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SAT SATURDAY 17 DECEMBER 2011 SAT SAT 00:00 Midnight News b0184w7m (Listen) SAT The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. SAT Followed by Weather. SAT SAT 00:30 Book of the Week b018scwh (Listen) SAT Londoners, Episode 5 SAT SAT By Craig Taylor. Abridged by Pete Nichols. SAT SAT Craig Taylor's book has given new voice to Londoners; the SAT rich and the poor, the native and the immigrant; men and SAT women. It continues an oral tradition that goes back to SAT Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor, published SAT in the mid-nineteenth century. SAT SAT Taylor gives us the squatter and the teacher; the bicycle SAT mechanic and the registrar; the plumber and the rickshaw SAT rider; the lost property clerk and the Wiccan priestess, who SAT casts the remnants of her spells into the Thames. SAT SAT These remarkable snapshots of the city dwellers are moving, SAT funny and informative. SAT SAT "What makes Londoners as valuable as any sociological SAT treatise is Taylor's appreciation of the ways in which his SAT subjects are themselves surveying, analysing and theorising SAT the turbulent city in which they live.... At more than 400 SAT pages, the book could easily have been twice as long... But SAT this remains a remarkable volume, from the heaving, SAT contradictory energy of its countless funny, terrifying, SAT epic stories" Sukhdev Sandhu in The Guardian. SAT SAT The lost property clerk ..... Paul Ritter SAT SAT Producer: Karen Rose SAT A Sweet Talk Production for BBC Radio 4. SAT SAT 00:48 Shipping Forecast b0184w7p (Listen) SAT The latest shipping forecast. SAT SAT 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b0184w7r (Listen) SAT BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. BBC Radio 4 resumes SAT at 5.20am. SAT SAT 05:20 Shipping Forecast b0184w7t (Listen) SAT The latest shipping forecast. SAT SAT 05:30 News Briefing b0184w7y (Listen) SAT The latest news from BBC Radio 4. SAT SAT 05:43 Prayer for the Day b0184wv2 (Listen) SAT with Bishop Dr Joe Aldred. SAT SAT 05:45 iPM b0184wv4 (Listen) SAT 'The sea's a monster, if you love it you're an idiot!' SAT Listeners Bill and Laurel Cooper long ago quit the land and SAT have spent half their lives sailing the world, but now age SAT and ill health have confined them to port. What do you do SAT after you've lived the dream? Also iPM visits an SAT old-fashioned menswear shop to talk about mohair and the SAT decline of the High Street. With Eddie Mair and Jennifer SAT Tracey. iPM@bbc.co.uk. SAT SAT 06:00 News and Papers b0184w9y (Listen) SAT The latest news headlines. Including a look at the papers. SAT SAT 06:04 Weather b0184wb2 (Listen) SAT The latest weather forecast. SAT SAT 06:07 Open Country b0184v2z (Listen) SAT Snowdonia: Search and Rescue Dog Association SAT SAT The Search and Rescue Dog Association (SARDA) Wales is a SAT specialist element of Mountain Rescue in England and Wales SAT responsible for the training and deployment of dogs to SAT search for missing people in the mountains and on the SAT moorlands of Britain as well as lowland, rural and urban SAT areas. When someone is missing in a rural or mountain SAT environment, a dog team can be more effective than 4 teams SAT of people, covering large areas much faster and effectively. SAT For the handlers and trainers who bring their dogs along to SAT be trained in this work, this work is voluntary and SAT something that they do out of their sheer love of the great SAT outdoors and, of course, the reward of working so closely SAT with their dogs to search for missing people. Helen Mark SAT joins some of the experienced, and not so experienced, dogs SAT and handlers at the foot of Cader Idris in the Snowdonia SAT National Park to find out what this work involves, how SAT important it is to the search teams and to the people they SAT help and to hear why 'one man (or woman!) and their dog are SAT such a fundamental part of the British landscape. SAT SAT Helen meets Helen Howe, an experienced trainer and handler, SAT who explains how the dogs and their handlers are trained to SAT search and rescue missing people. It can take around 3 years SAT to train a new puppy to become a fully qualified Search Dog SAT and Helen Howe explains how this is done. Between then, SAT Helen and Cluania have had several successful finds. SAT However, it is impossible to train a search dog without the SAT invaluable help of a team of people called 'dogsbodies' and SAT Helen Mark then meets up with Emmer Litt who has been SAT volunteering herself as a 'body' for over four years. At SAT each training event, Emmer spends her time hiding out in the SAT hills that she loves with a good book and a flask of tea SAT waiting to be 'found' by the dogs in training. Without the SAT help of people like Emmer it is impossible to train a search SAT dog because they need someone to search for and so Helen SAT joins trainee handler, Rob Johnson, and his dog Skye as they SAT set off in the hunt for Emmer who is now hidden somewhere SAT under Snowdonia's autumn sunshine in the foothills of Cader SAT Idris. SAT SAT Finally, Helen joins handler Iain Nicholson and his dog, SAT Mij, who is a trailing dog. Together they demonstrate for SAT Helen how Mij works in a scent specific way by following the SAT actual scent of the person that is missing. Iain and Mij SAT work from the place that the missing person was last seen SAT and have been extremely successful in locating people in SAT more lowland and urban areas as well as helping out with the SAT Mountain Rescue Teams of the Lake District. SAT SAT Being part of SARDA is extremely important to the handlers SAT and dogs that are involved but their continued presence on SAT the British landscape is just as vital to the people that SAT they help to rescue each year. SAT SAT Presenter: Helen Mark SAT Producer: Helen Chetwynd. SAT SAT Helen Mark with the trailing dogs and their handlers from SAT SARDA Wales SAT SAT 06:30 Farming Today b018851p (Listen) SAT Farming Today This Week SAT SAT The latest news about food, farming and the countryside. SAT Produced by Anne Marie Bullock. Presented by Charlotte SAT Smith. SAT SAT 06:57 Weather b0184wb6 (Listen) SAT The latest weather forecast. SAT SAT 07:00 Today b01886s5 (Listen) SAT With James Naughtie and Evan Davis. Including Sports Desk, SAT Weather, Thought for the Day. SAT SAT 09:00 Saturday Live b018851r (Listen) SAT Samantha Bond; Luke Wright; young ballerina; lung scientist; SAT Chi Chi's keeper; saw Sound Sculpture; Gareth Malone SAT SAT Richard Coles with actress Samantha Bond, poet Luke Wright, SAT young ballerina Izzy McGuire who left home to train in SAT Russia when she was just 14, medical scientist Dame Julia SAT Polak who ended up suffering from the rare condition she'd SAT been researching, JP Devlin continues the saga of celebrity SAT panda Chi-chi this week with Chris Madden who was the man SAT she mauled, a Sound Sculpture of a saw from listener SAT Alexander Frew, and the Inheritance Tracks of choirmaster SAT Gareth Malone. SAT SAT Producer: Sukey Firth. SAT SAT 10:00 Excess Baggage b018851t (Listen) SAT Animal welfare - Plant hunting SAT SAT John McCarthy meets Philip Cribb, a botanist and orchid SAT specialist at Kew Gardens who's spent thirty years plant SAT hunting in Western China. Along with Christopher SAT Grey-Wilson, he's just produced a Guide to the Flowers of SAT Western China and he regularly leads tours there. He SAT explains the process of gathering the flowers and how SAT attitudes towards their native flora are changing. SAT SAT John also discusses animal welfare abroad and meets two SAT women who have decided to devote their life to helping SAT domestic animals around the world. Barbara Webb spent ten SAT years trekking in Nepal before the plight of stray dogs SAT there inspired her to set up HART, the Himalayan Animal SAT Rescue Trust. Caroline Yates is CEO of the Mayhew, an animal SAT home in the UK supporting projects in Moscow, northern Peru, SAT India and Afghanistan. Now she regularly treks in East SAT Africa, Morocco and South America with animal welfare in SAT mind. SAT SAT Producer: Margaret Collins. SAT SAT 10:30 Pop Goes the Bible! b018851w (Listen) SAT As the 400th anniversary of the translation of the Bible SAT into English draws to a close Paul Gambaccini picks out some SAT of the 100's of pop songs that have been inspired by the Old SAT and New Testaments. The stories, characters and text have SAT led to a huge catalogue of songs ranging from Elvis Presley SAT ('Adam and Evil'), to Bob Dylan (Highway 61 Revisited), SAT Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice ('Joseph' and 'Jesus SAT Christ, Superstar'), The Byrds (Turn! Turn! Turn!), Leonard SAT Cohen ('Hallelujah'), and U2 ('40' and 'Yahweh'). SAT SAT Paul talks to Tim Rice about his early schooling which laid SAT down for him an intimate knowledge of Bible stories. One of SAT his favourites was that of 'Joseph' and the musical that SAT evolved became the foundation of the Rice/Lloyd-Webber SAT partnership. His fascination with the stories and characters SAT took Rice not only on to 'Jesus Christ, Superstar' but more SAT recently to the story of King David and Saul. He talks about SAT his continued absorption in the people within the pages of SAT the Bible. SAT SAT Diana Lipton, an Old Testament scholar, shows how many SAT popular song treatments refresh the ancient stories by SAT setting them in an entirely different and often contemporary SAT context. She cites Bob Dylan's treatment of the story of SAT Abraham and Isaac in 'Highway 61 Revisited', but also finds SAT a connection in Tom Jones' hit 'Delilah'. Although the only SAT Biblical connection is the name 'Delilah', the blind passion SAT of both the character in the song and Samson provokes the SAT same disastrous outcome. SAT SAT U2, with their song '40', took much of the lyric from Psalm SAT 40, and rock critic Neil McCormick points to the close SAT connection between Bono and his religious upbringing, a SAT connection which - as in many of the songs in this programme SAT - feeds into popular song culture. SAT SAT Producer: Richard Bannerman SAT A Ladbroke Production for BBC Radio 4. SAT SAT 11:00 Week in Westminster b018851y (Listen) SAT Jackie Ashley looks behind the scenes at Westminster. SAT The Editor is Peter Mulligan. SAT SAT 11:30 From Our Own Correspondent b0188520 (Listen) SAT The polar bear's back in the news - this time it's at the SAT centre of controversy in Canada where some believe it's a SAT far better animal to be the country's national symbol than SAT the one which currently holds the honour, the beaver. SAT Lorraine Mallinder has been finding out that some Canadians SAT reckon the beaver's just too boring for the job. At the end SAT of another stressful week in the eurozone Chris Morris tells SAT us that the Germans don't seem too concerned -- the SAT Christmas party season's on their minds! The revolution's SAT brought a new look to Libya but Tarik Kafala, who's been SAT back to Tripoli after many years away, says not everything's SAT changed. Jill McGivering's in Indian Kashmir where questions SAT are being asked about thousands of unmarked graves. And a SAT celebrated bookshop owner passed away this week in Paris and SAT Christine Finn, who worked in his shop recently, tells us SAT what made this store, over the bridge from Notre Dame, so SAT special. SAT SAT 12:00 Money Box b0188522 (Listen) SAT Paul Lewis presents the latest news from the world of SAT personal finance. SAT SAT 12:30 The Now Show b0184w5y (Listen) SAT Series 35, Episode 6 SAT SAT Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis are joined by Jon Holmes, Alun SAT Cochrane, Laura Shavin and Mitch Benn for the last in the SAT current series. SAT SAT Back in February 2012. SAT SAT Producer: Katie Tyrrell. SAT SAT 12:57 Weather b0184wbg (Listen) SAT The latest weather forecast. SAT SAT 13:00 News b0184wbj (Listen) SAT The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. SAT SAT 13:10 Any Questions? b0184w64 (Listen) SAT Jonathan Dimbleby presents a panel discussion of news and SAT politics from Sir John Cass Red Coat School in Stepney, SAT London with broadcaster and former Cabinet minister, Michael SAT Portillo; poet Andrew Motion; veteran foreign correspondent SAT and broadcaster, Dame Ann Leslie; and vice-chair of the SAT Liberal Democrats' National Policy Committee and Hacked Off SAT activist, Dr Evan Harris. SAT SAT Producer: Victoria Wakely. SAT SAT 14:00 Any Answers? b0188524 (Listen) SAT Listeners' calls and emails in response to this week's SAT edition of Any Questions? SAT SAT 14:30 Saturday Play b0188526 (Listen) SAT Our Country's Good SAT SAT by Timberlake Wertenbaker SAT SAT Australia 1789: A young lieutenant attempts to direct a cast SAT of convicts in 'The Recruiting Officer', the first play SAT ever to be staged in the country. SAT But one of his cast may be about to be hanged. SAT The convicts' production of The Recruiting Officer can be SAT heard on Drama on 3 on Sunday evening. SAT SAT Captain Arthur Philip ..... Nicholas Le Prevost SAT Major Robbie Ross ..... Stuart McQuarrie SAT Captain David Collins ..... Paul Moriarty SAT Captain Watkin Tench ..... Adam Billington SAT Captain Campbell ..... James Lailey SAT 2nd Lieutenant Ralph Clark ..... Paul Higgins SAT Reverend Johnson ..... Simon Bubb SAT Midshipman Harry Brewer ..... Rikki Lawton SAT Mary Brenham ..... Francine Chamberlain SAT Robert Sideway ..... Adam James SAT John Wisehammer ..... Elliot Levey SAT Liz Morden ..... Kate Fleetwood SAT Dabby Bryant ..... Alex Tregear SAT John Arscott ...... Ralph Ineson SAT Ketch Freeman ..... Jonathan Forbes SAT Duckling Smith ..... Adjoa Andoh SAT SAT Director ..... Sally Avens SAT SAT Timberlake Wertenbaker's stage play was adapted from Thomas SAT Keneally's novel, 'The Playmaker'. SAT It tells the true story of Lieutenant Ralph Clark's attempts SAT to put on a production of George Farquhar's 'The Recruiting SAT Officer' using a cast of convicts. It met with high praise SAT when it was first staged at The Royal Court and the play SAT argues eloquently for the redemptive power of theatre. Many SAT of the arguments are still current today as we debate how SAT best to rehabilitate prisoners. At the heart of the play is SAT its language; Wertenbaker celebrates the beauty of language SAT in the slang of the criminal classes and the poetry of the SAT play but she also looks at how language is used as an SAT instrument of power. SAT SAT Over one weekend Radio 4 and Radio 3 present new productions SAT of 'Our Country's Good' and 'The Recruiting Officer' using SAT the same cast. On Saturday on Radio 4 we hear 'Our Country's SAT Good' and watch a group of convicts' lives change as they SAT rehearse 'The Recruiting Officer' and on Sunday on Radio 3 SAT we hear the convicts' production of 'The Recruiting SAT Officer'. SAT SAT 16:00 Woman's Hour b01886jl (Listen) SAT Weekend Woman's Hour SAT SAT Highlights from the Woman's Hour week. Presented by Jane SAT Garvey. SAT SAT 17:00 PM b01886jn (Listen) SAT A fresh perspective on the day's news with sports headlines SAT with Carolyn Quinn. SAT SAT 17:30 iPM b0184wv4 (Listen) SAT [Repeat of broadcast at 05:45 today] SAT SAT 17:54 Shipping Forecast b0184wbq (Listen) SAT The latest shipping forecast. SAT SAT 17:57 Weather b0184wbs (Listen) SAT The latest weather forecast. SAT SAT 18:00 Six O'Clock News b0184wbx (Listen) SAT The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. SAT SAT 18:15 Loose Ends b01886jq (Listen) SAT Clive Anderson and guests with an eclectic mix of SAT conversation, music and comedy. SAT SAT In 2006 he was 'Pedantic and Whimsical', but this year, SAT Perrier Award-nominated Irish comedian Ed Byrne's critically SAT acclaimed show was a 'Crowd Pleaser' and is now available on SAT DVD. Ed tells Clive what it takes to tickle the ribs and SAT appease a room full of hecklers. SAT SAT Prize-winning author Adam Nicolson talks about his book 'The SAT Gentry: Stories of the English'. Telling the real story of SAT England, it focuses on fourteen families, from the medieval SAT gung-ho of the Plumpton family to the high-seas adventures SAT of the Lascelles in the 18th century and is a wonderful SAT sweep of English history. SAT SAT All aboard The Swallow! Jo Bunting talks to The Divine SAT Comedy's Neil Hannon about writing songs for the musical SAT play 'Swallows And Amazons' at London's Vaudeville Theatre. SAT Based on the much-loved book by Arthur Ransome, Neil's songs SAT accompany Captain John and his crew, embarking on an exotic SAT adventure capturing dastardly pirates and defeating mortal SAT enemies. SAT SAT Bonafide member of The IT Crowd, Katherine Parkinson SAT explains her new role as Conceptiva Secret-Past, the SAT on-screen wife of Robert Webb, purveyor of miscellaneous odd SAT things in BBC Two's 'The Bleak Old Shop of Stuff'. It's a SAT tale of hidden wills, brave urchins, giant clocks, misery, SAT joy and.treacle! SAT SAT Bringing some funk and rhythm into the Loose Ends studio is SAT soulful Nigerian Xantoné Blacq who performs 'Mama Won't SAT Listen' from his album 'Revelation'. SAT SAT And the magnificent singer-songwriter Ed Harcourt gives us SAT an exclusive rendition of his his brand new song 'El SAT Magnifico'. SAT SAT Producer: Cathie Mahoney. SAT SAT 19:00 Profile b01886js (Listen) SAT Peter Higgs SAT SAT Profile this week looks at the physicist Peter Higgs who in SAT the 1960s predicted the existence of the so-called "God SAT Particle" which scientists think they glimpsed at CERN this SAT week. SAT SAT The Higgs boson - which has so excited the scientific SAT community this week - is a subatomic particle which gives SAT mass