A Point of View Podcast
A weekly reflection on a topical issue.
Episodes to download
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Monarch's Message
Boxing Day 2014
David Cannadine reflects on the history of the Queen's Christmas message.
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Art: The Real Thing
Fri 19 Dec 2014
What constitutes real art, as opposed to kitsch or that based on fake emotions and cliche?
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Kitsch
Fri 12 Dec 2014
Why the fear of producing kitsch art has led to a new kind of pre-emptive kitsch.
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Faking It
Fri 5 Dec 2014
Roger Scruton muses on the difference between genuine art and that based on fake emotion.
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Thinking the Unthinkable
Fri 28 Nov 2014
John Gray argues that 'thinking the unthinkable' means exaggerating fashionable beliefs.
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Dostoevsky and Dangerous Ideas
Fri 21 Nov 2014
John Gray points to lessons from the novels of Dostoevsky about the danger of ideas.
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Soylent and the Charm of the Fast Lane
Fri 14 Nov 2014
John Gray explores why human beings crave busy lives.
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Capitalism and the Myth of Social Evolution
Fri 7 Nov 2014
John Gray reflects on why the advance of capitalism is not inevitable.
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Cures for Anxiety
Fri 31 Oct 2014
Adam Gopnik identifies four different types of anxiety that afflict modern people.
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A Lesson from Love Locks
Fri 24 Oct 2014
Adam Gopnik draws a lesson on the nature of love from the eyesore of love locks in Paris.
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The Football Fallacy
Fri 17 Oct 2014
Adam Gopnik explains why the English are better at watching football than at playing it.
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Dying with Dignity
Fri 10 Oct 2014
Adam Gopnick thinks we fail all too often to let people die with dignity.
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Short and Successful
Fri 3 Oct 2014
Adam Gopnik thinks there is a simple reason why short men enjoy stable marriages.
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Keeping Time
Fri 26 Sep 2014
Lisa Jardine reflects on the history of timepieces and the power of clocks and watches.
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Red Dress Sense
Fri 19 Sep 2014
Red may be now fashionable, but in the past it was powerful, reflects Lisa Jardine.
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The Horror of War
Fri 12 Sep 2014
Lisa Jardine says commemorating a war should not mean losing sight of its horror.
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When fiction comes to the historian's rescue
Fri 5 Sep 2014
Lisa Jardine on how fiction can be more useful than fact in helping us understand the past
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Why Orwell Is the Supreme Mediocrity
Fri 29 Aug 2014
Will Self takes on one of the nation's best-loved figures, George Orwell.
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The Affliction of Consumption
Fri 15 Aug 2014
Will Self reflects on the power of modern-day consumption and the effect it has on us.
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The Changing Nature of Utopias
Fri 1 Aug 2014
Will Self reflects on what the changing nature of utopias says about us.
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Is patriotism the last refuge of the scoundrel?
Fri 25 Jul 2014
Will Self reflects on what really lies behind our sense of patriotism.
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Believing in reason is childish
Fri 18 Jul 2014
John Gray argues that the belief in human reason is more 'childish' than religious faith.
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Isis: A modern revolutionary force?
Fri 11 Jul 2014
John Gray argues that the Sunni extremist group Isis is revolutionary, not reactionary.
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To See Ourselves
Fri 4 Jul 2014
AL Kennedy explores the downsides of personal and national introspection.
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Battling the Botnets
Fri 27 Jun 2014
AL Kennedy asks if it is time for us to rethink our devotion to computers.
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If You Haven't Got Anything Nice to Say...
Fri 20 Jun 2014
AL Kennedy argues for a world with less gossip.
