In Our Time

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss one of the most energetic, varied and innovative playwrights of his time. Thomas Middleton (1580-1627) worked across the London stages both alone and with others from Dekker and Rowley to Shakespeare and more. Middleton’s range included raucous city comedies such as A Chaste Maid in Cheapside and chilling revenge tragedies like The Changeling and The Revenger’s Tragedy, some with the main adult companies and some with child actors playing the scheming adults. Middleton seemed to be everywhere on the Jacobean stage, mixing warmth and cruelty amid laughter and horror, and even Macbeth’s witches may be substantially his work. With Emma Smith Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Hertford College, University of Oxford Lucy Munro Professor of Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature at Kings College London And Michelle O’Callaghan Professor of Early Modern Literature at the University of Reading Producer: Simon Tillotson Reading list: Swapan Chakravorty, Society and Politics in the Plays of Thomas Middleton (Clarendon Press, 1996) Suzanne Gossett (ed.), Thomas Middleton in Context (Cambridge University Press, 2011) R.V. Holdsworth (ed.), Three Jacobean Revenge Tragedies: A Selection of Critical Essays (Macmillan, 1990), especially ‘Calvinist Psychology in Middleton’s Tragedies’ by John Stachniewski Mark Hutchings and A. A. Bromham, Middleton and His Collaborators (Northcote House, 2007) Gordon McMullan and Kelly Stage (eds.), The Changeling: The State of Play (The Arden Shakespeare, 2022) Lucy Munro, Shakespeare in the Theatre: The King's Men (The Arden Shakespeare, 2020) David Nicol, Middleton & Rowley: Forms of Collaboration in the Jacobean Playhouse (University of Toronto Press, 2012) Michelle O’Callaghan, Thomas Middleton: Renaissance Dramatist (Edinburgh University Press, 2009) Gary Taylor and Trish Thomas Henley (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Thomas Middleton (Oxford University Press, 2012) In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio Production

Melvyn Bragg and guests explore the history and reputation of the Persian ruler Cyrus the Great. Cyrus the Second of Persia as he was known then was born in the sixth century BCE in Persis which is now in Iran. He was the founder of the first Persian Empire, the largest empire at that point in history, spanning more than two million square miles. His story was told by the Greek historians Herodotus and Xenophon, and in the Hebrew bible he is praised for freeing the Jewish captives in Babylon. But the historical facts are intertwined with fiction. Cyrus proclaimed himself ‘king of the four corners of the world’ in the famous Cyrus Cylinder, one of the most admired objects in the British Museum. It’s been called by some the first bill of human rights, but that’s a label which has been disputed by most scholars today. With Mateen Arghandehpour, a researcher for the Invisible East Project at Oxford University, Lindsay Allen, Senior Lecturer in Ancient Greek and Near Eastern History at King’s College London, And Lynette Mitchell, Professor Emerita in Classics and Ancient History at Exeter University. Producer: Eliane Glaser Reading list: Pierre Briant (trans. Peter T. Daniels), From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire (Eisenbrauns, 2002) John Curtis and Nigel Tallis (eds.), Forgotten Empire: The World of Ancient Persia (The British Museum Press, 2005) Irving Finkel (ed.), The Cyrus Cylinder: The King of Persia’s Proclamation from Ancient Babylon (I.B.Tauris, 2013) Lisbeth Fried, ‘Cyrus the Messiah? The Historical Background to Isaiah 45:1’ (Harvard Theological Review 95, 2002) M. Kozuh, W.F. Henkelman, C.E. Jones and C. Woods (eds.), Extraction and Control: Studies in Honour of Matthew W. Stolper (Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 2014), especially the chapter ‘Cyrus the Great, exiles and foreign gods: A comparison of Assyrian and Persian policies in subject nations’ by R. J. van der Spek Lynette Mitchell, Cyrus the Great: A Biography of Kingship (Routledge, 2023) Michael Roaf, Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East (Facts On File, 1990) Vesta Sarkosh Curtis and Sarah Stewart (eds.), Birth of the Persian Empire (I.B.Tauris, 2005), especially the chapter ‘Cyrus the Great and the kingdom of Anshan’ by D.T. Potts Matt Waters, King of the World: The Life of Cyrus the Great (Oxford University Press, 2022) In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio production