to all matter and the quest to find it has been SAT described as the holy grail of physics. SAT SAT Peter Higgs made his prediction in the mid-1960s when he was SAT a relatively young scientist, adding a crucial element to SAT the Standard Model of the universe. At the time the SAT significance of his work was not widely recognised or SAT understood, and one leading scientific journal even turned SAT down one of his early papers setting out his groundbreaking SAT theory. SAT SAT Higgs, now in his 80s, is very much a theoretical scientist. SAT Colleagues say he has never excelled at practical SAT experiments, and to this day he doesn't get on with SAT computers. SAT SAT What kind of man is he? Samira Ahmed talks to those who know SAT the scientist, and asks what makes him tick. SAT SAT Producers: SAT Ben Crighton and Arlene Gregorius. SAT SAT 19:15 Saturday Review b01886jv (Listen) SAT Tom Sutcliffe and his guests the writers Lisa Appignanesi SAT and Kamila Shamsie and theatre writer David Benedict review SAT the week's cultural highlights including Noises Off at the SAT Old Vic. SAT SAT THEATRE Noises Off - Old Vic - revival of Michael Frayn's SAT farce starring Celia Imrie SAT SAT FILM Dreams of a Life - dir. Carol Morley SAT SAT EXHIBITION Rabindranath Tagore - V&A - retrospective of SAT paintings by the Bengali polymath SAT SAT BOOK All Is Song - Samantha Harvey SAT SAT Producer: Torquil MacLeod. SAT SAT 20:00 Archive on 4 b01886jx (Listen) SAT The European Dream SAT SAT As the Eurozone lurches from crisis to crisis, John Tusa SAT takes us back to the very start of the journey to the single SAT currency: to the vision, and the realpolitik, that made SAT European union happen in the first place. SAT SAT In 1950, France and Germany, along with Italy, Belgium, SAT Holland and Luxemburg, agreed to surrender national control SAT over some of their most vital industries. Just six years SAT after the Nazis had been driven out of Paris. SAT SAT John traces how a highly unusual mix of vision and canny SAT national self-interest drove a handful of leading statesmen SAT to take this decisive step. SAT SAT Robert Schuman was the French Foreign Minister - but had SAT fought for the Germans in the First World War. Then, as a SAT French politician and member of the Resistance, he narrowly SAT avoided being sent by the Nazis to Dachau. SAT SAT Konrad Adenauer, West Germany's first Chancellor, was SAT proposing a form of European unity as early as 1923. Having SAT survived the Nazi era, he was intent on sacrificing power to SAT bind his pariah nation into the West - and keep it safe from SAT Stalin. SAT SAT More surprisingly, the idea of European union was also SAT championed by Winston Churchill, in a rousing run of SAT speeches across the Continent in the years after VE Day. The SAT great patriot even advocated a European Army. SAT SAT But John also explores why - once Churchill was back in SAT power in 1951 - he chose not to join the emergent union. SAT SAT Meanwhile, Churchill's wartime ally, America, was actively SAT pushing the Europeans to unite - and was prepared to pay SAT handsomely to ensure they wouldn't drag American troops into SAT yet another war. SAT SAT And John finds out how the whole project came to the brink SAT of collapse within weeks of its birth. In June 1950, the SAT Communists invaded South Korea. Western capitals panicked: SAT was West Germany next? Was this the start of World War 3? SAT SAT America demanded that West Germany be re-armed. But the SAT French public were outraged, and took to the streets with SAT large photos of Nazi atrocity victims held aloft. SAT SAT John explores how the project was rescued, and how its SAT strange fusion of realism and idealism presages the crises SAT of today. SAT SAT Producer: Phil Tinline. SAT SAT 21:00 Classic Serial b0183r3q (Listen) SAT Gargantua and Pantagruel by Francois Rabelais. Dramatised by SAT Lavinia Murray. SAT SAT Ep 1 Gargantua SAT SAT The bawdy, exuburant adventures of medieval giants. A SAT dizzying blend of fantasy, comedy, philosophy and SAT scatological humour. The world's a messy place. Episode 1 SAT depicts the young life of the giant Gargantua, who is SAT reduced to laughable insanity by an education at the hands SAT of paternal ignorance, old crones and syphilitic professors. SAT SAT Rabelais...David Troughton SAT Gargantua..Robert Wilfort SAT Grangousier..Eric Potts SAT Gargamelle..Melissa Jane Sinden SAT Holofornes/Friar Jean..Jonathan Keeble SAT Panochrates..Malcolm Raeburn SAT Eudomon/Sun..Kathryn Hunt SAT SAT Producer Gary Brown SAT SAT Gargantua (ep 1) depicts a young giant, reduced to laughable SAT insanity by an education at the hands of paternal ignorance, SAT old crones and syphilitic professors, who is rescued and SAT turned into a cultured Christian knight. SAT SAT This tale is a dizzying blend of fantasy, comedy, philosophy SAT and scatological humour. The world's a messy place. All the SAT big mock-heroic novels that followed - Don Quixote, Tristram SAT Shandy, Gulliver's Travels, Ulysses - are about mess, SAT they're about slops and slime, encyclopedic in their efforts SAT to encompass humanity in all its bawdy, chaotic, grungy, and SAT painful reality. And like Gargantua and Pantagruel they're SAT also very funny. The Rabelaisian world view is founded on SAT the assumption that the humourless are not yet wise - and SAT these tales insist you learn to laugh at humanity. SAT SAT Gargantua and Pantagruel is dramatised by Lavinia Murray, SAT one of our leading radio playwrights whose credits include SAT 'The Anatomy of Melancholy' and 'The Confessions of an SAT English Opium Eater'. SAT SAT 22:00 News and Weather b0184wc3 (Listen) SAT The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4, SAT followed by weather. SAT SAT 22:15 Bringing Up Britain b0184s39 (Listen) SAT Series 4, Feral Kids and Feckless Parents SAT SAT Programme 1: Feral Kids and Feckless Parents SAT SAT The August riots in parts of England showed youngsters out SAT of control on the streets, and put huge focus onto parenting SAT skills. SAT SAT MPs and council leaders warned parents that they should know SAT where their children were at night and keep them indoors and SAT out of trouble. SAT SAT But parents themselves were saying they were unable to SAT discipline their kids, either because they feared SAT repercussions by the authorities, or because their children SAT were simply physically too strong. SAT SAT In the first of the new series of "Bringing Up Britain", SAT Mariella Frostrup is joined by a panel of experts to discuss SAT parental discipline right across British society. SAT SAT How easy is it for us to control our children, especially SAT after they stop being biddable toddlers and begin to assert SAT their own personalities? SAT SAT Have we given children too many rights and ignored those of SAT parents? SAT SAT Can you really stop a large teenage child going out, and SAT what restraining measures can you legally use? SAT SAT And, if your child is going off the rails, how do you break SAT the cycle and get them back into good habits? SAT SAT Joining Mariella to explore these issues will be: SAT SAT Charlie Taylor, headteacher and behaviour advisor to the SAT Department of Education; SAT Sheldon Thomas, who founded "Gangsline" to help youngsters SAT caught up in gangs and their families; SAT Clem Henricson, social policy analyst and Member of the SAT University of Oxford Centre for Research into Parenting and SAT Children; SAT Guardian journalist Zoe Williams. SAT SAT We also find out the results of a poll commissioned by the SAT programme into attitudes to parental discipline. SAT SAT Producer: Emma Kingsley. SAT SAT 23:00 Brain of Britain b0183t4j (Listen) SAT (5/17) SAT What name is given to the curved surface of a liquid as it SAT stands in a tube, caused by surface tension? And what kind SAT of creature is a great curassow? SAT SAT Russell Davies is in the questionmaster's chair for the SAT fifth heat in the current series. Aiming to become the 59th SAT Brain of Britain champion are competitors from SAT Aberdeenshire, the West Midlands, Berkshire and Essex. SAT Today's winner will progress to the semi-finals in the new SAT year. SAT SAT There'll also be a chance, as usual, for a Brain of Britain SAT listener to outwit the contestants with questions of his or SAT her own. SAT SAT Producer: Paul Bajoria. SAT SAT 23:30 Guns, Roses and Poetry Readings b017c9ph (Listen) SAT Poet and translator W.N. Herbert and sound artist and editor SAT of Poetry Wales Zoe Skoulding share their experiences of SAT worldwide poetry festivals and performance. SAT SAT They tell us how in many Eastern European countries, poetry SAT festivals attract people in their thousands - particularly SAT to the town of Struga in Macedonia which has become one of SAT the most important poetry festivals in the world. Despite SAT the fall of Yugoslavia, the war in Bosnia, the Kosovo crisis SAT and the political and ethnic clashes in the whole of the SAT region - this particular poetry festival attracts hundreds SAT of international poets all wanting to take part. We discover SAT why. SAT SAT We also hear why in South America, poets from all over the SAT world gather not only to share their work, but each year SAT decide to "bury" a philosophical thought that the poets feel SAT the world can do without. But we also hear how, in places SAT like China and Burma, poetry can be seen as subversive and SAT is only shared with great risk of imprisonment or torture. SAT Bill Herbert and Zoe Skoulding share all this and more - as SAT they take us on a personal tour to experience poetry, SAT performance and festivals that celebrate this sometimes SAT marginalized art form. SAT SAT Presented by Bill Herbert. SAT SAT Producer: Neil Cargill SAT A Pier Production for BBC Radio 4. SAT SAT SUN SUNDAY 18 DECEMBER 2011 SUN SUN 00:00 Midnight News b01882w4 (Listen) SUN The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. SUN Followed by Weather. SUN SUN 00:30 Afternoon Reading b01276xs (Listen) SUN The British at Table, Episode 2 SUN SUN By Christopher Driver SUN SUN Christopher Driver's observations on the impact of foreign SUN food on British eating habits. SUN SUN Christopher Driver was a passionate writer, broadcaster, SUN second-hand bookshop owner, conscientious objector and SUN controversial hand-picked successor to Raymond Postgate as SUN editor of The Good Food Guide through the 1970s. His SUN descriptions of our changing attitudes towards what we SUN allowed to grace our plates between the end of rationing and SUN the affluent 1980s, and caustically witty observations of SUN the marvels of British catering (such as the waitress who SUN uncorked the wine with her teeth), made both informative and SUN amusing reading. It is, as he said, "a book about the way we SUN eat now in the light of the way we used to eat within SUN middle-aged-memory. It is about ourselves as shoppers, SUN cultivators, cooks and consumers." SUN SUN Driver saw the shape of food to come thirty years before the SUN rest of us and his accuracy is extraordinary: "The march of SUN regulation and technology means that to obtain good bacon it SUN will be once again necessary to kill and cure your own pig, SUN as in the eighteenth-century. Progress takes odd forms." SUN SUN It is sixty years since Postgate (known as "Public Stomach SUN Number One" after founding his "Society for the Prevention SUN of Cruelty to Food") first published the Good Food Guide. SUN Here is an opportunity to enjoy part of its history in the SUN words of its most eloquent editor, revealing everything from SUN the lost world of whale steaks, coypu vindaloo and sweet and SUN sour barracuda, to the language of food description that SUN embraces such evocative phrases as "the flavour of SUN unploughed fields" and "the texture of compressed string." SUN SUN Read by Tony Gardner SUN Abridged by Neil Cargill SUN Producer: Neil Cargill SUN A Pier Production for BBC Radio 4. SUN SUN 00:48 Shipping Forecast b01882w6 (Listen) SUN The latest shipping forecast. SUN SUN 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b01882w8 (Listen) SUN BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. SUN SUN 05:20 Shipping Forecast b01882wb (Listen) SUN The latest shipping forecast. SUN SUN 05:30 News Briefing b01882wd (Listen) SUN The latest news from BBC Radio 4. SUN SUN 05:43 Bells on Sunday b01886tx (Listen) SUN The bells from Tewkesbury Abbey in Gloucestershire. SUN SUN 05:45 Profile b01886js (Listen) SUN [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Saturday] SUN SUN 06:00 News Headlines b01882wh (Listen) SUN The latest national and international news. SUN SUN 06:05 Something Understood b01886zz (Listen) SUN 99 Words - Episode 2 SUN SUN When Liz Gray found herself forced into a strange period of SUN enforced retreat by a whiplash injury, the following SUN question came to her mind: if you had breath for no more SUN than 99 words, what would they be? SUN SUN She began asking friends, colleagues, artists and political SUN figures she admired, gathering together a collection of 99 SUN responses. SUN SUN In the second of a pair of programmes, she introduces SUN contributions from, among others, the artist Keith SUN Critchlow, the human rights campaigner Helen Bamber, the SUN writer Ariel Dorfman and film maker Sally Potter. SUN SUN Produced by Alan Hall SUN A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4. SUN SUN 06:35 On Your Farm b018887y (Listen) SUN Plans are underway for a memorial to the Women's Land Army SUN and Women's Timber Corps at the National Memorial Arboretum SUN in Staffordshire. If it goes ahead a statue of the iconic SUN land girl from the war time posters will stand alongside the SUN memorials for the Armed Forces and other civilian services. SUN SUN In 1943, more than 80,000 women were working from sunrise to SUN sunset toiling in the fields, doing the work of men who had SUN gone off to fight. SUN SUN In the programme, Charlotte Smith takes a tour of the SUN Arboretum and reminisces about the old days with 81 year old SUN Mary Wright from Cannock who signed up to the Land Army in SUN 1947. Mary worked for three years on a mixed farm in Burton SUN on Trent in Staffordshire. When she left the service, she SUN bought her own farm which she still runs with her family to SUN this day. Sitting having tea in the farmhouse kitchen, SUN Charlotte and Mary are also joined by Eunice Finney from the SUN Women's Farming Union which is behind the idea for a SUN memorial. SUN SUN This programme is presented by Charlotte Smith and produced SUN in Birmingham by Angela Frain. SUN SUN 06:57 Weather b01882wk (Listen) SUN The latest weather forecast. SUN SUN 07:00 News and Papers b01882wn (Listen) SUN The latest news headlines. Including a look at the papers. SUN SUN 07:10 Sunday b0188880 (Listen) SUN Edward Stourton with the religious and ethical news of the SUN week. Moral arguments and perspectives on stories familiar SUN and unfamiliar. SUN SUN Series Producer: Amanda Hancox. SUN SUN 07:55 Radio 4 Appeal b0188882 (Listen) SUN I CAN SUN SUN Michael Buerk presents the Radio 4 Appeal on behalf of the SUN charity I CAN. SUN Reg Charity: 210031 SUN To Give: SUN - Freephone 0800 404 8144 SUN - Freepost BBC Radio 4 Appeal, mark the back of the envelope SUN I CAN SUN - Give Online www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/appeal. SUN SUN I CAN SUN SUN More than 1 million children struggle to communicate – SUN finding it hard to speak, to understand words or express SUN themselves. Daily life for these children can be distressing SUN and frustrating. Their needs are often missed or SUN misunderstood, and their future prospects are uncertain. I SUN CAN are the experts in children’s communication. If we find SUN and help these children and their families, we can unlock SUN their potential and change the story of their lives. SUN SUN 07:57 Weather b01882wr (Listen) SUN The latest weather forecast. SUN SUN 08:00 News and Papers b01882wt (Listen) SUN The latest news headlines. Including a look at the papers. SUN SUN 08:10 Sunday Worship b0188884 (Listen) SUN The Coming of Emmanuel: A service for the last Sunday of SUN Advent from the Chapel of Unity, Methodist College, Belfast. SUN SUN Traditionally In the week leading up to Christmas, seven SUN antiphons, or short verses were sung after the Magnificat at SUN the Daily Office. Today's service focuses on the last of SUN these: SUN SUN O Emmanuel, our King and our lawgiver, SUN the hope of the nations and their Saviour: SUN Come and save us, O Lord our God SUN SUN Leader: Rev David Neilands SUN Preacher: Rev Professor Stephen Williams, Union Theological SUN College, Belfast. SUN Director of Music: Ruth McCartney SUN With the Chapel Choir. SUN Producer: Bert Tosh. SUN SUN 08:50 A Point of View b0184w66 (Listen) SUN Climate Change Belief SUN SUN Lisa Jardine thinks selective hearing skews the debate over SUN climate change and urges climate scientists to fully engage SUN in a conversation with their sceptical critics. "Graphs and SUN pie charts have evidently failed to convince. Perhaps a more SUN discursive approach which focuses on observable change SUN backed up by scientific evidence may be more persuasive." SUN SUN Producer: Sheila Cook. SUN SUN 09:00 Broadcasting House b0188886 (Listen) SUN News and conversation about the big stories of the week. SUN With Paddy O'Connell. SUN SUN 10:00 The Archers Omnibus b0188888 (Listen) SUN Writer ..... Adrian Flynn SUN Director ..... Kim Greengrass SUN Editor ..... Vanessa Whitburn SUN SUN Jill Archer ..... Patricia Greene SUN Shula Hebden Lloyd ..... Judy Bennett SUN David Archer ..... Timothy Bentinck SUN Pip Archer ..... Helen Monks SUN Elizabeth Pargetter ..... Alison Dowling SUN Freddie Pargetter ..... Jack Firth SUN Lily Pargetter ..... Georgie Feller SUN Tony Archer ..... Colin Skipp SUN Pat Archer ..... Patricia Gallimore SUN Helen Archer ..... Louiza Patikas SUN Tom Archer ..... Tom Graham SUN Brian Aldridge ..... Charles Collingwood SUN Jennifer Aldridge ..... Angela Piper SUN Fallon Rogers ..... Joanna Van Kampen SUN Kathy Perks ..... Hedli Niklaus SUN Joe Grundy ..... Edward Kelsey SUN Clarrie Grundy ..... Rosalind Adams SUN William Grundy ..... Philip Molloy SUN Nic Hanson ..... Becky Wright SUN Neil Carter ..... Brian Hewlett SUN Roy Tucker ..... Ian Pepperell SUN Lynda Snell ..... Carole Boyd SUN Bert Fry ..... Eric Allan SUN Annabelle Shrivener ..... Julia Hills SUN Eamonn Philips ..... Stephen Hogan SUN Clem Porter ..... Carl Prekopp. SUN SUN 11:15 Desert Island Discs b018888b (Listen) SUN Julian Fellowes SUN SUN Kirsty Young's castaway is the creator of Downton Abbey, SUN Julian Fellowes. SUN SUN He won an Oscar for his screenplay for Gosford Park and went SUN on to write other feature films including The Young Victoria SUN and Vanity Fair. Downton Abbey, which he created and writes, SUN has been an enormous TV success with a huge audience. "Of SUN course" he says, "if I had a clear understanding of why it SUN had done so well, I would continue to write shows that SUN attracted record viewers for the rest of my life." SUN SUN Producer: Leanne Buckle. SUN SUN 12:00 I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue b0183tly (Listen) SUN Series 56, Episode 5 SUN SUN The godfather of all panel shows pays a first visit to the SUN brand new Colosseum in Watford. Old-timers Barry Cryer, SUN Graeme Garden and Tim Brooke-Taylor are joined on the panel SUN by Andy Hamilton, with Jack Dee in the chair. Colin Sell SUN accompanies on the piano. Producer - Jon Naismith. SUN SUN 12:32 Food Programme b018888d (Listen) SUN Gin & Tonic SUN SUN Sheila Dillon explores the past and present of the most SUN British of drinks Gin & Tonic. SUN SUN 12:57 Weather b01882ww (Listen) SUN The latest weather forecast. SUN SUN 13:00 The World This Weekend b018888g (Listen) SUN Shaun Ley presents the latest national and international SUN news, with an in-depth look at events around the world. SUN Email: wato@bbc.co.uk; twitter: #theworldthisweekend. SUN SUN 13:30 Ayckbourn in Action b014gdqz (Listen) SUN Alan Ayckbourn's talent as a director has often been SUN obscured by his global success as a playwright. SUN SUN In this programme - amid rehearsals for his latest (75th!) SUN stage play, Neighbourhood Watch - we analyse what makes him SUN such a deft and consummate director of his own plays and SUN those of others. SUN SUN With contributions from Julia McKenzie, Michael Gambon, SUN Peter Bowles, Suzie Blake, Penelope Wilton and Martin Jarvis SUN we find out about his skill in handling actors and in SUN prompting performances that delicately balance the comedy SUN and the pain of life. SUN SUN Producer: Susan Marling SUN A Just Radio production for BBC Radio 4. SUN SUN 14:00 Gardeners' Question Time b0184vhj (Listen) SUN Sutton Coldfield SUN SUN Eric Robson chairs a Q&A with Anne Swithinbank, Bob SUN Flowerdew and Matthew Wilson. SUN How to: prune a Forest Pansy as well as how best detect SUN truffles. In addition, the panel's favourite fruit and SUN vegetable varieties. SUN SUN Produced by Howard Shannon SUN A Somethin' Else production by BBC Radio 4. SUN SUN 14:45 Coming Out b01888d8 (Listen) SUN Bankruptcy SUN SUN Five programmes exploring the ways in which we reveal our SUN true histories to the world. SUN SUN 5. Bankruptcy SUN SUN Hannah, like many students, left university with a burden of SUN debt in addition to her student loan. Unable to find a job SUN in the field she had trained for, her debts escalated to the SUN point where she had to consider bankruptcy. With her father SUN and a friend who had also had to declare herself bankrupt SUN she looks back over the depression and guilt which SUN accompanied her financial disaster and is now able to draw SUN some positive conclusions from it. SUN SUN Producer Christine Hall. SUN SUN 15:00 Classic Serial b01888l1 (Listen) SUN Gargantua and Pantagruel by Francois Rabelais. Dramatised by SUN Lavinia Murray. SUN SUN Ep 2 - Pantagruel. SUN SUN Concluding the bawdy and scatological adventures of Medieval SUN giants. This episode concentrates on the story of SUN Gargantua's son, Pantagruel and his morally dubious friend SUN Panurge, as they go on a quest to discover whether marriage SUN is for them. On the way they have many adventures before SUN they come before the Seer of the Holy Bottle who gives them SUN a definitive judgement. SUN SUN Rabelais.....David Troughton SUN Gargantua....Robert Wilfort SUN Pantagruel....Justin Edwards SUN Panurge...Conrad Nelson SUN Friar Jean....Jonathan Keeble SUN Jacqueline/Seer...Fiona Clarke SUN Librarian/Secretary...Mark Chatterton SUN SUN Producer Gary Brown SUN SUN This tale is a dizzying blend of fantasy, comedy, philosophy SUN and scatological humour. The world's a messy place. All the SUN big mock-heroic novels that followed - Don Quixote, Tristram SUN Shandy, Gulliver's Travels, Ulysses - are about mess, SUN they're about slops and slime, encyclopaedic in their SUN efforts to encompass humanity in all its bawdy, chaotic, SUN grungy, and painful reality. And like Gargantua and SUN Pantagruel they're also very funny. The Rabelaisian world SUN view is founded on the assumption that the humourless are SUN not yet wise - and these tales insist you learn to laugh at SUN humanity. SUN SUN Gargantua and Pantagruel is dramatised by Lavinia Murray, SUN one of our leading radio playwrights whose credits include SUN 'The Anatomy of Melancholy' and 'The Confessions of an SUN English Opium Eater'. SUN SUN 16:00 Open Book b01888w8 (Listen) SUN Open Book continues its celebration of funny books and SUN writers SUN SUN Mariella Frostrup continues Open Book's celebration of funny SUN books and funny writers, ending her history of comic writing SUN by talking 20th-century classics with Ronald Harwood. SUN SUN Open Book Funniest Book SUN SUN Christopher Brookmyre's choice: Swing Hammer Swing by Jeff SUN Torrington SUN SUN Where The Bodies Are Buried by Christopher Brookmyre SUN SUN All Fun and Games Until Somebody Loses an Eye by Christopher SUN Brookmyre SUN SUN AUTHOR INTERVIEW SUN SUN Out of It by Selma Dabbagh SUN SUN Mini History of Comic Writing SUN SUN Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh SUN A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh SUN SUN Thank You Jeeves by P G Wodehouse SUN Right Ho Jeeves by P G Wodehouse SUN SUN Right Ho Jeeves by PG Wodehouse - CD: BBC Radio 4 SUN dramatisation starring Michael Hordern and Richard Briers SUN SUN 16:30 What the Donkey Saw: UA Fanthorpe's Christmas Poems SUN b018vdhw (Listen) SUN Sheila Hancock reads a selection of poems written especially SUN for Christmas by U. A. Fanthorpe, a poet both popular and SUN critically acclaimed. SUN SUN In 1972 U.A. Fanthorpe and Rosie Bailey started sending new SUN poems as Christmas cards to their friends. They continued, SUN graduating from an old Banda machine to a small Adana SUN moveable type press, up to U.A.'s death in 2009. SUN SUN Fanthorpe was witty, original, and she reworked the SUN Christmas story from quirky angles, such as from the SUN donkey's point of view (the donkey who, it is suggested, SUN later carries Christ into Jerusalem) and from the cat and SUN sheep-dog left out of the stable. There's even a wicked SUN fairy who intrudes from another genre, with alternative SUN gifts for Jesus. SUN SUN These were so popular with their recipients that Enitharmon SUN Press published a collection called 'Christmas Poems', and SUN Sheila Hancock reads a selection from this volume. SUN SUN U. A.'s partner Rosie Bailey, recorded at their home, with SUN the press and some of the cards, introduces the poems. We SUN hear, too, from some of those on their Christmas card list, SUN including the Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy and writers SUN Lawrence Sail and Jackie Kay. For them receiving U.A's poem SUN was important, a funny but thoughtful beginning to SUN Christmas. SUN SUN Producer: Julian May. SUN SUN 17:00 Boundaries of Blood b0184rgx (Listen) SUN In December 1971, after just two weeks of a hot war with SUN India, Pakistan suffered a humiliating defeat and a new SUN country, Bangladesh, was born. The BBC's South Asia Editor, SUN Shahzeb Jillani, was born in what was then West Pakistan as SUN the bombs were falling. 40 years later, Shahzeb, now the BBC SUN World Service South Asia Editor, returns to the region to SUN find out how these traumatic events have shaped contemporary SUN Pakistan. It is a personal journey of discovery to challenge SUN the contradictions in the Pakistani narrative he was taught SUN while at school. SUN SUN There he learned little, if anything, of the injustices SUN visited in the 1950s and 1960s on Eastern Pakistan by the SUN Western half - with government spending and political power SUN overwhelmingly biased towards the the West. The SUN discrimination came to a head in the bid for Bangladeshi SUN independence and then a brutal war which Pakistan expected SUN to win. When India entered on the side of the Bangladeshi SUN independence fighters, Pakistan suffered the ultimate SUN humiliation: surrender on December 16th 1971. SUN SUN Through this programme, Shahzeb will explore how the memory SUN of defeat at the hands of India has shaped the thinking of SUN the Pakistani military - that the country faces a continued SUN external threat from its much larger neighbour. Does that go SUN some way to explaining Pakistan's determination to acquire SUN the bomb and, as is widely suspected, to support militant SUN groups active in South Asia? And Shahzeb will explore the SUN hidden legacy of violence, coming face to face with SUN Bangladeshis who witnessed the widespread rape, torture, and SUN killings by Pakistani forces and to understand the SUN resentment many Bangladeshis still feel towards Pakistan. SUN SUN Scars of Bangladesh independence war 40 years on SUN SUN The defeat of the Pakistani army on 16 December 1971 was a SUN triumph for India and the Bengali insurgents it had SUN assisted. For Pakistan, it was perhaps the darkest moment in SUN its history and the ultimate humiliation. Forty years on, SUN Shahzeb Jillani examines the legacy of this brief but bitter SUN war. SUN SUN 17:40 Profile b01886js (Listen) SUN [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Saturday] SUN SUN 17:54 Shipping Forecast b01882wy (Listen) SUN The latest shipping forecast. SUN SUN 17:57 Weather b01882x0 (Listen) SUN The latest weather forecast. SUN SUN 18:00 Six O'Clock News b01882x2 (Listen) SUN The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. SUN SUN 18:15 Pick of the Week b01888wb (Listen) SUN Sheila McClennon makes her selection from the past seven SUN days of BBC Radio. SUN SUN This week a gastronomic festival puts Budleigh Salterton on SUN the European Carte du Cuisine and an Italian marathon runner SUN has to be helped across the Olympic finishing line after too SUN much champagne en route. Not a problem for the fell runners SUN tackling over 70 miles and 42 peaks in the Lakes or the SUN composer who's been inspired to set their feat to music. SUN There are fake sob stories, bad boys and shock eliminations SUN and a reminder that the American Dance Hall Marathons were SUN the 1920s equivalent of reality TV. And how gaffer tape came SUN to the rescue of a Primary School's Nativity Play in SUN Scotland. SUN SUN Giles Wemmbley Hogg Goes Off - Radio 4 SUN Broadcasting House - Radio 4 SUN Post Mortem - Radio 4 SUN Detective Sergeant Nick Mohammed - Radio 4 SUN Open Country - Radio 4 SUN The Essay - Radio 3 SUN The Wild Neighbour and the Willing Coward - World Service SUN The Bob Graham Round - Radio 4 SUN Our Country's Good - Radio 4 SUN Start The Week - Radio 4 SUN They Shoot Horses Don't They? - Radio 2 SUN Good Morning Scotland - Radio Scotland SUN SUN Email: potw@bbc.co.uk or www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/potw SUN Producer: Helen Lee. SUN SUN 19:00 The Archers b01888wd (Listen) SUN SUN 19:15 Dilemma b01888wg (Listen) SUN Episode 6 SUN SUN Sue Perkins puts four guests through the moral and ethical SUN wringer in this show show in which there are no "right" SUN answers - but there are some deeply damning ones. SUN SUN This edition features comedians Zoe Lyons and Phill Jupitus, SUN author Simon Garfield and the actor and writer Humphrey Ker. SUN This week the guests are dealt quandaries involving swapped SUN babies, one-night stands, and biochip crime prevention. They SUN also solve some dilemmas the audience have brought along. SUN SUN The show was devised by award-winning stand-up and writer SUN Danielle Ward (The News Quiz, Newswipe, Mock The Week). SUN SUN Producer: Ed Morrish. SUN SUN 19:45 Stories from Earth Music Bristol b01888wj (Listen) SUN I Am River SUN SUN I am River. A story by Horatio Clare. A watery memory of SUN dark times. Inspired by the themes of the Earth Music SUN Bristol festival and recorded in front of an audience there. SUN Producer: Tim Dee. SUN SUN 20:00 More or Less b0184w5t (Listen) SUN Higgs Boson: SUN In the week that scientists at the Large Hadron Collider SUN announced that the most coveted prize in particle physics - SUN the Higgs boson - may have been found, Tim Harford hears how SUN everyone is getting confused about how to report statistical SUN significance. Robert Matthew of Aston University says the SUN meaning of 2, 3 and 5-sigma evidence is being misinterpreted SUN by science journalists and some of the physicists SUN themselves. SUN SUN Medieval mathematics: SUN Tim Harford talks to author Keith Devlin about how Fibonacci SUN revolutionised trade by introducing medieval businessmen to SUN simple arithmetic. SUN SUN How (not) to corner a market: SUN Performance artist Jamie Moakes is trying to corner the SUN market in a 1980s plastic doll from cartoon series He- Man. SUN Tim Harford explores the difficulties of Jamie's quest to SUN push up the price of something that for many years no one SUN has much wanted. He hears from Professor Eric Smith of the SUN University of Essex who says that there is no saying why SUN certain items gain value, although in this instance Jamie SUN may struggle to achieve his goal. He also hears lessons from SUN history from John Gapper of the Financial Times. SUN SUN Producer: Ruth Alexander SUN More or Less is made in association with the Open SUN University. SUN SUN 20:30 Last Word b0184w5r (Listen) SUN John Wilson on: SUN SUN Christopher Hitchens, a giant of modern political SUN journalism, who targeted tyranny, corruption and religion in SUN print. SUN SUN Microbiologist Lynn Margulis, whose theories about evolution SUN brought about new understanding of cellular development. SUN SUN George Whitman, owner of the world famous Shakespeare and SUN co. bookshop in Paris. SUN SUN And Jerry Robinson, the comic strip artist who created the SUN character of Batman's faithful sidekick Robin and his arch SUN villain The Joker. SUN SUN 21:00 Money Box b0188522 (Listen) SUN [Repeat of broadcast at 12:00 on Saturday] SUN SUN 21:26 Radio 4 Appeal b0188882 (Listen) SUN [Repeat of broadcast at 07:55 today] SUN SUN 21:30 In Business b0184v3f (Listen) SUN Cuba Now SUN SUN After 53 years of revolution, President Raul Castro is SUN trying to change the state-controlled Cuban economy with SUN moves to promote private employment, and an open market in SUN secondhand cars and home. Peter Day reports from Havana on SUN an island where in many ways time has been standing still SUN for half a century. SUN SUN Producer Julie Ball SUN Editor Stephen Chilcott. SUN SUN 22:00 Westminster Hour b018b5dg (Listen) SUN Preview of the week's political agenda at Westminster with SUN MPs, experts and commentators. Discussion of the issues SUN politicians are grappling with in the corridors of power. SUN SUN 22:45 What the Papers Say b018b5dj (Listen) SUN Episode 83 SUN SUN Hugo Rifkind of The Times analyses how the newspapers are SUN covering the biggest stories in Westminster and beyond. SUN SUN 23:00 The Film Programme b0184v31 (Listen) SUN Francine Stock talks to two of the brightest stars in SUN British cinema, the actor, Eddie Marsan and the director, SUN Carol Morley. SUN SUN Carol's documentary, Dreams of a Life, is being hailed as SUN one of the most accomplished and disturbing films of the SUN year. Its a story of casual neglect -- no harm intended more SUN a case of someone just slipping off the radar -- but it ends SUN in death. A young woman's body is discovered in a North SUN London flat ...there are three years worth of bills on the SUN floor and the television is still playing....all the SUN ingredients for a film noir...or a modern morality tale. SUN SUN Dreams of a Life inhabits the same recognisably contemporary SUN world as Paddy Considine's award winning, Tyrannosaur -- SUN just one of the films featuring Eddie Marsan this year. He's SUN also in Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows and SUN Junkhearts and next year he'll appear in Spielberg's SUN Warhorse and, as a dwarf, in Snow White and The Huntsman. As SUN Francine discovered he believes in mixing and matching and SUN revels in the variety. SUN SUN Francine hears from the critics too -- Andrew Collins gives SUN his verdict on the nominations for this year's Golden Globes SUN and Jonathan Romney and Hannah McGill pick the year's best SUN foreign language films and look forward to 2012. SUN SUN Producer: Zahid Warley. SUN SUN 23:30 Something Understood b01886zz (Listen) SUN [Repeat of broadcast at 06:05 