Art can bring the dead back to life, argues the late novelist Hilary Mantel, starting with the story of her own great-grandmother. 'We sense the dead have a vital force still,' she says. 'They have something to tell us, something we need to understand. Using fiction and drama, we try to gain that understanding.' She describes how and why she began to write fiction about the past, and how her view of her trade has evolved. We cannot hear or see the past, she says, but 'we can listen and look'. This was the first of a series of five lectures recorded in 2017, in which Dame Hilary discussed the role that history plays in our culture. How can we understand the past, she asks, and how can we convey its nature today? Above all, she believed, we must all try to respect the past amid all its strangeness and complexity. This lecture is being rebroadcast as a tribute to Dame Hilary. It was recorded in front of an audience at Halle St Peter's in Manchester, followed by a question and answer session chaired by Sue Lawley. Producer: Jim Frank Production Coordinator: Brenda Brown Editor: Hugh Levinson

The philosopher and cultural theorist Kwame Anthony Appiah says the idea of "Western civilization" or "Western culture" is a mistaken one and that we should abandon it.He uncovers the history of the idea from its roots at the time of the Crusades to its modern incarnation in the second half of the 20th century. However, we have very little culturally in common with our forebears in say the England of Chaucer's time. And indeed much of the knowledge supposedly at the heart of Western civilisation was actually transmitted via Islamic scholarship. No-one, he argues, can claim exclusive ownership of culture. "The values European humanists like to espouse belong just as easily to an African or an Asian who takes them up with enthusiasm as to a European," he says.The lecture is recorded in front of an audience at New York University in Appiah's adopted home city. The series is presented and chaired by Sue LawleyThe producer is Jim Frank.

The philosopher and cultural theorist Kwame Anthony Appiah argues for a world free of racial fixations. He tells the story of Anton Wilhelm Amo Afer. He was five years old when he was brought from the Gold Coast to Germany in 1707, educated at a royal court and became an eminent philosopher. He argues that this elaborate Enlightenment experiment illuminates a series of mistaken ideas , including that there is a "racial essence" which all members of that race carry. Modern science long ago disproved this, as almost all of the world's genetic variation is found within every so-called racial group. Instead, "race is something we make; not something that makes us."The lecture is recorded in front of an audience at the British Council in Accra, Ghana. The series is presented and chaired by Sue LawleyThe producer is Jim Frank.

The philosopher and cultural theorist Kwame Anthony Appiah argues against a mythical, romantic view of nationhood, saying instead it should rest on a commitment to shared values.He explores the history of the idea, born in the 19th century, that there are peoples who are bound together by an ancient common spirit and that each of these nations is entitled to its own state. He says this idea is a mistaken one, illustrating his argument through the life story of the writer who took the pen name Italo Svevo - meaning literally Italian Swabian. He was born a citizen of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and became a citizen of the new republic of Italy, all without leaving his home city of Trieste. Appiah argues that states exist as a set of shared beliefs rather than membership of some sort of mythical and ancient group. "What binds citizens together is a commitment," he says, "to sharing the life of a modern state, united by its institutions, procedures and precepts."The lecture is recorded in front of an audience at the University of Glasgow. The series is presented and chaired by Sue Lawley. Future lectures will examine the themes of colour and culture.The producer is Jim Frank.

Philosopher and cultural theorist Kwame Anthony Appiah argues that when considering religion we overestimate the importance of scripture and underestimate the importance of practice.He begins with the complexities of his own background, as the son of an English Anglican mother and a Ghanaian Methodist father. He turns to the idea that religious faith is based around unchanging and unchangeable holy scriptures. He argues that over the millennia religious practice has been quite as important as religious writings. He provides examples from Jewish, Christian, Islamic and Buddhist texts to show that they are often contradictory and have been interpreted in different ways at different times, for example on the position of women and men in Islam. He argues that fundamentalists are a particularly extreme example of this mistaken scriptural determinism.The lecture is recorded in front of audience at the London School of Economics and Political Science. The series is presented and chaired by Sue Lawley. Future lectures will examine identity in the contexts of country, colour and culture.The producer is Jim Frank.

The Cambridge cosmologist Professor Stephen Hawking delivers the second of his BBC Reith Lectures on black holes. Professor Hawking examines scientific thinking about black holes and challenges the idea that all matter and information is destroyed irretrievably within them. He explains his own hypothesis that black holes may emit a form of radiation, now known as Hawking Radiation. He discusses the search for mini black holes, noting that so far "no-one has found any, which is a pity because if they had, I would have got a Nobel Prize." And he advances a theory that information may remain stored within black holes in a scrambled form.The programmes are recorded in front of an audience of Radio 4 listeners and some of the country's leading scientists at the Royal Institution of Great Britain in London. Sue Lawley introduces the evening and chairs a question-and-answer session with Professor Hawking. Radio 4 listeners submitted questions in their hundreds, of which a selection were invited to attend the event to put their questions in person to Professor Hawking.Producer: Jim Frank.

Professor Stephen Hawking delves into the mysteries of black holes, challenging conventional understanding of the universe. He explores the history of scientific thinking on black holes and their potential to unlock cosmic secrets. The lectures are recorded in front of a live audience, with Sue Lawley moderating a Q&A session. The chapters cover topics such as the allure of solitude, the skepticism towards black holes, and Stephen Hawking's resilience and determination.

The surgeon and writer Atul Gawande calls for a new focus on medical systems to ensure doctors work more effectively, alongside far greater transparency about their performance.Speaking to an audience at the India International Centre in Delhi, he describes the story of medicine over the last century through the prism of his own family. From a grandmother who died in rural India from malaria - a preventable disease - to the high-tech medicine of today. He argues that despite its scientific advances, medicine has failed to exploit its knowledge successfully. In both the developed and developing world doctors do not carry out basic procedures effectively and often do not act in the best interests of their patients. He calls for wide-ranging research into the systems by which medical care is delivered, alongside far greater transparency about performance.The Reith Lectures are introduced and chaired by Sue Lawley and produced by Jim Frank.

Surgeon and writer Atul Gawande calls for a new approach to the two great unfixable problems in life and healthcare - ageing and death. He tells the story of how his daughter's piano teacher faced up to terminal cancer and the crucial choices she made about how to spend her final days. He says the teacher was only able to do this because of an essential honesty from her physicians and the people around her. Dr. Gawande argues that the common reluctance of society and medical institutions to recognise the limits of what professionals can do can end up increasing the suffering of patients towards the end of life. He proposes that both doctors and individuals ask a series of simple but penetrating questions to decide what kind of treatment is appropriate - or whether treatment is appropriate at all. And he praises the values of the hospice movement, in putting quality of life before prolonging life.The programme was recorded at The Royal Society in Edinburgh in front of an audience.The Reith Lectures are introduced and chaired by Sue Lawley and produced by Jim Frank.

The surgeon and writer Atul Gawande argues that better systems can transform global healthcare by radically reducing the chance of mistakes and increasing the chance of successful outcomes.He tells the story of how a little-known hospital in Austria managed to develop a complex yet highly effective system for dealing with victims of drowning. He says that the lesson from this dramatic narrative is that effective systems can provide major improvements in success rates for surgery and other medical procedures. Even a simple checklist - of the kind routinely used in the aviation industry - can be remarkably effective. And he argues that these systems have the power to transform care from the richest parts of the world to the poorest.The programme was recorded at The Wellcome Collection in London before an audience.The Reith Lectures are chaired and introduced by Sue Lawley and produced by Jim Frank.