Arts & Ideas Folgen

To mark the 60th anniversary of Ludwig Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations, Rana Mitter is joined by philosophers Rupert Read and Barry Smith, and Wittgenstein’s biographer Ray Monk, to examine his legacy in Western philosophical tradition. Graham Stewart talks about his new book which details the influence and paradoxes of the 1980s. And Aidan Foster-Carter and Shakuntala Banaji discuss the ‘soft’ power that K-Pop and Bollywood have generated for their respective countries.

Fiona Shaw takes to the stage with Samuel Coleridge’s epic The Rime of the Ancient Mariner; she joins Philip Dodd to discuss language, endurance and death. Professors Michael King and Linda Woodhead, and theologian Mark Vernon, explore whether we can make any sense of the idea of ‘spirituality’ without religion. And David Benedict reviews the New Year Blockbuster, Les Misérables.

Matthew Sweet picks over the bones of the Profumo affair with the historian Richard Davenport-Hines, author of a passionate new account of the scandal. There’s also a discussion of Gangster Squad – the latest love letter from Hollywood to the world of rackets, mobsters and molls. And to round things off in real style, Matthew talks to the writer, Michael Frayn, whose 80th birthday is being celebrated with a short series of radio plays including one of his best known works; Copenhagen.