Since plants have to mate and produce offspring while rooted to the spot, they have to be pollinated – by wind, water, or animals – most commonly insects. They use a surprising array of tricks to attract pollinators: striking colours, iridescent light effects, and enticing scents, to name but a few. Insects, on the other hand, do not seek to pollinate plants – they are looking for food; so plants make sure it’s worth their while. Insects are also remarkably sophisticated in their ability to find, recognise and find their way inside flowers. So pollination has evolved as a complex dance between plants and pollinators that is essential for life on earth to continue. With Beverley Glover, Director of the Cambridge University Botanic Garden Jane Memmott, Professor of Ecology at the University of Bristol And Lars Chittka, Professor of Sensory and Behavioural Ecology at Queen Mary, University of London. Producer: Eliane Glaser Reading list: Stephen L Buchmann and Gary Paul Nabhan, The Forgotten Pollinators (Island Press, 1997) Lars Chittka, The Mind of a Bee (Princeton University Press, 2023) Steven Falk, Field Guide to the Bees of Britain and Ireland (British Wildlife Publishing, 2015) Francis S. Gilbert (illustrated by Steven J. Falk), Hoverflies: Naturalists' Handbooks vol. 5 (Pelagic Publishing, 2015) Dave Goulson, A Sting in the Tale: My Adventures with Bumblebees (Vintage, 2014) Edwige Moyroud and Beverley J. Glover, ‘The evolution of diverse floral morphologies’ (Current Biology vol 11, 2017) Jeff Ollerton, Birds and Flowers: An Intimate 50 Million Year Relationship (Pelagic Publishing, 2024) Alan E. Stubbs and Steven J. Falk, British Hoverflies (‎British Entomological & Natural History Society, 2002) Timothy Walker, Pollination: The Enduring Relationship Between Plant and Pollinator (Princeton University Press, 2020) In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio Production

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Hindu goddess Kali, often depicted as dark blue, fierce, defiant, revelling in her power, and holding in her four or more arms a curved sword and a severed head with a cup underneath to catch the blood. She may have her tongue out, to catch more blood spurting from her enemies, be wearing a garland of more severed heads and a skirt of severed hands and yet she is also a nurturing mother figure, known in West Bengal as ‘Maa Kali’ and she can be fiercely protective. Sometimes she is shown as young and conventionally beautiful and at other times as old, emaciated and hungry, so defying any narrow definition. With Bihani Sarkar Senior Lecturer in Comparative Non-Western Thought at Lancaster University Julius Lipner Professor Emeritus of Hinduism and the Comparative Study of Religion at the University of Cambridge And Jessica Frazier Lecturer in the Study of Religion at the University of Oxford and fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies During this discussion, Julius Lipner reads a translation of a poem by Kamalakanta (c.1769–1821) "Is my black Mother Syama really black?" This translation is by Rachel Fell McDermott and can be found in her book Singing to the Goddess, Poems to Kali and Uma from Bengal (Oxford University Press, 2001) Producer: Simon Tillotson Reading list: Mandakranta Bose (ed.), The Goddess (Oxford University Press, 2018) John S. Hawley and Donna M. Wulff (eds.), Devi: Goddesses of India (University of California Press, 1996) Knut A. Jacobsen (ed.), Brill's Encyclopedia of Hinduism, vol 1 (Brill, 2025) David Kinsley, Hindu Goddesses: Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Tradition (University of California Press, 1986), especially chapter 8 Rachel Fell McDermott and Jeffrey J. Kripal (eds.), Encountering Kālī in the margins, at the center, in the west (University of California Press, 2003) In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio Production

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the renowned and versatile Irish writer Oliver Goldsmith (1728 - 1774). There is a memorial to him in Westminster Abbey’s Poet’s Corner written by Dr Johnson, celebrating Goldsmith's life as a poet, natural philosopher and historian. To this could be added ‘playwright’ and ‘novelist’ and ‘science writer’ and ‘pamphleteer’ and much besides, as Goldsmith explored so many different outlets for his talents. While he began on Grub Street in London, the centre for jobbing writers scrambling for paid work, he became a great populariser and compiler of new ideas and knowledge and achieved notable successes with poems such as The Deserted Village, his play She Stoops to Conquer and his short novel The Vicar of Wakefield. With David O’Shaughnessy Professor of Eighteenth-Century Studies at the University of Galway Judith Hawley Professor of Eighteenth-Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London And Michael Griffin Professor of English at the University of Limerick Producer: Simon Tillotson Reading list: Norma Clarke, Brothers of the Quill: Oliver Goldsmith in Grub Street (Harvard University Press, 2016) Leo Damrosch, The Club: Johnson, Boswell, and the Friends Who Shaped an Age (Yale University Press, 2019) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. Aileen Douglas and Ian Campbell Ross), The Vicar of Wakefield: A Tale, Supposed to Be Written by Himself (first published 1766; Cambridge University Press, 2024) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. Arthur Friedman), The Vicar of Wakefield (first published 1766; Oxford University Press, 2008) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. Arthur Friedman), The Collected Works of Oliver Goldsmith, 5 vols (Clarendon Press, 1966) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. Robert L. Mack), Oliver Goldsmith: Everyman’s Poetry, No. 30 (Phoenix, 1997) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. James Ogden), She Stoops to Conquer (first performed 1773; Methuen Drama, 2003) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. James Watt), The Citizen of the World (first published 1762; Cambridge University Press, 2024) Oliver Goldsmith (ed. Nigel Wood), She Stoops to Conquer and Other Comedies (first performed 1773; Oxford University Press, 2007) Michael Griffin and David O’Shaughnessy (eds.), Oliver Goldsmith in Context (Cambridge University Press, 2024) Michael Griffin and David O’Shaughnessy (eds.), The Letters of Oliver Goldsmith (Cambridge University Press, 2018) Roger Lonsdale (ed.), The Poems of Gray, Collins and Goldsmith (Longmans, 1969) In Our Time is a BBC Studios Audio production