Immortality

Karel Čapek's 1922 play The Makropulos Affair about a famous singer who has lived for over 300 years was adapted into an opera by the composer Leoš Janáček and premiered in 1926. George Bernard Shaw's play Back to Methuselah, which premiered in 1922, also looks at human destiny and ideas about long life. As Welsh National Opera's new touring production of The Makropulos Affair opens in Cardiff, Matthew Sweet and guests New Generation Thinker Sarah Dillon, classicist Charlotte Higgins and philosopher Rebecca Roache explore the quest for endless youth in literature, film and myth and discussions of the idea by philosophers including Bernard Williams.

The Makropulos Affair opens at the Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff on Friday 16th September for three performances and then goes on tour to Llandudno, Plymouth, Birmingham, Southampton and Oxford.

Professor Sarah Dillon is working on a student guide How to Study the Contemporary and researching a literary history of AI. Her books include Storylistening: Narrative Evidence and Public Reasoning and she is on the editorial boards of C21: Journal of Twenty-First Century Writing and Fantastika. Charlotte Higgins' books include Greek Myths: A New Retelling and Red Thread: On Mazes and Labrynths

Producer: Torquil MacLeod

The Free Thinking programme website has a playlist called Free Thinking the Future which includes discussions about AI, robots and an interview with Ray Kurzweil https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03zwn4d