today] SUN SUN MON MONDAY 19 DECEMBER 2011 MON MON 00:00 Midnight News b01882xq (Listen) MON The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. MON Followed by Weather. MON MON 00:15 Thinking Allowed b0184s2x (Listen) MON Tipping points MON MON Laurie Taylor explores the idea of the Tipping Point using a MON multidisciplinary project at Durham University as a MON springboard to examine what tipping points are, how they MON happen and what effect they have. Professor Tim Clark and MON Professor Pat Waugh from Durham University and Professor MON Alex Bentley from Bristol University are all involved in the MON Durham Tipping Points project and they are joined by Dr MON Shahidha Bari from Queen Mary, London to discuss the idea of MON the tipping point and what it might tell us about ourselves MON and our environment - and how, perhaps, we can use our MON understanding of it to prevent significant problems in areas MON as diverse as banking and sociology. MON Producer: Chris Wilson. MON MON 00:45 Bells on Sunday b01886tx (Listen) MON [Repeat of broadcast at 05:43 on Sunday] MON MON 00:48 Shipping Forecast b01882xs (Listen) MON The latest shipping forecast. MON MON 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b01882xv (Listen) MON BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. MON MON 05:20 Shipping Forecast b01882xx (Listen) MON The latest shipping forecast. MON MON 05:30 News Briefing b01882xz (Listen) MON The latest news from BBC Radio 4. MON MON 05:43 Prayer for the Day b018b5fm (Listen) MON with Bishop Dr Joe Aldred. MON MON 05:45 Farming Today b018g3hk (Listen) MON The latest news about food, farming and the countryside. MON Produced by Angela Frain. Presented by Charlotte Smith. MON MON 05:57 Weather b01882y1 (Listen) MON The latest weather forecast for farmers. MON MON 06:00 Today b018g3hm (Listen) MON With Sarah Montague and James Naughtie. Including Sports MON Desk; Weather; Thought for the Day. MON MON 09:00 Start the Week b018b63r (Listen) MON The Spirit of Christmas: Claire Tomalin, Susan Hill and MON Canon Giles Fraser MON MON Andrew Marr discusses the idea of Christmas with Canon Giles MON Fraser who argues that the Christian Christmas was invented MON by the Emperor Constantine for political, not religious, MON reasons, 300 years after the birth of Christ. Canon Fraser MON will be discussing the idea that the legacy of Constantine's MON December feast distorts the message of Christ and casts a MON long shadow on modern believers. Clare Tomalin will be MON talking about Dickens and how the Victorian imagination MON shaped our understanding of what Christmas is and should be, MON and Susan Hill will be exploring the Christmas ghost story - MON one of the tenacious Victorian traditions still being MON reinvented in the 21st century. MON MON Producer: Eleanor Garland. MON MON 09:45 Book of the Week b018b63t (Listen) MON The Etymologicon, Episode 1 MON MON Abridged by Jane Marshall. MON MON A circular stroll through the fascinating and amusing MON connections of the English language by the author of the MON popular Inky Fool blog, Mark Forsyth. MON MON In the first episode the glorious insanities of our language MON are explored as a turn up for the books starts a chain MON reaction which leads to gambling in medieval France, the MON link between gonads and testifying by oath and the MON derivation of the word avocado. MON MON Read by Hugh Dennis. MON MON Produced by Jane Marshall MON A Jane Marshall Production for BBC Radio 4. MON MON 10:00 Woman's Hour b018b63w (Listen) MON Presented by Jane Garvey. A phone in about the first night MON with a new baby. Call 03700 100 444 with your experiences MON after 0800 or you can email us via the woman's hour web MON site. MON MON First night with a new baby MON MON A phone in about that most poignant of human experiences… MON the first night with a new baby. Were you at home or in MON hospital? Was it your first baby? Did you give birth to MON twins or triplets? How did you cope? How did they cope? If MON you’re a dad, how did you feel? Was it a difficult night? MON Were you in pain and just thoroughly exhausted? Did you not MON feel the bond that you thought you would? Are you still in MON contact with women you met around that time? Let us know. MON You can email us via the web-site and tell us your story. MON MON Kate Clanchy’s poetry collection is Newborn is published by MON Picador. MON Jenny Colgan’s latest novel is Meet Me at the Cupcake Café. MON Ross Raisin’s new book Waterline is out now. MON Josienne Clarke’s version of Silent Night is available at MON For Folk’s Sake MON MON 10:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018b63y (Listen) MON Possession, Episode 1 MON MON Roland Michell, an academic research assistant, is MON completing some work in the London Library, when he comes MON across two unfinished letters written by the Victorian Poet, MON Randolph Henry Ash. These letters have obviously not been MON found by anyone else and they are not to his wife but to an MON unknown woman. Roland, whose entire academic life has been MON devoted to studying Ash, decides, recklessly to pocket the MON letters and try to determine exactly who they were written MON to. MON MON This is the beginning of a quest that will change literary MON history and with the help of a feminist literary scholar MON Maud Bailey, they are determined to find out the truth MON behind these letters. Certain other characters hear about MON the letters and are eager to get their hands on them for MON their own financial gain and will do so, by any means MON necessary, and so the chase begins. MON MON Written by A S Byatt. Dramatised by Timberlake Wertenbaker MON MON Maud ...... Jemma Redgrave MON Roland ...... Harry Hadden-Paton MON Ash ....... James d'arcy MON Lamotte ..... Rachael Stirling MON Blackadder ..... Bill Paterson MON Cropper ..... Matthew Marsh MON George ...... Kenneth Cranham MON Joan ....... Joanna David MON Beatrice Nest ...... Stella Gonet MON Euan ...... Nicholas Boulton MON Fergus ...... Jonjo O'Neil MON Hildebrand ..... Robert Portal MON Val ...... Laura Pyper MON Leonora .... Lorelei King MON Raoul/Toby Byng .... Sam Dale MON Mrs Wapshott/Mrs Cammish/Mrs lees ..... Jane Whittenshaw MON Beth/PA/Mrs Judge/Librarian ...... Rachel Atkins MON Girl ...... Sylvie Goodwin MON MON Director: Celia de Wolff MON A Pier production for BBC Radio 4. MON MON 11:00 Tales from the Arab Spring b018b6y8 (Listen) MON Revolution (Egypt) MON MON The BBC's Middle East Editor Jeremy Bowen looks back over a MON momentous year in the Middle East and hears from those who MON witnessed events at first hand. The protests started in MON Tunisia after a fruit-seller set himself on fire and quickly MON spread to Egypt which, once again, became the leader of the MON Arab world, although not in a way anyone had expected. MON Millions of protesters took the streets demanding the MON overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak but why hadn't this MON happened sooner and what exactly did they want? MON MON Jeremy Bowen recalls his own experiences of the Mubarak MON regime and meets blogger Wael Abbas in Tahrir Square. The MON security police didn't take the internet seriously at first MON but then Abbas and his fellow bloggers started to organise MON demonstrations on the streets. Abbas was detained and MON questioned many times and the authorities spread rumours MON designed to discredit him in the eyes of his followers. MON Tunisia, however, provided the spark which set Egypt on MON fire: " It gave people courage to do something similar. MON Because they saw that it was possible. Other people did it. MON This small country that beats us in football, in African MON tournaments has removed its president. Why the hell can't we MON do that?" MON MON Bowen recounts his own experiences during the 'Day of Rage' MON graphically recorded as the security forces moved in to MON Tahrir Square, firing teargas as they went. He meets Essam MON el-Erian, one of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, who MON was locked up in jail earlier that day but escaped along MON with scores of criminals when then MON jails were sprung open - either by protestors or amazingly MON by the security forces who, some say, wanted to show what MON would happen if the people were left in charge. MON MON A senior figure in the military describes how they were MON ordered not to fire on protestors although he makes the MON point that it would have been useless to do so because the MON protestors kept on coming and they would have run out of MON ammunition. And the deputy chief of police in a northern MON industrial town describes the battles they fought on the MON streets. MON MON Produced by Mark Savage and Cara Swift. MON MON 11:30 Giles Wemmbley Hogg Goes Off b018b6yb (Listen) MON Series 5, Rocket Man MON MON In this episode, Giles meets some leftover post-Soviet MON rocket fuel. What could possibly go wrong? And how will he MON react to the world's first weightless pasty? MON MON Budleigh Salterton's most famous citizen is back! But this MON time, he's got a computer! Giles Wemmbley Hogg has been MON grounded by both the Home Office and his father, so he's set MON up GWH Travvel ("2m's 2g's 2v's, bit of a mix up at the MON printers"). MON MON Run from his bedroom in Budleigh Salterton, with the help of MON his long-suffering former Primary Schoolteacher Mr Timmis MON and the hindrance of his sister Charlotte, it's a one-stop MON Travel/Advice/Events Management/Website service, where each MON week, his schemes range far and wide - whether it's roaming MON the country lecturing would-be overlanders on how to pack a MON rucksack ("If in doubt, put it in. And double it"), or MON finding someone a zebra for a corporate promotion ("I'll MON look in the Phone Book - how hard can it be? Now, "A to MON D".....), GWH Travvel stays true to its motto - "We do it MON all, so you won't want to". MON MON Giles ..... Marcus Brigstocke MON Mr. Timmis ..... Vincent Franklin MON Charlotte Wemmbley Hogg ..... Catherine Shepherd MON Callum ..... David Fynn MON Sergei ..... Jack Klaff MON Russkov ..... Paul Shearer MON Professor Komarov ..... Lorelei King MON MON Written by Marcus Brigstocke, Jeremy Salsby & Toby Davies MON MON Produced & directed by David Tyler MON A Pozzitive production for BBC Radio 4. MON MON 12:00 You and Yours b018b6yd (Listen) MON Why a compulsory medical test for drink drivers is not MON happening MON MON Nearly 4,000 convicted drink drivers have been given back MON their licences without undergoing the required medical MON checks. MON MON Why NHS dentistry is in the process of undergoing its second MON major shake-up in 5 years. We look at what the reforms will MON mean for patients. MON MON And changes to the way gluten free foods are labelled. MON MON The presenter is Julian Worricker. The producer is Alex MON Lewis. MON MON 12:57 Weather b01882y3 (Listen) MON The latest weather forecast. MON MON 13:00 World at One b018b6yg (Listen) MON Martha Kearney presents the national and international news. MON Listeners can share their views via email: wato@bbc.co.uk or MON on twitter: #wato. MON MON 13:45 The People's Post: A Narrative History of the Post MON Office b018b6yj (Listen) MON The Telegraph MON MON In 1870 the telegraph system came under the control of the MON post office, in the first ever instance of the government MON nationalising a commercial industry. The aim was to provide MON an extended and more efficient network, to serve the public MON and make a profit. MON MON In the late nineteenth century the Post Office became a key MON instrument of the State. MON MON Providing a national telegraph service, as censor and MON channel in the first world war, as a model employer in the MON 1930s and pioneer in communications technology for much of MON the twentieth century. The last four decades have seen the MON State pulling away from Royal Mail leaving it's future very MON much uncertain. MON MON Writer and Presenter: Dominic Sandbrook MON Historical Consultant: Iain Stevenson MON Musicians: Sam Lee, Bella Hardy, Mick Sands, Nick Hart MON Actors: Morgan George, John Sessions, Simon Tcherniak, MON Malcolm Tierney, Jane Whittenshaw MON Producer: Joby Waldman MON A Somethin Else production for BBC Radio 4. MON MON 14:00 The Archers b01888wd (Listen) MON [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Sunday] MON MON 14:15 Afternoon Play b018b6yl (Listen) MON Down and Out in Auchangaish MON MON By BAFTA-winning writer, Donna Franceschild. MON MON Cal's about to turn eighteen and he's sleeping rough. Ziggy MON keeps setting fire to his hotel. And Gino, the local MON chipshop owner, wants to help everyone. Everyone except his MON wife, that is. MON MON A gentle comedy about the love that fire-fighting brings to MON a remote Highland village. MON MON Gino ..... Liam Brennan MON Anna ..... Wendy Seager MON Cal ..... Kyle McPhail MON Ziggy ..... David Ireland MON Natia ..... Lesley Hart MON Peter ..... Simon Tait MON Donnie ..... Robin Laing MON MON Director: Kirsty Williams. MON MON 15:00 Brain of Britain b018b7jn (Listen) MON (6/17) MON Arranged alphabetically, which is the last book of the Old MON Testament? MON MON If the contestants' general knowledge is up to scratch in MON this week's Brain of Britain contest, the answer to this MON question may help them in their bid to become the 59th proud MON holder of the Brain of Britain title. Russell Davies is MON joined by four contestants from the North of England in this MON sixth heat of the series. MON MON Producer: Paul Bajoria. MON MON 15:30 Food Programme b018888d (Listen) MON [Repeat of broadcast at 12:32 on Sunday] MON MON 16:00 The Art of Darkness b018b8ct (Listen) MON Richard Coles travels in the dead of winter up to the MON Lofoten Island in Norway - where the Northern lights and the MON extraordinary colours of winter darkness draw spellbound MON artists to live and work. Lofoten, on the very edge of MON Norway's Fjords, is home to both art and artists in MON abundance. Every turning on the road has a sign pointing to MON a gallery, and as Richard observes, "Looking out the window MON is like looking at an abstract painting - streaks of MON brilliant pastel colours across the dark sky and sea". Shops MON display paintings and weavings, inspired by the grandeur of MON winter at its wildest. The natural surroundings - the sea, MON triangular fish-drying racks, the jagged snow peaked MON mountains, and the darkness, illuminated by the dancing MON lights of the Aurora Borealis - provide rich inspiration. MON The peninsula has even attracted international artists, such MON as Anthony Gormley and Anish Kapoor, to contribute inspired MON pieces of work to the striking landscape. MON MON Richard Coles travels to the frozen landscape of extreme MON beauty to meet the artists inspired by both the cold and the MON dark; artists like Scott Thoe, who breaks the ice to swim MON every morning; his wife Vebjørg Hagene, who creates MON underwater tapestries; Dagfinn Bakke, whose landscapes MON feature tiny figures dwarfed by storms, and Yngve Henriksen MON who grew up on the Islands and felt drawn to return to paint MON the colours of the landscape he finds so compelling - huge MON canvases smothered in layered oils and filled with a MON darkness relieved only by a 'Blue Hour'. The one person who MON wishes for Spring is Kjell Ove Storvik. MON MON Producer: Sara Jane Hall. MON MON 16:30 The Infinite Monkey Cage b018b8cw (Listen) MON Series 5, I'm a Chemist Get Me Out of Here MON MON Robin Ince and Brian Cox give the chemists a chance to fight MON back as they stage the ultimate battle of the sciences to MON find out, once and for all, whether all science is really MON just physics..and whether chemistry is, as Brian puts it MON "the social science of molecules". Joining Brian in the MON physics corner will be comedian and ex-physicist Dara MON O'Briain, and trading punches for the chemists will be MON Professor Andrea Sella and monkey cage regular Professor MON Tony Ryan. Referee Robin Ince will be ringside to make sure MON its a clean fight and there's no hitting below the belt. MON Ding ding MON MON Producer: Alexandra Feachem. MON MON 17:00 PM b018b8cy (Listen) MON Eddie Mair presents the day's top stories. Including MON Weather. MON MON 18:00 Six O'Clock News b01882y5 (Listen) MON The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. MON MON 18:30 I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue b018b8d0 (Listen) MON Series 56, Episode 6 MON MON Back for a second week at the Watford Colosseum, regulars MON Barry Cryer, Graeme Garden and Tim Brooke-Taylor are joined MON on the panel by Andy Hamilton, with Jack Dee in the chair. MON Piano accompaniment is provided by Colin Sell. Producer - MON Jon Naismith. MON MON 19:00 The Archers b018b8d2 (Listen) MON MON 19:15 Front Row b018b8d4 (Listen) MON With Mark Lawson, including the verdict on the latest MON Mission: Impossible film, starring Tom Cruise. MON MON Producer Timothy Prosser. MON MON 19:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018b63y (Listen) MON [Repeat of broadcast at 10:45 today] MON MON 20:00 How New Is the New Philanthropy? b018b8s5 (Listen) MON Victorian Philanthropy and its Critics MON MON As the debate about wealth in British society continues, MON Professor Hugh Cunningham presents a timely history of MON philanthropic giving MON MON 2. Victorian Philanthropy and its Critics MON MON The Victorian era is often seen as the high-point of MON philanthropic giving and Hugh Cunningham starts his journey MON by recalling his own great-grandfather, Andrew Usher, a MON brewer and distiller who donated £100,000 to the city of MON Edinburgh to build the