Arts & Ideas

The Punjabi "Romeo and Juliet" is explored at Bradford Lit Fest plus New Generation Thinker Catherine Fletcher talks to Jonathan Dollimore about his memoir and the influence of the Centre for the Study of Sexual Dissidence which he set up at Sussex University. The Greek poet Sappho is championed by Professor Margaret Reynolds as part of Queer Icons - a project to mark the 50th anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in which 50 leading figures choose an LGBT artwork that is special to them. And Rohit Dasgupta from Loughborough University talks about his research published in Digital Queer Cultures in India. Jonathan Dollimore's Memoir is called Desire. Waris Shah's Heer Ranja is discussed at Bradford Lit Fest by Mahmood Awan, Avaes Mohammad and Pritpal Singh on Saturday, 8th July 2017 2:45 pm - 4:00 pm at Bradford College - ATC. One of the definitive works of the Sufiana tradition it's an epic love poem set in 18th-century undivided Punjab. You can find more information about Queer Icons on the Front Row website. You can hear Catherine Fletcher chairing a Free Thinking discussion about Women's Voices in the Classical World recorded with Bettany Hughes, Paul Cartledge and Colm Toibin at the Hay Festival on the Free Thinking website. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08rsrlt You can find the BBC's Gay Britannia season of programmes on radio and tv collected on the website. They include documentaries, Drama on 3, episodes of Words and Music and more editions of Free Thinking including Philip Hoare on Cecil Beaton, Jake Arnott on Joe Orton and Sophie-Grace Chappell on Plato. Producer Craig Smith

Matthew Sweet talks to Philip Hoare about literary history and the ocean. Poet Elizabeth Jane Burnett performs snippets from her collection, Swims. Writer Jake Arnott reassesses the film Prick Up Your Ears as it's re-released in cinemas. Continuing the 'Queer Icon' series, Philip Hoare plumps for Cecil Beaton's image of Stephen Tennant. Philip Hoare's new book is called RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTARQueer Icons is a project to mark the 50th anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in which 50 leading figures choose an LGBTQ artwork that is special to them. You can find more details on the Front Row website on BBC Radio 4 and in the Gay Britannia collection of programmes from radio and television. The BFI is holding a series of Joe Orton events: Obscentities in Suburbia through August when Prick Up Your Ears is re-released in cinemas along with a Gross Indecency Season focusing on television and film made after the 1968 Act which partially decriminalised homosexuality. Drama on 3 - a Joe Orton double bill: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08wn0lm Producer: Craig Templeton Smith

Can going out for a meal really be an aesthetic experience, like going to a gallery or a theatre? What kind of statement are we making when we say we don’t like beetroot? And what can the great thinkers of history – the philosopher David Hume, the anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss – tell us about table manners? And which thousand islands are we talking about when we talk about a thousand island dressing? Matthew Sweet explores the joys of food with philosopher Barry Smith, restaurant critic cum trainee chef Lisa Markwell, literary critic Alex Clark, and food historian Elsa RichardsonProducer: Luke Mulhall

Matthew Sweet looks at the Canadian influence on British TV drama in the early 1960s, with director Alvin Rakoff, Sydney Newman biographer, Ryan Danes, and Graeme Burk, contributor to the publication of Newman's memoirs. Newman was instrumental in setting up Armchair Theatre, The Avengers and Doctor Who and The Wednesday Play at a time when broadcasting was in an excitingly fluid state. The British-Trinidadian poet Vahni Capildeo on her Forward Prize winning collection Measures of Expatriation and a new Poetry Prize for Second Collections, the Ledbury Forte Prize. Artists Larissa Sanour and Jonathan May discuss the Survival of the Artist as this year's Shubbak, London's festival of Contemporary Arab Culture opens. Presenter: Matthew Sweet Guests: Graeme Burk 'Head of Drama: The Memoir of Sydney Newman' by Sydney Newman (Author), Ted Kotcheff (Foreword, Contributor), Graeme Burk (Contributor) out in September Ryan Danes 'The Man Who Thought Outside the Box: The Life and Times of Doctor Who Creator Sydney Newman' out now Vahni Capildeo 'Measure of Expatriation' out now. The Ledbury Poetry Festival 30th June to 9th July 2017 The Survival of the Artist presented by The Mosaic Rooms, at the British Museum July 2nd, part of Shubbak, London's Festival of Contemporary Arab Culture 1–16 July 2017 .Producer: Jaqueline Smith.

