, by Antonio Tabucchi, translated by Frances Frenaye‘Requiem: A hallucination’, by Antonio Tabucchi, translated by Margaret Jull Costa‘Pereira Maintains: A testimony’, by Antonio Tabucchi, translated by Patrick Creagh‘Memory Speaks: On losing and reclaiming language and self’ by Julie SedivyProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas look back at this year’s podcasts. We hear from Joyce Carol Oates, Margaret Drabble, Mary Beard and Paul Muldoon, among others, covering literature, film, art, poetry and much more.Produced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas look back at this year’s podcasts. We hear from Joyce Carol Oates, Margaret Drabble, Mary Beard and Paul Muldoon, among others, covering literature, film, art, poetry and much more. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A conversation between the novelists Sarah Hall and Sarah Moss, both of whose most recent novels confront life in the middle of a pandemic, chaired by the TLS’s fiction editor Toby Lichtig.(This event was recorded in November at Hay Festival’s Winter Weekend)'Burntcoat' by Sarah Hall'The Fell' by Sarah MossProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Emer Nolan, Professor of English at Maynooth University, to discuss the letters of John McGahern, one of Ireland’s most accomplished writers of fiction; How did Napoleon get his hands on Veronese’s enormous masterpiece “The Wedding Feast at Cana”, once safely housed in a Venetian monastery? Does it matter and should we do anything to remedy the situation? Ruth Scurr, the author of ‘Napoleon: A Life told in gardens and shadows’, considers Napoleon’s thirst for art, and its legacy; plus, a quick look at some of 2021’s most favourably reviewed films and plays ‘The Letters of John McGahern’, edited by Frank Shovlin‘Napoleon’s Plunder: And the theft of Veronese’s Feast’ by Cynthia SaltzmanProduced by Sophia Franklin Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by Francesca Wade, at work on a book about Gertrude Stein’s afterlife, to discuss Stein’s ‘lost’ notebooks – and the magnificent amount of research conducted by Leon Katz, who discovered them some seventy years ago – and shed new light on the writer’s process and personal life; and the musician and critic Wesley Stace takes us back to a stormy but productive time in the life of The Beatles, via a new film by Peter Jackson‘No no no, nonsense, never: Hidden notebooks reveal the tense relationships behind Gertrude Stein’s genius’ by Francesca Wade, in this week’s TLS.‘The Beatles: Get Back’, on Disney+Produced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Lucy Dallas and Alex Clark discuss roses, Orwell and rhizomatic thinking with Margaret Drabble; Kathryn Hughes is our guide through histories of self-improvement; plus, what log-rolling really means.'Orwell's Roses' by Rebecca Solnit'The Art of Self-Improvement' by Anna Katharina SchaffnerThe Log Driver's Waltz: https://www.nfb.ca/film/log_drivers_waltzProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Thea Lenarduzzi and Lucy Dallas are joined by TLS editors to look through twelve months of intriguing books, as nominated by contributors including Mary Beard, the poet Paul Muldoon and the writer and critic Marina Warner, covering a range of genres and subjects, from ancient Greek swear words to fictional messiahsFor the full round-up, go to the-tls.co.uk/ Produced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week, Lucy Dallas and Toby Lichtig are guided by Mark Ford through Concord, Massachusetts, the home of Emerson, Thoreau and the Transcendentalists; we talk to Susan Owens about the mystery and melancholy of lighted windows seen from outside; plus, new work from Dave Eggers and Zadie Smith'The Transcendentalists and their world' by Robert A. Gross'The Every' by Dave Eggers'The Wife of Willesden' by Zadie Smith'The Lighted Window: Evening walks remembered' by Peter DavidsonProduced by Sophia Franklin  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.