Usher Hall. MON MON However, he has questions about such major capital projects, MON which might have enhanced the lives of the poor but did MON little to relieve their poverty. MON MON Hugh also chases a less familiar story: that of the critics MON who believed that philanthropy would create what is MON sometimes today called a 'dependency culture'. MON MON He travels to Stoke and to Manchester, exploring the lives MON of the 'deserving' and 'undeserving' poor; looking into how MON women increasingly participated in philanthropic activity MON and how this, in turn, helped their struggle for equality. MON MON He hears about the Victorian trend towards the poor helping MON the poor. MON MON He talks to historian and Labour MP Tristram Hunt, and to MON Nick Hurd, Conservative MP and Minister for Civil Society in MON the Coalition Government, about the obstacles which can MON stand in the way of philanthropists combating poverty today. MON MON And he interviews Dame Susie Sainsbury, who speaks both of MON the major capital projects to which she has donated and MON about her willingness to give to the "less sexy items on the MON philanthropic shopping list". MON MON Hugh Cunningham is Emeritus Professor of History in the MON University of Kent, and was academic consultant and MON co-writer of Radio Four's major narrative history series MON 'The Invention of Childhood'. MON MON Producer: Beaty Rubens. MON MON 20:30 Crossing Continents b0184v2q (Listen) MON China's Migrant Worker Mega-City MON MON The world economy has pinned its hopes on China's economy, MON which depends on over 150 million migrant workers and their MON labour. The system of internal migration, based on the idea MON that workers do not settle in the places they work, has MON sustained an economic miracle and rapid development. But the MON country has seen a summer of unrest, with rioting among MON migrants in the Pearl River Delta and angry reactions to the MON injustices of the system. Mukul Devichand visits Guangzhou, MON the southern metropolis where 7 million migrants form half MON the population. There is anger and frustration with the MON hukou, China's "internal passport." Meanwhile, the city is MON now also home to communities from around the world, with MON 100,000 Africans adding to the already sensitive ethnic mix. MON How will the city change under the pressure of migration, MON and will its economic success survive the social tensions? MON MON 21:00 Material World b0184v33 (Listen) MON Quentin Cooper presents the latest on the search for the MON Higgs particle, hears about a scheme to pair scientists with MON members of Parliament, announces the next group of MON shortlisted candidates for So You Want to Be a Scientist and MON sniffs the smell of the Moon from a lunar exhibition in MON Liverpool. MON MON Producer: Martin Redfern. MON MON A Glimpse of the Higgs MON MON A particle traffic accident. High energy protons colliding MON in the LHC spray out all sorts of debris, perhaps including MON Higgs particle. MON MON For physics enthusiasts, the picture shows a typical MON candidate event including two high-energy photons whose MON energy (depicted by red towers) is measured in the CMS MON electromagnetic calorimeter. The yellow lines are the MON measured tracks of other particles produced in the MON collision. The pale blue volume shows the CMS crystal MON calorimeter barrel. MON MON Last week it was only a rumour of a glimpse, this week the MON glimpse has been confirmed but, say all the experts at the MON European particle physics centre, CERN near Geneva, they MON have still only glimpsed what might be the much sought-after MON Higgs particle. The latest announcements do not add up to a MON discovery. But they have caused much excitement among MON physicists and in the media. Quentin discusses the new MON results and their significance with Prof Tejinder Virdee of MON the CMS experiment at CERN and Imperial College London, and MON with Dr Peter Skands, of the theory division at CERN. MON MON MPs Meet the Scientists MON MON Every year since 2001 the Royal Society has paired MPs with MON scientists. The scientists spend a week in Westminster MON shadowing an MP, and in return that MP visits the lab of the MON scientist they are paired with. This year, two people who MON were paired were Dr Julian Huppert, MP for Cambridge, and Dr MON Catherine Rae, a researcher in metallurgy at the Cambridge MON University. They have just completed their exchange, and MON join Quentin in the studio. MON MON Republic of the Moon MON MON Artists in Liverpool are preparing to launch a new MON exhibition that imagines how we might live on the Moon. MON Ahead of the exhibition's lift-off, Quentin speaks to MON curator Rob le Frenais and artist Sue Corke about making MON scratch 'n' sniff lunar postcards and training geese to be MON astronauts - all in the name of art, of course. The Republic MON of the Moon exhibition is at FACT, Wood Street, Liverpool MON from 16 December 2011 - 26 February 2012 and then at AV MON Festival, Newcastle upon Tyne 1 - 31 March 2012 MON MON More Shortlisted Amateur Scientists MON MON Three more shortlisted ideas for So You Want To Be A MON Scientists are announced: Head teacher Janis Craig from MON Edinburgh asks whether high winds really make children wild, MON Dan O’Brien, a 46 year old Environmental Health Officer from MON Pattingham, wants to find out whether football clubs at the MON top of the Premier League receive special treatments from MON referees and William Rudling, a 69 year old illustrator from MON Leeds, wonders whether people who look alike do also have MON similar voices! MON MON 21:30 Start the Week b018b63r (Listen) MON [Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today] MON MON 21:58 Weather b01882y7 (Listen) MON The latest weather forecast. MON MON 22:00 The World Tonight b018cbbp (Listen) MON Ritula Shah presents national and international news and MON analysis. MON MON 22:45 Book at Bedtime b018cbbr (Listen) MON The Pursuit of Love, Episode 1 MON MON Nancy Mitford's razor-sharp comic classic on love and MON growing up in the 1930s. Abridged by Lauris Morgan-Griffiths MON and read by Diana Quick. MON MON Fanny Logan tells the story of her beloved aristocratic MON cousins, the Radletts, and in particular Linda, who is MON beautiful and loves animals. Uncle Mathew hunts his children MON with bloodhounds (to the horror of respectable families in MON the local village) and keeps a blood-spattered entrenching MON tool above the fireplace as a relic of his experiences in MON the First World War. The cousins spend much of their MON childhood in the airing cupboard - the only warm place in MON the enormous Alconleigh Hall - discussing love and sex. MON MON Beautifully observed and hilariously funny, the novel is MON also a fascinating hinterland account of the period leading MON to the Second World War and never pulls its punches in MON evoking the painful reality of the times. MON MON Reader...Diana Quick MON Abridger...Lauris Morgan-Griffiths MON Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. MON MON 23:00 Off the Page b0184rgl (Listen) MON Birmingham MON MON Dominic Arkwright and guests Adrian Goldberg, Shazia Mirza MON and Luke Bainbridge discuss Birmingham; its flaws and its MON fabulousness. MON MON According to a recent survey, the majority of the population MON believe that Manchester is the UK's second city and not MON Birmingham. Lord Digby Jones added further fuel to that MON debate when he suggested earlier this year that Manchester MON has a more legitimate claim to that crown. But is there MON anything to be gained from being classified as second? Is it MON a title that either cities want? MON MON Brummies Adrian Goldberg and Shazia Mirza and Mancunian Luke MON Bainridge join Dominic Arkwright to discuss why coolness is MON the one adjective that has eluded the city of a thousand MON trades. Blighted by dialectic prejudice and the stereotypes MON borne of Crossroads and the like, Birmingham is about to MON embark on another architectural city revamp. Is Birmingham MON happy with itself? MON MON Producer: Sarah Langan. MON MON 23:30 Today in Parliament b018cbd5 (Listen) MON Sean Curran with the day's top news stories from MON Westminster. MON MON TUE TUESDAY 20 DECEMBER 2011 TUE TUE 00:00 Midnight News b01882yw (Listen) TUE The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. TUE Followed by Weather. TUE TUE 00:30 Book of the Week b018b63t (Listen) TUE [Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Monday] TUE TUE 00:48 Shipping Forecast b01882yy (Listen) TUE The latest shipping forecast. TUE TUE 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b01882z0 (Listen) TUE BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. TUE TUE 05:20 Shipping Forecast b01882z2 (Listen) TUE The latest shipping forecast. TUE TUE 05:30 News Briefing b01882z4 (Listen) TUE The latest news from BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 05:43 Prayer for the Day b018mbvg (Listen) TUE with Bishop Dr Joe Aldred. TUE TUE 05:45 Farming Today b018cbns (Listen) TUE The latest news about food, farming and the countryside. TUE Produced by Angela Frain. Presented by Anna Hill. TUE TUE 06:00 Today b018cbnv (Listen) TUE With James Naughtie and Sarah Montague. Including Yesterday TUE in Parliament, Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day. TUE TUE 09:00 The Life Scientific b018cbnx (Listen) TUE Lord Robert Winston TUE TUE He's the man on the telly with the big moustache, famous for TUE A Child of Our Time, The Human Body and Making Babies but TUE Robert Winston is also a well respected scientist. He played TUE a pioneering role in developing IVF technology, and has TUE brought life to many hundreds of couples who had given up TUE hope of ever having a baby . Jim Al-Khalili talks to Robert TUE Winston about why he quit the theatre to become a medic, TUE creating human life in a test tube and why he disagrees with TUE Richard Dawkins about The God Delusion. TUE TUE Producer: Anna Buckley. TUE TUE 09:30 One to One b018cbnz (Listen) TUE Lucy Kellaway with Sir Peter Moores TUE TUE Lucy Kellaway of the Financial Times concludes her TUE exploration into the complexities of having considerable TUE personal wealth by talking Sir Peter Moores. Son of John TUE Moores, founder of the Littlewoods company, Sir Peter is now TUE eighty and starting to wind up his foundation that has given TUE an estimated ninety three million pounds to charity. He TUE talks to Lucy about how he's used the money he inherited and TUE earned, the things he's still stingy about and why he trusts TUE no one to run his foundation after he has gone. TUE Producer: Lucy Lunt. TUE TUE 09:45 Book of the Week b018cdmv (Listen) TUE The Etymologicon, Episode 2 TUE TUE Abridged by Jane Marshall. TUE TUE The author of the Inky Fool blog leads us on a fascinating TUE journey tracing the connection between seemingly unrelated TUE words and uncovers the links between the 'proof of a TUE pudding', 'sausage-shaped poison', being hoist by a 'petard' TUE and 'feisty heroines'. TUE TUE Read by Hugh Dennis TUE Produced by Jane Marshall TUE A Jane Marshall Production for BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 10:00 Woman's Hour b018cdmx (Listen) TUE Celebrating, informing and entertaining women. Presented by TUE Jane Garvey. TUE TUE 10:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018cdmz (Listen) TUE Possession, Episode 2 TUE TUE Director: Celia de Wolff TUE A Pier production for BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 11:00 Tales from the Arab Spring b018cdn1 (Listen) TUE Counter Revolution (Libya) TUE TUE The experience of protesters in Libya proved to be the TUE opposite of their counterparts in Egypt and Tunisia. After TUE Egypt's President Mubarak fell, many assumed that all you TUE had to do was organise using social media, occupy, push hard TUE and the hollow regime would fall. Colonel Gaddafi had other TUE ideas. He was determined to crush the revolution. Jeremy TUE Bowen hears from some of those who were caught up in the TUE conflict TUE TUE Bowen first met Salem al-Faturi at a funeral for someone who TUE had been killed after government forces opened fire on TUE protesters in a suburb of Tripoli. The regime's use of TUE killings, beatings, arbitrary arrests and torture provoked TUE violent resistance. Salem, an accountant with Price TUE Waterhouse Coopers, became a gun-runner and describes how he TUE would buy weapons, which were stole from a military TUE warehouse, and smuggle them through army checkpoints, hidden TUE inside his car door. He still keeps a Kalashnikov in the TUE boot of his car, together with two home-made pipe bombs. TUE Everybody in Libya, Salim says, is interested in weapons TUE now. TUE TUE Jeremy Bowen was among the last journalists to interview TUE Colonel Gaddafi. He describes how he was rushed to a secret TUE location by one of the Colonel's nephews. The BBC journalist TUE stopped to ask if he could put on a suit. TUE 'No,' said his minder: 'It's war. Jeans are fine.' Gaddafi TUE thought that people were prepared to die to protect him. TUE Some were, but many others were prepared to die to bring him TUE down. Mohammed al-Ziani was caught attempting to bomb an TUE army checkpoint. He was taken to Abu Salim, Libya's TUE notorious jail, where he was beaten and tortured along with TUE other opponents of the regime, including lawyers and TUE doctors. Mohammed goes back to the jail with Jeremy where he TUE says he learnt many things that will help him in life: 'How TUE to be patient, how to not lose faith . . .You know beating TUE Gaddafi was something like impossible. But we was believing TUE it.' TUE TUE The programme ends with celebrations in the centre of TUE Tripoli in Martyr's Square. But Gaddafi had his supporters, TUE including a young woman called Noor Saied who helped TUE translate for foreign journalists. She tells Jeremy Bowen TUE that people still love him but are afraid of saying so. TUE TUE Producer: Mark Savage. TUE TUE 11:30 Warsaw Variations b018cg7v (Listen) TUE Panufnik and Lutoslawski were the great hopes of Polish TUE music at the outbreak of World War Two. TUE TUE During the Occupation, opportunities for musical development TUE were severely limited, but an artistic life sprang up in the TUE cafes and bars of Warsaw. For four years, Lutoslawski and TUE Panufnik made a living playing arrangements of popular and TUE classical tunes (most famously the Paganini variations) to TUE mixed audiences of music lovers, nationalist resisters and TUE cultured Wehrmacht officers. TUE TUE Warsaw Variations traces the experiences of these two young TUE musicians through the Occupation, the Warsaw Uprising (in TUE which virtually all their manuscripts were destroyed) and TUE into the era of Socialist Realism. TUE TUE Immediately following the war Panufnik was designated TUE 'Composer Number One'. But by 1954, he'd had enough of TUE pleasing the authorities and defected to Britain. TUE Lutoslawski stayed in Poland and emerged as one of the most TUE prominent composers of the late 20th Century. TUE TUE With contributions from two men with memories of Warsaw's TUE war-time cafe culture - actor and former waiter Witold TUE Sadowy and musicologist Wladyslaw Malinowski, as well as TUE Panufnik's widow, Lady Camilla Panufnik; the music scholar TUE and Lutoslawski expert Adrian Thomas; Panufnik's biographer TUE Beata Boleslawska, and a historian of Polish musical life TUE under the Nazis Katarzyna Naliwajek. TUE TUE Produced by Alan Hall TUE A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 12:00 You and Yours b018cg7x (Listen) TUE The Problem of Childhood Obesity TUE TUE How do we reverse the trend of childhood obesity? TUE TUE Call You and Yours with Julian Worricker. An opportunity to TUE contribute your views to the programme. Email TUE youandyours@bbc.co.uk or call 03700 100 444 (lines open at TUE 10am). TUE TUE 12:57 Weather b01882z6 (Listen) TUE The latest weather forecast. TUE TUE 13:00 World at One b018cg81 (Listen) TUE Martha Kearney presents national and international news. TUE Listeners can share their views via email: wato@bbc.co.uk or TUE on twitter: #wato. TUE TUE 13:45 The People's Post: A Narrative History of the Post TUE Office b018cg83 (Listen) TUE The Post Office at War TUE TUE In 1914 the post office was called upon to play a vital role TUE in the country's war effort. Every week twelve and half TUE million letters left Britain for Flanders, and it took 2 TUE days for a letter to reach the front. The post office also TUE supported the army's censorship activities, preventing TUE sensitive information reaching enemy hands and helping to TUE capture spies. TUE TUE As Royal Mail faces an uncertain future, Dominic Sandbrook TUE charts the development of the post office and examines it's TUE impact on literacy, free speech, commerce and communication. TUE The Post Office has become a cherished social institution, TUE linking people together and extending their vision outward TUE into the wider world. TUE TUE It's called Royal Mail but it should be known as the TUE People's Post TUE TUE Writer and Presenter: Dominic Sandbrook TUE TUE Musicians: Sam Lee, Bella Hardy, Mick Sands, Nick Hart TUE Historical Consultant: Iain Stevenson TUE Actors: Morgan George, John Sessions, Simon Tcherniak, TUE Malcolm Tierney, Jane Whittenshaw TUE Producer: Joby Waldman TUE A Somethin Else production for BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 14:00 The Archers b018b8d2 (Listen) TUE [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Monday] TUE TUE 14:15 Afternoon Play b018cpzy (Listen) TUE McLevy - Series 8, The Last Illusion TUE TUE Victorian detective mystery