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Past Present Future is a bi-weekly History of Ideas podcast with David Runciman, host and creator of Talking Politics, exploring the history of ideas from politics to philosophy, culture to technology. David talks to historians, novelists, scientists and many others about where the most interesting ideas come from, what they mean, and why they matter. Ideas from the past, questions about the present, shaping the future. Brought to you in partnership with the London Review of Books. New episo ...
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Discover your next favourite book, or take a deep dive into the mind of an author you love, with The Shakespeare and Company Interview podcast. Long-form interviews with internationally acclaimed authors, recorded from our bookshop in the heart of Paris. Hosted by S&Co Literary Director, Adam Biles. Discover all our upcoming events here. If you enjoy these conversations, you can order The Shakespeare and Company Book of Interviews here. Past guests include: Ottessa Moshfegh, Ian McEwan, Ali ...
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Coronavirus! Climate! Brexit! Trump! Politics has never been more unpredictable, more alarming or more interesting: Talking Politics is the podcast that tries to make sense of it all. Every week David Runciman and Helen Thompson talk to the most interesting people around about the ideas and events that shape our world: from history to economics, from philosophy to fiction. What does the future hold? Can democracy survive? How crazy will it get? This is the political conversation that matters ...
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From razor-sharp analysis of current events to the hottest debates in politics, science, philosophy and culture, Late Night Live puts you firmly in the big picture. This LNL podcast contains the stories in separate episodes.
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A new series of talks by David Runciman, in which he explores some of the most important thinkers and prominent ideas lying behind modern politics – from Hobbes to Gandhi, from democracy to patriarchy, from revolution to lock down. Plus, he talks about the crises – revolutions, wars, depressions, pandemics – that generated these new ways of political thinking. From the team that brought you Talking Politics: a history of ideas to help make sense of what’s happening today. Hosted on Acast. Se ...
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From razor-sharp analysis of current events to the hottest debates in politics, science, philosophy and culture, Late Night Live puts you firmly in the big picture.
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A weekly interview series from Russell Brand that examines what's beneath the surface—of the people we admire, the ideas that define our time, and the history we’re told. Speaking with guests from the worlds of academia, popular culture, and the arts, Russell seeks to uncover the ulterior truth behind our constructed reality. And have a laugh.On his new podcast ‘Above the Noise’ Russell guides us all—curious beginners, spiritual skeptics, and experienced practitioners—in brief, 10-minute med ...
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Welcome to On The Road To Better Business. A place where every business can learn something new and be inspired by others every day.
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Political philosopher David Runciman sits down with David Marr to discuss why democracy is in such a state of disrepair, and the scintillating idea he has to give our tired old systems a jolt of adrenaline.By Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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David Runciman on saving democracy, and the resilience of island ecosystems
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How did we come to live in a world ruled by - mostly - idiots? And can we fix our struggling democracies by enfranchising children as young as six? Political philosopher David Runciman attempts to pump some adrenaline into our limp and languishing systems. Plus, the staggering beauty and fragility of island ecosystems.…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Mother Courage & Her Children
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Our ninth Great Political Fiction is Bertolt Brecht’s classic anti-war play, written in 1939 at the start of one terrible European war but set in the time of another: the Thirty Years’ War of the 17th century. How did Brecht think a three-hundred-year gap could help us to understand our own capacity for violence and cruelty? Why did he make Mother …
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: The Time Machine
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Our eighth Great Political Fiction is H. G. Wells’ The Time Machine (1895) which isn’t just a book about time travel. It’s also full of late-19th century fear and paranoia about what evolution and progress might do to human beings in the long run. Why will the class struggle turn into savagery and human sacrifice? Who will end up on top? And how wi…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde
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Today’s Great Political Fiction is Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) - a story that it’s easy to know without really knowing it at all. David explores all the ways that Robert Louis Stevenson’s tale confounds our expectations about good and evil. What does Dr Jekyll really want? What are all the men in the book trying to hide? And what has any of this g…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Phineas Redux
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The sixth Great Political Fiction in our summer re-release is Anthony Trollope’s Phineas Redux (1874), his lightly and luridly fictionalised account of parliamentary polarisation in the age of Gladstone and Disraeli. A tale of political and personal melodrama, it explores what happens when political parties steal each other’s clothes and politician…
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The race to save the world's islands - with stunning results
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Islands are the location of two extremes: they hold the greatest concentration on earth of both biodiversity and species extinctions. The challenge to save them and their inhabitants from the triple threat threat of invasive species, sea level rises and global heating seems immense, But the results when rescue teams are sent in are remarkably quick…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Middlemarch Part 2
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This second episode about George Eliot’s masterpiece explores questions of politics and religion, reputation and deception, truth and public opinion. What is the relationship between personal power and faith in a higher power? Is it ever possible to escape from the gossip of your friends once it turns against you? Who can rescue the ambitious when …
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Middlemarch Part 1
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Today’s Great Political Fiction is George Eliot’s Middlemarch (1872), which has so much going on that it needs two episodes to unpack it. In this episode David discusses the significance of the book being set in 1829-32 and the reasons why Nietzsche was so wrong to characterise it as a moralistic tale. Plus he explains why a book about personal rel…
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Poetry: Ishion Hutchinson reads from and discusses School of Instructions
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School of Instructions, the latest work by Ishion Hutchinson, draws from the time he spent in the archive of the Imperial War Museum, to foreground the experience—brutal, significant, but long overlooked—of West Indian volunteers in the First World War. This book length poem is a sensorial voyage into the convoys, garrisons and trenches of the Midd…
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Should artists have the right to freedom of political expression?