Shahidha Bari and Laurence Scott look at images of Canada from First Nations art through Anne of Green Gables on TV to poems and art posted on Instagram and Twitter by Rupi Kaur. Their studio guests are author Alison MacLeod, Robbie Richardson and Deborah Pearson. Plus film maker Kevan Funk. Rupi Kaur has published a book called Milk and Honey and you can find images of her art via her website https://www.rupikaur.com/Robbie Richardson from the University of Kent is writing a book about the connections between representations of First Nations people in 18th-century British literature and the rise of modern British identity.Kevan Funk's film Hello Destroyer is on a tour of UK cinemas along with other films from the Canada Now Festival and it is also available from Curzon Home Cinema.Alison MacLeod has published a short story collection all the beloved ghosts.Deborah Pearson's documentary History History History is screening as part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival from August 5th to 10th. Anne of Green Gables, the 1908 novel by Canadian author Lucy Maud Montgomery, has recently been remade for TV in a CBC-Netflix adaptationPart of Canada 150: a week of programmes marking the 150th anniversary of the founding of the nation. You can find links to concerts and other broadcasts on the Radio 3 website.Producer: Torquil MacLeod

Philip Dodd explores the influence of Canadian history and the difference between stand up and performing a one man show. Katherine Ryan is based in the UK and about to perform at summer festivals and in an autumn tour. The French Canadian playwright, performer and opera director Robert Lepage recently staged his autobiographical "memory play", 887, at the Barbican in London. He has directed a ring cycle for the Metropolitan Opera which was featured in a 2012 documentary Wagner's Dream and productions of Berlioz's The Damnation of Faust and Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress and has also worked on shows for Cirque Du Soleil. http://www.katherineryan.co.uk/ http://lacaserne.net/index2.php/robertlepage/ Part of Radio 3's Canada 150: a week of programmes marking the 150th anniversary of the founding of the nation. You can find links to concerts and other broadcasts on the Radio 3 website.Producer: Robyn Read

Garry Kasparov talks to Philip Dodd about being defeated by a supercomputer in the chess match he played in 1997 and how this affected his view of AI. 100 years ago, Wyndham Lewis was first commissioned as a war artist; Richard Slocombe, curator of a new exhibition and art historian Anna Grueztner Robins discuss his art with John Keane who was a war artist in the Gulf War. 2017 New Generation Thinker Simon Beard outlines his research into overpopulation and our attitude towards death. Garry Kasparov's book is called Deep Thinking: Where Artificial Intelligence Ends and Human Creativity Begins.Wyndham Lewis: Life, Art, War is a display of 160 artworks, books, journals and pamphlets which runs at the Imperial War Museum North in Salford from 23 June 2017 – 1 January 2018Simon Beard is based at the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Cambridge researching existential risk. New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by the BBC and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to find academics who can turn their research into radio and television. You can find more on the Free Thinking website.

Rana Mitter goes to a drama which asks the audience to play jury in a trial following the hijacking of a plane. He's joined by Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, whose book 'The Enemy Within' looks at attitudes towards the Islamic community in Britain, Richard English author of 'Does Terrorism Work?: A History', Faisal Devji, author of several studies of political Islam and the ideology of Jihad, and 2017 New Generation Thinker Thomas Simpson. 'Terror' by Ferdinand von Schirach in a translation by David Tushingham is directed at the Lyric Hammersmith by Sean Holmes running from 14 Jun ‐ 15 Jul 2017Baroness Sayeeda Warsi's book is called 'The Enemy Within'. Richard English is the author of Does Terrorism Work?: A History Faisal Devji's books include 'Landscapes of the Jihad: Militancy, Morality, Modernity' (2005) and 'The Terrorist in Search of Humanity: Militant Islam and Global Politics' (2009) Tom Simpson is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford.New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by the BBC and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to find academics who can turn their research into radio and television. You can find more on the Free Thinking website. Producer: Luke Mulhall

Essayist Tom McCarthy joins presenter Anne McElvoy, academics Dennis Duncan + Peter Mackay and the curator of A Museum of Modern Nature. As a new exhibition opens in Edinburgh, 'Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Jacobites', poet and New Generation Thinker Peter Mackay explores the hundreds of artefacts gathered from home and abroad and gives us his reflections on the old old story of the Kings over the Water. Dennis Duncan from The Bodleian Centre for the Study of the Book brings a tale of how indexes were used to expose British Jacobite sympathisers in the decades following the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Plus a new exhibition called 'A Museum of Modern Nature' features objects offered by members of the public who were asked to reflect on what connected them to the natural world and their sense of the presence of nature in their own lives with Rosie Stanbury and Rebekah ShamanTom McCarthy's Essay Collection is called Typewriters, Bombs, Jellyfish. Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Jacobites: National Museum of Scotland 23 June - 12 November 2017 A Museum of Modern Nature: Wellcome Trust exhibition in London 22 June - 8 October 2017Producer: Jacqueline Smith

Anne McElvoy is joined by screenwriter Alex von Tunzelmann who discusses her new film, Churchill. New Generation Thinker Christopher Bannister, an expert on the propaganda unit The Ministry of Information, reveals the influence it still wields today. Academic Nandini Das and Stephanie Pratt, an art historian with Native American heritage, consider the complicated legacy of Pocahontas 400 years after her death. Plus, writer Elif Batuman offers a linguistic guide to the nuisances of the Turkish language and explains why she's so in love with the book titles of Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Elif Batuman's The Idiot is out now. You can find information about Pocahontas events from Gravesend Council http://www.visitgravesend.co.uk/events/pocahontas-400/ and http://www.bigideascompany.org/project/pocahontas-2017/Churchill is on general release from Friday.Christopher Bannister is based at the School of Advanced Study at University College London. New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by BBC Radio 3, BBC Arts and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to find academics who can turn their research into radio and television. You can find more on the Free Thinking website.Producer: Craig Templeton Smith