starring Brian Cox and Siobhan TUE Redmond. TUE TUE Episode 4: The Last Illusion. TUE TUE McLevy sets out to prove a celebrated stage magician is a TUE jewel thief. TUE TUE McLevy...............................................BRIAN COX TUE Jean Brash...........................SIOBHAN REDMOND TUE Mulholland..........MICHAEL PERCEVAL-MAXWELL TUE Roach..........................................DAVID ASHTON TUE Hannah.......................................COLETTE O'NEIL TUE Charles Boniface...................................ALAN COX TUE Fergus Dundee...........................TAM DEAN BURN TUE Tam.........................................DANIEL PORTMAN TUE Callum..................................................ALI CRAIG TUE Gambler........................................RIKKI LAWTON TUE TUE Producer/director: Bruce Young. TUE TUE 15:00 Home Planet b018cq00 (Listen) TUE Richard Daniel and the team discuss listener's questions TUE about our world and our impact upon it. TUE TUE Producer: Toby Murcott TUE A Pier production for BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 15:30 Questions, Questions b012lkkl (Listen) TUE Stewart Henderson presents another sparkling series of TUE Questions Questions - the programme which offers answers to TUE those intriguing questions of everyday life, inspired by TUE current events and popular culture. TUE TUE Each programme is compiled directly from the well-informed TUE and inquisitive Radio 4 audience, who bring their unrivalled TUE collective brain to bear on these puzzlers every week. TUE TUE In this weeks programme Stewart travels to Cornwall to TUE explore the musical heritage of tin mining, he investigates TUE the origins of the collective nouns for birds and asks how TUE we recognise voices. TUE TUE Producer: Kevin Dawson TUE A Whistledown Production for BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 16:00 Word of Mouth b018cq02 (Listen) TUE Bonds and Bailouts - the language of the financial markets. TUE Michael Rosen returns for a new series on words and the way TUE we use them. TUE The ups and downs of the banking world have moved from the TUE financial news to the front pages. We are, we're told, TUE witnessing momentous events with far-reaching consequences. TUE But how well do we understand the language of global TUE economic turmoil? Does financial jargon explain or obscure TUE the picture? Michael Rosen talks to money makers, TUE anti-capitalists and commentators. TUE TUE Producer: Chris Ledgard. TUE TUE 16:30 Great Lives b018csyq (Listen) TUE Series 26, Thomas Hobbes TUE TUE Thomas Hobbes: the writer and psychologist Steven Pinker TUE joins Matthew Parris to discuss the life of the great TUE English philosopher. Noel Malcolm from All Souls College, TUE Oxford provides the expert analysis. TUE Power and violence are themes of the discussion of Hobbes TUE who, Steven Pinker argues, was "perhaps the first cognitive TUE psychologist." Although he was born in the late sixteenth TUE century, we are fortunate to have some rich biographical TUE description of Hobbes thanks to his contemporary and friend, TUE the writer John Aubrey. TUE Now, the word Hobbesian is often used to describe a world in TUE which life is "nasty, brutish and short." But Professor TUE Pinker suggests Hobbes was actually "a nice man, despite the TUE fact his name became a rather nasty adjective." TUE TUE Producer: Chris Ledgard. TUE TUE 17:00 PM b018csys (Listen) TUE Eddie Mair presents the day's top stories. Including TUE Weather. TUE TUE 18:00 Six O'Clock News b01882z8 (Listen) TUE The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. TUE TUE 18:30 Mark Steel's in Town b018csyv (Listen) TUE Series 3, Basingstoke TUE TUE In this third series comedian Mark Steel visits 6 more UK TUE towns to discover what makes them and their inhabitants TUE distinctive. TUE TUE He creates a bespoke stand-up show for that town and TUE performs the show in front of a local audience. TUE TUE As well as shedding light on the less visited areas of TUE Britain, Mark uncovers stories and experiences that resonate TUE with us all as we recognise the quirkiness of the British TUE way of life and the rich tapestry of remarkable events and TUE people who have shaped where we live. TUE TUE During the series 'Mark Steel's In Town' Mark will visit TUE Berwick-Upon Tweed, Holyhead, Basingstoke, Douglas (Isle of TUE Man), Bungay and Wigan. TUE TUE Episode 3 - In this episode Mark performs a show for the TUE residents of Basingstoke, where he talks about war with the TUE Salvation Army, prehistoric roundabouts and a rather unusual TUE world record set in a shopping centre. TUE TUE Written by Mark Steel with additional material by Pete TUE Sinclair. TUE Produced by Sam Bryant. TUE TUE 19:00 The Archers b018csyx (Listen) TUE TUE 19:15 Front Row b018csyz (Listen) TUE John Wilson reports on the art of book cover design in the TUE age of the digital download; three music writers with very TUE different tastes nominate their recording of the year. TUE TUE Producer Lisa Davis. TUE TUE 19:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018cdmz (Listen) TUE [Repeat of broadcast at 10:45 today] TUE TUE 20:00 Can You Touch Your Toes? b018csz1 (Listen) TUE The Government wants to cut the benefits bill, but how TUE should it decide who is and isn't fit for work? Anita Anand TUE investigates the new assessment scheme being used to decide TUE between deserving claimants and those who are playing the TUE system. TUE TUE This programme takes us inside the controversial new series TUE of tests and forms being used to decide who is eligible for TUE the 'employment support allowance' - the replacement for the TUE old incapacity benefit - and who needs extra support in TUE getting back into the jobs market. Disability campaigners TUE claim the new system is too crude to measure fairly TUE claimants' fitness to work, but how exactly does it work? TUE TUE Anita Anand follows four people with different disabilities TUE and health problems through the process. She meets TUE claimants, sees their day-to-day lives and learns how their TUE medical conditions affect them and the jobs they could do - TUE from visual impairment to depression, cerebral palsy and ME. TUE We follow all four people through the assessments - from TUE filling in the forms to the 'computer-led' medical, the TUE results and the appeals process. TUE TUE 20:40 In Touch b018csz3 (Listen) TUE Peter White with news and information for blind and TUE partially sighted people. TUE TUE 21:00 All in the Mind b018csz5 (Listen) TUE Claudia Hammond reports on the results of the BBC's TUE scientific study into the UK's stress levels. The BBC Stress TUE test was launched in June and the results have just been TUE revealed. How anxious and depressed are we and what does TUE this huge psychology experiment tell us about the causes of TUE all kinds of mental ill health. Peter Kinderman, professor TUE of clinical psychology at the University of Liverpool, TUE reveals the results of the first experiment of this size and TUE asks what it can tell us about our mental well being and TUE what coping mechanisms we can use to be more resilient to TUE stress. TUE TUE Producer: Pam Rutherford. TUE TUE 21:30 The Life Scientific b018cbnx (Listen) TUE [Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today] TUE TUE 21:58 Weather b01882zb (Listen) TUE The latest weather forecast. TUE TUE 22:00 The World Tonight b018csz7 (Listen) TUE Ritula Shah presents national and international news and TUE analysis. TUE TUE 22:45 Book at Bedtime b018csz9 (Listen) TUE The Pursuit of Love, Episode 2 TUE TUE by Nancy Mitford. Fanny is anxious about meeting her beloved TUE Aunt Emily's husband-to-be. Abridged by Lauris TUE Morgan-Griffiths and read by Diana Quick. TUE TUE Reader...Diana Quick TUE Abridger...Lauris Morgan-Griffiths TUE Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. TUE TUE 23:00 The Infinite Monkey Cage b018b8cw (Listen) TUE [Repeat of broadcast at 16:30 on Monday] TUE TUE 23:30 Today in Parliament b018cvsg (Listen) TUE Susan Hulme with the day's top news stories from TUE Westminster. TUE TUE WED WEDNESDAY 21 DECEMBER 2011 WED WED 00:00 Midnight News b01882zx (Listen) WED The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. WED Followed by Weather. WED WED 00:30 Book of the Week b018cdmv (Listen) WED [Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Tuesday] WED WED 00:48 Shipping Forecast b01882zz (Listen) WED The latest shipping forecast. WED WED 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b0188301 (Listen) WED BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. WED WED 05:20 Shipping Forecast b0188303 (Listen) WED The latest shipping forecast. WED WED 05:30 News Briefing b0188305 (Listen) WED The latest news from BBC Radio 4. WED WED 05:43 Prayer for the Day b018mbxz (Listen) WED with Bishop Dr Joe Aldred. WED WED 05:45 Farming Today b018cvtm (Listen) WED The latest news about food, farming and the countryside. WED Produced by Clare Freeman. Presented by WED Anna Hill. WED WED 06:00 Today b018cwgw (Listen) WED With John Humphrys and James Naughtie. Including Yesterday WED in Parliament, Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day. WED WED 09:00 Midweek b018cwgy (Listen) WED Lively and diverse conversation with Libby Purves and WED guests. WED Producer: Chris Paling. WED WED 09:45 Book of the Week b018cwh0 (Listen) WED The Etymologicon, Episode 3 WED WED Abridged by Jane Marshall. WED WED The Etymologicon takes a festive turn as we discover the WED origins of turkey, punch, and pink champagne. And look at WED the difference between balderdash and rumbullion. WED WED Read by Hugh Dennis WED WED Produced by Jane Marshall WED A Jane Marshall Production for BBC Radio 4. WED WED 10:00 Woman's Hour b018cwh2 (Listen) WED Celebrating, informing and entertaining women. Presented by WED Jenni Murray. WED WED 10:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018fljt (Listen) WED Possession, Episode 3 WED WED Director: Celia de Wolff WED A Pier production for BBC Radio 4. WED WED 11:00 Tales from the Arab Spring b018fljw (Listen) WED Whose Tomorrow? (Syria) WED WED The BBC's Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen hears from some of WED the people who have witnessed the repression of Bashir WED al-Assad's regime in Syria. WED WED An activist describes his attempts to make the rest of the WED world aware of the violence being meted out to protestors. WED From the comparatively safe haven of his apartment in WED Beirut, he describes the efforts made to smuggle out WED evidence of brutality. WED WED A protestor recalls being subjected to endless torture WED sessions by the secret police: "The worst thing ever was WED hearing the young women pleading for their virginity when WED they were being raped. They would say 'Please leave me WED alone. I'm a virgin'. The other prisoners would start WED yelling and beating on the doors, hoping that the guards WED would give up and start beating them instead, but they just WED carried on. WED WED A deserter from the Syrian military describes how his unit WED was ordered to fire on protestors. He was threatened when he WED refused and eventually fled across the border into Lebanon WED where he is being harboured by sympathisers. WED WED Producers: Mark Savage and Cara Swift. WED WED 11:30 John Peel's Shed b018fljy (Listen) WED Direct from a five-star, complete sell-out run at the WED Edinburgh Festival, comes John Osborne's Radio 4 debut WED partly adapted from his acclaimed book Radio Head (Radio 4's WED Book Of The Week). WED WED In 2002, John Osborne won a competition on John Peel's Radio WED One show. His prize was a box of records that took eight WED years to listen to. This is an ode to radio, those records WED and anyone who's ever sought solace in the wireless. WED WED A story about one man's love for radio, how it allows you to WED escape into another world. Based on his book Radio Head, up WED and down the dial of British Radio, this is about what WED happened next: a show about the pleasure of having your own WED personal project. The story is about passion, obsession with WED music and about legacy; trying to do something special with WED such a rare, eclectic box of records. WED WED Produced by John Pocock WED WED 12:00 You and Yours b018flk0 (Listen) WED Consumer news with Winifred Robinson. WED WED 12:57 Weather b0188307 (Listen) WED The latest weather forecast. WED WED 13:00 World at One b018flk2 (Listen) WED Shaun Ley presents national and international news. WED Listeners can share their views via email: wato@bbc.co.uk or WED on twitter: #wato. WED WED 13:45 The People's Post: A Narrative History of the Post WED Office b018flk4 (Listen) WED A Job in a Million WED WED In the 1930s the GPO was a model employer, pioneering equal WED opportunities and offering staff a secure career path. WED Employees were encouraged to attend academic classes and WED leisure pursuits, but lateness and inefficiency weren't WED tolerated. WED WED As Royal Mail faces an uncertain future, Dominic Sandbrook WED charts the development of the post office and examines its WED impact on literacy, free speech, commerce and communication. WED The Post Office has become a cherished social institution, WED linking people together and extending their vision outward WED into the wider world. WED WED It's called Royal Mail but it should be known as the WED People's Post WED WED Writer and Presenter: Dominic Sandbrook WED Musicians: Sam Lee, Bella Hardy, Mick Sands, Nick Hart WED Historical Consultant: Iain Stevenson WED Actors: Morgan George, John Sessions, Simon Tcherniak, WED Malcolm Tierney, Jane Whittenshaw WED Producer: Joby Waldman WED A Somethin Else production for BBC Radio 4. WED WED 14:00 The Archers b018csyx (Listen) WED [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Tuesday] WED WED 14:15 Afternoon Play b00pcl7n (Listen) WED Black Hearts in Battersea, Episode 1 WED WED By Joan Aiken, dramatised by Lin Coghlan WED WED A dramatisation of Joan Aiken's classic children's WED adventure. Young Simon comes to 18th century London to study WED painting - and finds himself caught up in wicked Hanoverian WED plots to overthrow the king. WED WED SIMON ..... Joe Dempsie WED DIDO ..... Nicola Miles-Wildin WED SOPHIE ..... Emerald O'Hanrahan WED DUKE ..... John Rowe WED DUCHESS ..... Sheila Reid WED COBBE ..... Ben Crowe WED MRS COBBE ..... Annabelle Dowler WED MR TWITE ..... Rhys Jennings WED MRS TWITE ..... Tessa Nicholson WED JUSTIN ..... Sam Pamphilon WED BUCKLE ..... Nigel Hastings WED DR FURNEAUX ..... Bruce Alexander WED GUS ..... Joseph Cohen Cole WED JABWING ..... Piers Wehner WED WOMAN ..... Kate Layden WED WED Directed by Marc Beeby. WED WED 15:00 Money Box Live b018flkz (Listen) WED Financial phone-in. WED WED 15:30 All in the Mind b018csz5 (Listen) WED [Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 on Tuesday] WED WED 16:00 Thinking Allowed b018fll1 (Listen) WED Laurie Taylor explores the latest research into how society WED works. WED WED 16:30 The Media Show b018fll3 (Listen) WED Steve Hewlett presents a topical programme about the WED fast-changing media world. WED The producer is Simon Tillotson. WED WED 17:00 PM b018fll5 (Listen) WED Eddie Mair presents the day's top stories. Including WED Weather. WED WED 18:00 Six O'Clock News b018830h (Listen) WED The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. WED WED 18:30 Heresy b018fll7 (Listen) WED Series 8, Episode 4 WED WED Victoria Coren presents another edition of the show which WED dares to commit heresy. WED WED Her guests this week are comedians Rufus Hound and Dr Phil WED Hammond and writer and broadcaster Germaine Greer. Together WED they have fun exposing the wrong-headedness of received WED wisdom and challenging knee-jerk public reaction to events. WED WED GP, Dr Phil Hammond enthusiastically argues against the WED received wisdom that people should not self-diagnose using WED the internet, pointing out that statistically doctors only WED just beat the internet in getting it right. Germaine Greer WED offers some constructive if controversial advice for WED self-diagnosers who get it wrong: 'Just die!' WED WED Germaine also refutes the belief that the sixties were a WED great time to be young by cheerfully recalling the decade as WED a time of police repression and sexually-transmitted WED diseases. WED WED And Rufus Hound pours scorn on the suggestion that the best WED Christmas presents are the ones you make yourself. He warns WED Victoria Coren that if she turns up at his house on WED Christmas Day with a gift she has baked herself, he will ask WED her to leave. WED WED Producer: Brian King WED An Avalon Television production for BBC Radio 4. WED WED 19:00 The Archers b018fll9 (Listen) WED WED 19:15 Front Row b018fllc (Listen) WED With John Wilson, who creates a new artwork in neon, WED unveiled tonight at the BBC's Salford building. WED WED Producer Ekene Akalawu. WED WED 19:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018fljt (Listen) WED [Repeat of broadcast at 10:45 today] WED WED 20:00 Bringing Up Britain b018fllf (Listen) WED Series 4, Birds, Bees and Blushes WED WED Birds, Bees and Blushes. Mariella Frostrup and a panel of WED expert guests debate how parents talk to their children WED about sex. In a recent poll only 6% of young people said WED they got the information they needed from their parents. If WED that's the case, why are so many of us failing to have these WED vital conversations? WED WED Many parents worry about what to say to their children, and WED when. And it's not just because it can all be a bit WED embarrassing. Mariella and her guests explore how adults' WED attitudes to children and sexuality colour how they