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Since the war in Gaza broke out there has been a crisis of censorship in the arts sector around the world, in what the not-for-profit group Freemuse is calling a most alarming moment for freedom of expression. Here in Australia pianist Jayson Gillham had his concerts cancelled after speaking about the killing of journalists in Gaza, and arts organi…
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Should artists have the right to freedom of political expression?
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Since the war in Gaza broke out there has been a crisis of censorship in the arts sector around the world, in what the not-for-profit group Freemuse is calling a most alarming moment for freedom of expression. Here in Australia pianist Jayson Gillham had his concerts cancelled after speaking about the killing of journalists in Gaza, and arts organi…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Fathers and Sons
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Our fourth Great Political Fiction is Ivan Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons (1862), the definitive novel about the politics – and emotions – of intergenerational conflict. How did Turgenev manage to write a wistful novel about nihilism? What made Russian politics in the early 1860s so chock-full of frustration? Why did Turgenev’s book infuriate his cont…
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Ern Malley, the greatest Australian poet who never lived
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80 years ago, an exciting new poet by the name of Ern Malley burst onto the Australian literary scene. As it turned out, Ern was a hoax, concocted by two conservative poets intent on humiliating the country’s literary avante garde.By Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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In Sudan nearly 26 million people are facing starvation and more than 11 million people have been internally displaced in a war which has seen atrocities committed by both sides. A report from Amnesty International shows hundreds of thousands of weapons are being brought into Sudan from countries including China, Russia, Serbia, Türkiye, the United…
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Bruce Shapiro on Biden's speech, what's actually happening in Sudan, and remembering the great Australian literary hoax
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President Biden has spoken at the Democratic Convention. Who's fuelling the atrocities in the Sudan? And it's 80 years since the fictitious 'Ern Malley' dazzled with his poetry.By Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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Bruce Shapiro's America - The Democratic Convention
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Joe Biden has made a passionate speech at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in support of Kamala Harris and their agenda. There was a lot of love in the room for Joe Biden, but will his final legacy be handing over the nomination to Kamala Harris? Guest: Bruce Shapiro, contributing editor with the Nation Magazine and Director of the Dar…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Mary Stuart
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Our third Great Political Fiction is Friedrich Schiller’s monumental play Mary Stuart (1800), which lays bare the impossible choices faced by two queens – Elizabeth I of England and Mary Queen of Scots – in a world of men. Schiller imagines a meeting between them that never took place and unpicks its fearsome consequences. Why does it do such damag…
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Italy's attempts to lure you to live in its regions
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Crumbling but charming village houses for sale for one euro. Free accommodation for digital nomads. Shepherd training for foreigners. These are just some of the ways Italy's regions are trying to replenish their populations. James Imam reports on where it's working.By Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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The betrayals behind the Voice Referendum loss
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The Voice Referendum began as a conservative project. Its ultimate failure was due to lies, betrayals and mistakes, according to lawyer Shireen Morris, who worked on the proposal for many years.By Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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Laura Tingle on Gaza visas, and why the Voice Referendum failed
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Laura Tingle on Peter Dutton's calls for a Gaza visa ban. Constitutional lawyer Shireen Morris on why the Voice referendum failed. Plus, what's it really like to buy a 1 Euro house in rural Italy?By Australian Broadcasting Corporation
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Laura Tingle's Canberra: tussle over Gaza visas
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The Albanese Government's progress on its legislative agenda has slowed to a snail's pace since Parliament returned. But what has now escalated is Labor's political return of fire to the very political attack by Peter Dutton over visas granted to people fleeing to Gaza. Guest: Laura Tingle, Chief Political Correspondent 7.30…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Gulliver’s Travels
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Today’s episode on the Great Political Fictions is about Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1726) – part adventure story, part satire of early-eighteenth-century party politics, but above all a coruscating reflection on the failures of human perspective and self-knowledge. Why do we find it so hard to see ourselves for who we really are? What mak…
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Fifteen Fictions for Summer re-release: Coriolanus
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In the first episode of the summer daily re-release of our series on the Great Political Fictions, David talks about Shakespeare’s Coriolanus (1608-9), the last of his tragedies and perhaps his most politically contentious play. Why has Coriolanus been subject to so many wildly different political interpretations? Is pride really the tragic flaw of…
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What If… The Vietnam War Had Ended in 1964?
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What If… The Vietnam War Had Ended in 1964? For our latest counterfactual David talks to historian Thant Myint-U about his grandfather U Thant, UN Secretary General for most of the 1960s and the man who might have ended the Vietnam War before it really got started. How close did U Thant get to bringing LBJ and the Vietcong to the negotiating table …
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The misadventures of John Lang - Australia’s trail-blazing first novelist
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Author Henry Savery is credited with being Australia's first novelist, for his work 'Quintus Servinton', but author and historian Sean Doyle says in fact the first Autralian-born novelist was John Lang. Lang was born in a Parramatta pub in 1816 and his 1836 novel called 'Violet; Or, the Danseuse: A Portraiture of Human Passion and Character' was pu…
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