behave WED as parents. Are we a society dangerously relaxed about the WED sexualised clothing, imagery and culture surrounding young WED people? Or, has the increased awareness of child sexual WED abuse in recent years made parents deeply uncomfortable with WED talking and thinking about children and sex at all? WED WED Mariella explores how all of this translates into everyday WED dilemmas and awkward situations, and pinpoints practical WED solutions and useful research. Parents know that children WED are curious about their bodies and where babies come from, WED but if your five year old still exposes himself at every WED family gathering and your teen is online all night with the WED door closed, what do you do? Perceptions of what is 'normal' WED differ, but what do we know about how sexual identity WED develops, and how should that shape these conversations? WED WED Reg Bailey, Chief Executive of The Mothers' Union carried WED out a recent review into the sexualisation and WED commercialisation of childhood, Simon Blake is the Chief WED Executive of Brook, a charity offering sexual health WED information and services. They join Viviane Green, adult, WED child and adolescent psychotherapist and Programe Manager WED for the MSc in Child and Adolescent Counselling and WED Psychotherapy, Dept of Psychosocial Studies Birkbeck College WED and Dr. Jan Macvarish from the University of Kent to debate WED the issues. WED WED The columnist and writer Giles Coren talks about the why he WED wrote a highly personal magazine article about his baby WED daughter in which he imagined her future sex life. And WED parents who think that schools teach too much too young WED explain why they feel their parental authority is being WED undermined WED WED Producer: Erin Riley. WED WED 20:45 Four Thought b018fllh (Listen) WED Series 2, James Lange WED WED James Lange describes how YouTube videos of drug use have WED improved the speed and quality of his research, and argues WED that they can be a vital tool for scientists. WED WED Dr. Lange's research has been into salvia divinorum, and he WED explains how new technology could now make his job even WED easier. He argues that YouTube is an incredible archive of WED social and biological behaviour, which did not exist a few WED years ago, and that using it in a sophisticated and WED systematic way can help us to quickly understand complicated WED behaviour. WED WED Four Thought is a series of talks which combine thought WED provoking ideas and engaging storytelling. Recorded in front WED of an audience at the RSA in London, speakers take to the WED stage to air their latest thinking on the trends, ideas, WED interests and passions that affect our culture and society. WED WED Producer: Giles Edwards. WED WED 21:00 The Oath b018fllk (Listen) WED In realms of science as diverse as vaccine safety, cloning, WED drugs trials, climate research, psychology and WED palaeontology, the behaviour of scientists has come in for WED harsh public criticism. In some cases, published research WED has turned out to be fraudulent or conducted unethically. WED Other actions or omissions in recent controversies have been WED condemned as misleading, economical with the truth or WED avoiding openness. WED WED So, should scientists sign up to an ethical code of WED behaviour along the lines of the Hippocratic Oath and what WED specific clauses should they promise to uphold? WED WED Science broadcaster Adam Rutherford chairs a discussion with WED a panel of scientists, ethicists and commentators to WED formulate an Oath for scientists to take. The panel will WED include Bad Science columnist and epidemiologist Ben WED Goldacre. WED WED Dr Adam Rutherford was a biologist and is now a regular WED presenter of science shows on Radio 4, such as The Material WED World, Science Betrayed and Frontiers. He also presents WED science television programmes on BBC2 and BBC4. WED WED Producer: Andrew Luck-Baker. WED WED 21:30 Midweek b018cwgy (Listen) WED [Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today] WED WED 21:58 Weather b018830p (Listen) WED The latest weather forecast. WED WED 22:00 The World Tonight b018fllm (Listen) WED Robin Lustig presents national and international news and WED analysis. WED WED 22:45 Book at Bedtime b018fllp (Listen) WED The Pursuit of Love, Episode 3 WED WED by Nancy Mitford. Aunt Sadie needs to find some young men to WED invite to Louisa's ball. Abridged by Lauris Morgan-Griffiths WED and read by Diana Quick. WED WED Reader...Diana Quick WED Abridger...Lauris Morgan-Griffiths WED Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. WED WED 23:00 Detective Sergeant Nick Mohammed b018gr0v (Listen) WED Episode 2 WED WED Someone's been Kidnapped... Yikes! Join DS Nick Mohammed and WED co. for the antithesis to We Need To Talk About Kevin. WED WED Written & performed by Nick Mohammed, with Anna Crilly, WED Colin Hoult, and special guests Peter Dickson and Kae WED Alexander. WED WED Produced by Victoria Lloyd. WED WED 23:30 Today in Parliament b018flly (Listen) WED Sean Curran presents the day's top news stories from WED Westminster. WED WED THU THURSDAY 22 DECEMBER 2011 THU THU 00:00 Midnight News b018832k (Listen) THU The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. THU Followed by Weather. THU THU 00:30 Book of the Week b018cwh0 (Listen) THU [Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Wednesday] THU THU 00:48 Shipping Forecast b018832m (Listen) THU The latest shipping forecast. THU THU 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b018832r (Listen) THU BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. THU THU 05:20 Shipping Forecast b018832t (Listen) THU The latest shipping forecast. THU THU 05:30 News Briefing b018832w (Listen) THU The latest news from BBC Radio 4. THU THU 05:43 Prayer for the Day b018md2j (Listen) THU with Bishop Dr Joe Aldred. THU THU 05:45 Farming Today b018flp0 (Listen) THU The latest news about food, farming and the countryside. THU Produced by Clare Freeman. Presented by Charlotte Smith. THU THU 06:00 Today b018flp2 (Listen) THU With John Humphrys and Evan Davis. Including Yesterday in THU Parliament, Sports Desk, Weather and Thought for the Day. THU THU 09:00 In Our Time b018flp4 (Listen) THU Robinson Crusoe THU THU Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Daniel Defoe's seminal THU novel Robinson Crusoe. Published in 1719, it was an THU immediate success and is considered the classic adventure THU story. The plot is now universally known - the sailor THU stranded on a desert island who learns to tame the THU environment and the native population. As well as being a THU rip-roaring tale of life in the wilderness, the book is a THU piece of didactic literature designed to instruct the reader THU in leading a moral and religious life. THU THU Producer: Natalia Fernandez. THU THU 09:45 Book of the Week b018flp6 (Listen) THU The Etymologicon, Episode 4 THU THU Abridged by Jane Marshall. THU THU Before you can say Jack Robinson the Etymologicon uncovers THU who Jack Robinson was and what his link is to The Tower of THU London, derricks and guillotines. THU THU Read by Hugh Dennis THU Produced by Jane Marshall THU A Jane Marshall Production for BBC Radio 4. THU THU 10:00 Woman's Hour b018flp8 (Listen) THU Celebrating, informing and entertaining women. Presented by THU Jenni Murray. THU THU 10:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018flpb (Listen) THU Possession, Episode 4 THU THU Director: Celia de Wolff THU A Pier production for BBC Radio 4. THU THU 11:00 Crossing Continents b018flpd (Listen) THU The Graves of Kashmir THU THU Jill McGivering, the BBC World Service South Asia editor, THU investigates the discovery of thousands of bodies in mass THU graves in Indian Kashmir. Human rights groups suspect they THU are just some of the victims of "disappearances" at the THU hands of the Indian military in this contested region. The THU authorities respond that the bodies are in fact those of THU militants who have infiltrated from Pakistan. Will an THU official investigation reveal the truth? THU Producer: Michael Gallagher. THU THU 11:30 Sex and the Single Girl b018flpg (Listen) THU Helen Gurley Brown's 'Sex and the Single Girl' was first THU published in 1962. 50 years on Karen Krizanovich, once named THU the 'Sharon Stone of agony aunts', delves into the story THU behind the writing of the book and charts the enormous THU impact it has had and continues to have today. THU THU After its publication in 1962 it sold 2 million copies in 3 THU weeks. 'Sex and the Single Girl' was of and ahead of its THU time and went on to influence some of the greatest success THU stories of recent decades: Bridget Jones's Diary, Sex and THU the City and Mad Men among them. The popularity of the book THU landed Helen Gurley Brown the role of Editor-in-Chief of THU Cosmopolitan in the mid-sixties. She went on to create the THU 'Cosmo girl' and defined the magazine's now instantly THU recognizable style of lipsticks and sex tips. THU THU Presenter and single girl about town Karen will take on some THU of the advice from Helen Gurley Brown's study on 'how to THU stay single in superlative style' and will meet the writers, THU journalists, film and TV personalities it has inspired along THU the way. This will be a fun, cheeky and sexy look at the THU changing status of the single woman through the five decades THU from its first publication, as expressed through the books, THU TV and films 'Sex and the Single Girl' has inspired and THU continues to inspire today. THU THU Producer: Rose de Larrabeiti THU A Whistledown production for BBC Radio 4. THU THU 12:00 You and Yours b018flpj (Listen) THU Consumer news with Winifred Robinson. THU THU 12:57 Weather b018832y (Listen) THU The latest weather forecast. THU THU 13:00 World at One b018flpl (Listen) THU Shaun Ley presents national and international news. THU Listeners can share their views via email: wato@bbc.co.uk or THU on twitter: #wato. THU THU 13:45 The People's Post: A Narrative History of the Post THU Office b018flpn (Listen) THU The Post Code THU THU When a national post-code system was introduced in the 1970s THU it met with fierce resistance: from postal workers, THU concerned about the pace of change, and a general public THU incensed by "useless symbols". Intended to aid sorting THU mechanisation, today postcodes are used by geodemographic THU databases to classify households for the benefit of THU commerce, government services and political canvassing. THU THU As Royal Mail faces an uncertain future, Dominic Sandbrook THU charts the development of the post office and examines its THU impact on literacy, free speech, commerce and communication. THU The Post Office has become a cherished social institution, THU linking people together and extending their vision outward THU into the wider world. THU THU It's called Royal Mail but it should be known as the THU People's Post THU THU Writer and Presenter: Dominic Sandbrook THU Musicians: Sam Lee, Bella Hardy, Mick Sands, Nick Hart THU Historical Consultant: Iain Stevenson THU Actors: Morgan George, John Sessions, Simon Tcherniak, THU Malcolm Tierney, Jane Whittenshaw THU Producer: Joby Waldman THU A Somethin Else production for BBC Radio 4. THU THU 14:00 The Archers b018fll9 (Listen) THU [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Wednesday] THU THU 14:15 Afternoon Play b00pd18h (Listen) THU Black Hearts in Battersea, Episode 2 THU THU By Joan Aiken, dramatised by Lin Coghlan THU THU To save the King from Hanoverian plotters Simon and Sophie THU must first suffer shipwreck, attacks by wolves and a narrow THU escape from an exploding castle in hot air balloon. THU THU SIMON ..... Joe Dempsie THU DIDO ..... Nicola Miles-Wildin THU SOPHIE ..... Emerald O'Hanrahan THU DUKE ..... John Rowe THU DUCHESS ..... Sheila Reid THU COBBE ..... Ben Crowe THU MRS COBBE ..... Annabelle Dowler THU MR TWITE ..... Rhys Jennings THU MRS TWITE ..... Tessa Nicholson THU JUSTIN ..... Sam Pamphilon THU BUCKLE ..... Nigel Hastings THU DR FURNEAUX ..... Bruce Alexander THU DR FIELD ..... Ewan Hooper THU MRS BUCKLE ..... Kate Layden THU MOGG ..... John Biggins THU GUS ..... Joseph Cohen Cole THU JABWING ..... Piers Wehner THU THU Directed by Marc Beeby. THU THU 15:00 Open Country b018flps (Listen) THU This is one of the busiest times of year on the Farne THU Islands off the Northumberland Coast. Almost 1,500 seal pups THU are being born and almost half of these will die in their THU first three weeks. Since 1951, wardens have been counting THU and tagging the pups born on the Farne Islands. During this THU time, the number of pups born has trebled, from 500 to 1499, THU making it the largest English colony of Atlantic grey seals. THU THU When the survey began, scientists knew almost nothing about THU how seals bred, what they ate or where they went during the THU winter. Those early studies on the Farnes were THU groundbreaking, setting the standard for all later seal THU research around the world. THU THU The local port, Seahouses, used to be a major fishing town. THU During the 1960's and 70's, thousands of seals were shot THU because they were thought to be a threat to local fish THU stocks. Now the town relies more on tourism than fishing. THU THU Jules Hudson visits the Farne Islands to find out more about THU the research project and to investigate the impact the seals THU are having on the fishing industry and the local area. THU THU 15:27 Radio 4 Appeal b0188882 (Listen) THU [Repeat of broadcast at 07:55 on Sunday] THU THU 15:30 Open Book b01888w8 (Listen) THU [Repeat of broadcast at 16:00 on Sunday] THU THU 16:00 The Film Programme b018fmq6 (Listen) THU Francine Stock talks to cinema's movers and shakers. THU THU 16:30 Material World b018fmq8 (Listen) THU Quentin Cooper presents his weekly digest of science in and THU behind the headlines. He talks to the scientists who are THU publishing their research in peer reviewed journals, and he THU discusses how that research is scrutinised and used by the THU scientific community, the media and the public. The THU programme also reflects how science affects our daily lives; THU from predicting natural disasters to the latest advances in THU cutting edge science like nanotechnology and stem cell THU research. THU THU Producer: Martin Redfern. THU THU 17:00 PM b018fmqb (Listen) THU Eddie Mair presents the day's top stories. Including THU Weather. THU THU 18:00 Six O'Clock News b0188330 (Listen) THU The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. THU THU 18:30 Elvenquest b016vn8f (Listen) THU Series 3, Episode 4 THU THU As they continue their search for the Sword of Asnagar, the THU noble Questers find themselves coming to the rescue of King THU Baldwin the Jovial whose mead hall is being terrorised by a THU terrible creature called "The Grundle". But when Amis, the THU Chosen One, starts to question whether he is actually all THU that special after all, the Questers hatch a plan to kill THU the beast and restore Amis' self-worth. THU THU Meanwhile, time is running out for Lord Darkness. Kreech THU tells he must find a girlfriend to keep him young, or he'll THU find his incorporeal essence once more slowly shrivelling THU and turning to dust. So Darkness starts off on the dating THU game. Trouble is, it's been a bit of time since he last met THU a girl, let alone chatted one up... THU THU Starring: THU Darren Boyd as Vidar THU Kevin Eldon as Dean/Kreech THU Dave Lamb as Amis aka The Chosen One THU Alistair McGowan as Lord Darkness THU Stephen Mangan as Sam THU Daniel Rigby as King Baldwin The Jovial THU and THU Sophie Winkleman as Penthiselea THU THU Written by Anil Gupta and Richard Pinto THU Producer: Sam Michell. THU THU 19:00 The Archers b018fmqd (Listen) THU THU 19:15 Front Row b018fmqg (Listen) THU Mark Lawson unwraps a selection of interviews with the arts THU headline-makers of 2011, including Nicholas Hytner, Richard THU Bean and James Corden on their hit play One Man, Two THU Guvnors. THU THU Producer Ellie Bury. THU THU 19:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018flpb (Listen) THU [Repeat of broadcast at 10:45 today] THU THU 20:00 The Report b018fmrf (Listen) THU Clinical trials THU THU Current affairs series combining original insights into THU major news stories with topical investigations. THU THU 20:30 In Business b018fmrh (Listen) THU 21st Century Unlimited THU THU The American business guru Joe Pine thinks we have moved THU into an era of what he calls "Infinite Possibility". Peter THU Day finds out what he is talking about and what the ideas THU mean for conventional 20th-centuy-style corporations. THU Producer: Sandra Kanthal THU Editor: Stephen Chilcott. THU THU 21:00 Am I Really Free? b018fmrk (Listen) THU Four years ago, twenty six year old Kerrie Wooltorton drank THU antifreeze with the intention of ending her life. She'd THU already been admitted to hospital several times following THU previous attempts. But this time, there was a notable THU difference. THU THU Kerrie handed medical staff a note she'd written, asking THU them to keep her comfortable but to let her die. The THU treating team noted the clarity of her communication and THU instructions, and concluded that she had the ability or THU 'capacity' to refuse life-saving treatment. They felt they THU had no alternative but to let her die. THU THU Although the inquest into Kerrie's death concluded that she THU had the capacity to refuse life-saving treatment, her family THU disagreed - how could a young woman, who had made several THU attempts on her life, be capable of making a decision that THU would ultimately lead to her death? THU THU This case highlights a pressing issue in mental health THU circles today - when is a person with certain disorders of THU the mind or brain, including some who are being detained THU under the mental act, free to decide for themselves, and THU when does that disorder constrain their freedom? THU THU For many years, the health service has recognised a THU patient's right to consent to or refuse treatment for THU physical disorders. But with the arrival of the Mental THU Capacity Act in 2007, which places the prized concept of THU patient autonomy at the very heart of medical decision THU making, consideration of patient rights are now extending THU more overtly into the mental health setting. THU THU Mental health professionals are starting to face questions THU about whether some patients' expressed wishes can genuinely THU be said to be their own. THU THU It's also taxing the minds of philosophers and lawyers, who THU are working with psychiatrists, interviewing patients with a THU range of mental health disorders, to shed light on when THU people are free decide, and when they are not. THU THU 21:30 In Our Time b018flp4 (Listen) THU [Repeat of broadcast at 09:00 today] THU THU 21:58 Weather b0188334 (Listen) THU The latest weather forecast. THU THU 22:00 The World Tonight b018fmrm (Listen) THU Robin Lustig presents national and international news and THU analysis. THU THU 22:45 Book at Bedtime b018fmrp (Listen) THU The Pursuit of Love, Episode 4 THU THU by Nancy Mitford. Linda falls in love, to the dismay of her THU family. Abridged by Lauris Morgan-Griffiths and read by THU Diana Quick. THU THU Reader...Diana Quick THU Abridger...Lauris Morgan-Griffiths THU Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. THU THU 23:00 Weird Tales b018fmrr (Listen) THU Series 3, Louisa's THU THU By Amanda Whittington. THU THU When a stranger walks into Louisa's café, the juke box which THU hasn't played a record for years whirrs into action, the THU lights start flashing and Louisa is thrown into a world THU where her past challenges life as she knows it. THU THU Part of a series of chilling plays for winter nights. THU THU Louisa ... Sara Poyzer THU Pete ... Paul Rider THU Joe ... Gerard McDermott THU THU Producer, Jessica Brown THU THU 23:30 Cat Women of the Moon b013q20k (Listen) THU Episode 1 THU THU Cat Women of the Moon was a 1950s film that followed a THU popular motif in science fiction; an all women society THU surviving without men. Charlotte Perkins Gilman explored the THU idea as early as 1915 in the classic novel 'Herland'. In THU part one of a two part programme we look at how science THU fiction has been used to examine relationships between the THU sexes - and in some cases, more than two sexes. In many THU novels the exploration of sexuality is unconventional and THU experimental. Some societies have more than one sex, in THU others people can change sex at will. In certain imagined THU worlds people form relationships with aliens or don't have THU sex with flesh and blood beings at all - but with artificial THU life forms instead. The programme includes contributions THU from some of Britain's leading science fiction writers THU including Iain Banks, China Mieville and Nicola Griffith. THU The programme is presented by the writer Sarah Hall, author THU of 'The Carhullan Army' and 'The Electric Michelangelo' THU which was short listed for the Booker Prize. The programme THU is produced in Manchester by Nicola Swords. THU THU FRI FRIDAY 23 DECEMBER 2011 FRI FRI 00:00 Midnight News b018833v (Listen) FRI The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. FRI Followed by Weather. FRI FRI 00:30 Book of the Week b018flp6 (Listen) FRI [Repeat of broadcast at 09:45 on Thursday] FRI FRI 00:48 Shipping Forecast b018833x (Listen) FRI The latest shipping forecast. FRI FRI 01:00 Selection of BBC World Service Programmes b018833z (Listen) FRI BBC Radio 4 joins the BBC World Service. FRI FRI 05:20 Shipping Forecast b0188341 (Listen) FRI The latest shipping forecast. FRI FRI 05:30 News Briefing b0188343 (Listen) FRI The latest news from BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 05:43 Prayer for the Day b018md3r (Listen) FRI with Bishop Dr Joe Aldred. FRI FRI 05:45 Farming Today b018fmsn (Listen) FRI The latest news about food, farming and the countryside. FRI Produced by Clare Freeman. Presented by Charlotte Smith. FRI FRI 06:00 Today b018fmsq (Listen) FRI With John Humphrys and Evan Davis. Including Sports Desk; FRI Weather; Thought for the Day. FRI FRI 09:00 Desert Island Discs b018888b (Listen) FRI [Repeat of broadcast at 11:15 on Sunday] FRI FRI 09:45 Book of the Week b018fmss (Listen) FRI The Etymologicon, Episode 5 FRI FRI Abridged by Jane Marshall. FRI FRI Our circular stroll through the English language takes us to FRI Venice and Ancient Rome, to Germany and the Hudson River, in FRI search of the derivations of magazines and salt cellars, FRI fast bucks and bucks that are passed -as we finally end up FRI in the office of President Harry S Truman. FRI FRI Read by Hugh Dennis FRI Produced by Jane Marshall FRI A Jane Marshall Production for BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 10:00 Woman's Hour b018fmsv (Listen) FRI Celebrating, informing and entertaining women. Presented by FRI Jenni Murray. FRI FRI 10:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018fmsx (Listen) FRI Possession, Episode 5 FRI FRI Director: Celia de Wolff FRI A Pier production for BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 11:00 Inside the Academie Francaise b018fmsz (Listen) FRI The French language is under attack from foreign invasion. FRI In today's world of mass instant communication and FRI globalisation, it is harder and harder to protect one of the FRI world's most refined languages. FRI FRI Nevertheless, Francophones are trying to do just that, with FRI the help of the Academie Francaise, the institution which FRI for nearly 400 years has been the official authority on the FRI French language. FRI FRI Run by 40 illustrious members known as "Immortals", the FRI Academie is one of France's most hallowed institutions and a FRI symbol "par excellence" of Gallic pride. Its functions FRI include publishing a dictionary sanctioning new words and FRI reminding people of "le bon usage". FRI FRI Once the language of the world's elite, French now ranks as FRI only the eighth most spoken language in the world and its FRI influence is clearly receding. French teenagers and FRI twenty-somethings talk of "le buzz", they wear "les FRI leggings" and enjoy "happy hour" in "le pub", immune to the FRI protestations of the Academie. FRI FRI In this programme, the London-based French journalist Agnes FRI Poirier is invited inside the Academie to talk to some of FRI the "Immortals". She has exclusive access to the reception FRI of the latest member, the Belgian writer Francois Weyergans, FRI and observes the Academie's quirky rituals first-hand. FRI FRI She questions the role and relevance of the body, which has FRI been working on the latest edition of the French dictionary FRI for more than 70 years. She also compares the conservative FRI approach taken in France with the more "laissez-faire" FRI attitude adopted in the Anglophone world towards the English FRI language. FRI FRI Producer: Leala Padmanabhan. FRI FRI 11:30 North by Northamptonshire b018fmt1 (Listen) FRI Series 2, Episode 4 FRI FRI Sheila Hancock narrates the bittersweet adventures of the FRI residents of a small town in Northamptonshire. Esther has a FRI big question to ask Ken and Keith, while on the horizon, FRI storm clouds gather... FRI FRI written by Katherine Jakeways FRI produced by Victoria Lloyd FRI FRI John Biggins................................Keith FRI Mackenzie Crook...........................Rod FRI Kevin Eldon...................Jonathan / Ken FRI Shelia Hancock....................... Narrator FRI Jessica Henwick...........................Helen FRI Katherine Jakeways........ Esther / Jacqui FRI Felicity Montagu..............................Jan FRI Geoffrey Palmer........................Norman FRI Lizzie Roper..............................Angela FRI Penelope Wilton............................Mary FRI Rufus Wright................................Frank. FRI FRI 12:00 You and Yours b018fmt3 (Listen) FRI Consumer news with Peter White. FRI FRI 12:57 Weather b0188345 (Listen) FRI The latest weather forecast. FRI FRI 13:00 World at One b018fmt5 (Listen) FRI Shaun Ley presents national and international news. FRI Listeners can share their views via email: wato@bbc.co.uk or FRI on twitter: #wato. FRI FRI 13:45 The People's Post: A Narrative History of the Post FRI Office b018fmt7 (Listen) FRI The Last Post FRI FRI In 1969 the post office ceased being a government industry FRI to become a nationalised industry. It avoided being sold off FRI in the 1980s, only to face even bigger challenges in the FRI 2000s: sustaining the costs of a huge labour force, and FRI rivalry from digital communications. As it sits on the brink FRI of privatisation, what does the Royal Mail mean today? FRI FRI As Royal Mail faces an uncertain future, Dominic Sandbrook FRI charts the development of the post office and examines its FRI impact on literacy, free speech, commerce and communication. FRI The Post Office has become a cherished social institution, FRI linking people together and extending their vision outward FRI into the wider world. FRI FRI It's called Royal Mail but it should be known as the FRI People's Post FRI FRI Writer and Presenter: Dominic Sandbrook FRI Musicians: Sam Lee, Bella Hardy, Mick Sands, Nick Hart FRI Historical Consultant: Iain Stevenson FRI Actors: Morgan George, John Sessions, Simon Tcherniak, FRI Malcolm Tierney, Jane Whittenshaw FRI Producer: Joby Waldman FRI A Somethin Else production for BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 14:00 The Archers b018fmqd (Listen) FRI [Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 on Thursday] FRI FRI 14:15 Afternoon Play b00g3cfq (Listen) FRI Christmas Eve FRI FRI Festive comic drama by Imison Award-winner Adam FRI Beeson, based on a short story by Nikolai Gogol. FRI FRI As the snow falls on Christmas Eve in the Ukrainian FRI village of Dikanka, the local witch is in league with a FRI devil to steal the moon and the stars. Meanwhile, FRI the witch's son goes on a magical night flight to St FRI Petersburg to borrow a pair of shoes from Catherine the FRI Great. FRI FRI Gogol...................... Dave Anderson FRI Solokha.................. Juliet Cadzow FRI Vakula .................... Steven McNicol FRI Devil ........................ Paul Thomas Hickey FRI Chub.................... Mark McDonnell FRI Oksana................... Lucy Paterson FRI Mayor ............. Crawford Logan FRI Deacon ........... Ralph Riach FRI Producer/director: Bruce Young. FRI FRI 15:00 Gardeners' Question Time b018fmtp (Listen) FRI Tenterden, Kent FRI FRI A festive GQT recorded with Tenterden & District FRI Horticultural Society in Kent, chaired by Eric Robson. FRI Joining him on the panel are Bob Flowerdew, Matthew Wilson FRI and Bunny Guinness. FRI FRI Produced by Howard Shannon & Lucy Dichmont FRI A Somethin' Else production for BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 15:45 O Henry Stories b018fmtr (Listen) FRI The Gift of the Magi FRI FRI The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry. FRI A young couple struggle to find the money for a really FRI special Christmas present for each other. FRI FRI A Christmas classic by a cherished American writer, to warm FRI the soul and intrigue the listener with satisfyingly FRI unexpected plot twists. FRI FRI Reader...John Guerrasio FRI Abridger...Annie Caulfield FRI Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. FRI FRI 16:00 Last Word b018ft0z (Listen) FRI Presented by Matthew Bannister. Obituary series, analysing FRI and celebrating the life stories of people who have recently FRI died. FRI FRI 16:30 More or Less b018ft11 (Listen) FRI Tim Harford investigates the numbers in the news. FRI FRI 17:00 PM b018ft13 (Listen) FRI Eddie Mair presents the day's top stories. Including FRI Weather. FRI FRI 18:00 Six O'Clock News b0188347 (Listen) FRI The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 18:30 The News Quiz b018ft15 (Listen) FRI Series 76, Episode 1 FRI FRI A satirical review of the week's news, chaired by Sandi FRI Toksvig. FRI FRI 19:00 The Archers b018ft17 (Listen) FRI FRI 19:15 Front Row b018ft19 (Listen) FRI Mark Lawson unwraps a further selection of interviews with FRI arts headline makers of 2011, including the writers behind FRI The Inbetweeners, whose film has taken more than £40m in the FRI UK. FRI FRI Producer Georgia Mann. FRI FRI 19:45 Woman's Hour Drama b018fmsx (Listen) FRI [Repeat of broadcast at 10:45 today] FRI FRI 20:00 Saving Species b018ft1c (Listen) FRI Sustaining Life FRI FRI In a special edition of Saving Species, recorded in front of FRI an audience at the University of Bristol, Brett Westwood FRI chairs a discussion about the building tension between the FRI natural world and the burgeoning human population. FRI FRI Every 2 seconds another child is born. The human population FRI is now over 7 billion and is projected to rise to 9 billion FRI by 2050. All these people will need food, water, energy and FRI materials, is that possible? If everyone in the world lived FRI like us in the UK, even at the present level of population, FRI we would need 4 planet's worth of resources to sustain our FRI lifestyles, and as the world gets wealthier and more people FRI attain a western lifestyle, where will those resources come FRI from? FRI FRI How can a burgeoning population really live with a FRI flourishing natural world? FRI FRI Not only will more wetlands be drained, more forests FRI destroyed for agriculture and the seas fished even more, the FRI distribution of resources will be unevenly spread around the FRI world. How will this affect us all in the years to come? FRI FRI Or is another way possible, where we let go of the systems FRI that drive the processes that destroy nature and learn to FRI live with the natural world, which will mean making FRI sacrifices? FRI FRI Sustaining Life takes the issue of the human population and FRI nature head on. FRI FRI The speakers are: FRI FRI Shiva Vandana - an environmentalist from India; Jacqueline FRI McGlade - Executive Director of the European Environment FRI Agency; Aubrey Manning - Emeritus Professor of Natural FRI History, University of Edinburgh; Jon Bridle, Evolutionary FRI Biologist, Cabot Institute, University of Bristol. FRI FRI There are guest performances by writer ALK and poet, Miles FRI Chambers. FRI FRI Saving Species news reporter Kelvin Boot will be presenting FRI some of the themes. FRI FRI And questions from some of the 800 members of the public who FRI attended the recording of the programme. FRI FRI Chair Brett Westwood FRI Producer Mary Colwell FRI Editor Julian Hector. FRI FRI 20:50 A Point of View b018ft1f (Listen) FRI The historian Lisa Jardine reflects on the week's events. FRI Producer: Sheila Cook. FRI FRI 21:00 The People's Post: A Narrative History of the Post FRI Office b018ft1h (Listen) FRI The Post Office and the State FRI FRI In 1870 the telegraph system came under the control of the FRI post office, in the first ever instance of the government FRI nationalising a commercial industry. The aim was to provide FRI an extended and more efficient network, to serve the public FRI and make a profit. FRI FRI In the late nineteenth century the Post Office became a key FRI instrument of the State. FRI FRI Providing a national telegraph service, as censor and FRI channel in the first world war, as a model employer in the FRI 1930s and pioneer in communications technology for much of FRI the twentieth century. The last four decades have seen the FRI State pulling away from Royal Mail leaving it's future very FRI much uncertain. FRI FRI Writer and Presenter: Dominic Sandbrook FRI FRI Historical Consultant: Iain Stevenson FRI FRI Musicians: Sam Lee, Bella Hardy, Mick Sands, Nick Hart FRI FRI Actors: Morgan George, John Sessions, Simon Tcherniak, FRI Malcolm Tierney, Jane Whittenshaw FRI FRI Producer: Joby Waldman FRI A Somethin Else production for BBC Radio 4. FRI FRI 21:58 Weather b0188349 (Listen) FRI The latest weather forecast. FRI FRI 22:00 The World Tonight b018ft1k (Listen) FRI Robin Lustig presents national and international news and FRI analysis. FRI FRI 22:45 Book at Bedtime b018ft1m (Listen) FRI The Pursuit of Love, Episode 5 FRI FRI Reader...Diana Quick FRI Abridger...Lauris Morgan-Griffiths FRI Producer...Mary Ward-Lowery. FRI FRI 23:00 Great Lives b018csyq (Listen) FRI [Repeat of broadcast at 16:30 on Tuesday] FRI FRI 23:30 Cat Women of the Moon b0145x7h (Listen) FRI Episode 2 FRI FRI Cat Women of the Moon was a 1950s film that followed a FRI popular motif in science fiction; an all women society FRI surviving without men. One of its biggest challenges? How to FRI reproduce. In the final part of a two part programme we look FRI at how science fiction has been used to examine the myriad FRI ways we might continue the human race. From test tube babies FRI to parthenogenesis. From cloning to male pregnancy. From FRI artificial wombs to a collective consciousness or hive mind. FRI The programme includes contributions from some of Britain's FRI leading science fiction writers including Iain Banks, China FRI Mieville, Nicola Griffith and Geoff Ryman. The programme is FRI presented by the writer Sarah Hall, author of 'The Carhullan FRI Army' and 'The Electric Michelangelo' which was short listed FRI for the Booker Prize. The programme is produced in FRI Manchester by Nicola Swords. FRI
16 December, 2011
Radio 4 Listings for 17/12/2011 - 23/12/2011
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