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Going Dark, Disaster, Russell Banks, Bel Ami

Anne McElvoy meets author Russell Banks, who discusses his new novel Lost Memory of Skin.

Susannah Clapp reviews a new play Going Dark running at the Young Vic Theatre. The Sound and Fury Theatre Company are using immersive sound and total darkness to bring theatre goers the wonder of the cosmos. Previous productions from this company include the acclaimed Kursk which centred on the sinking of the Russian submarine of that name in 2000 and was a worldwide hit.

One year on from the perfect storm of earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown at Fukushima in Japan Anne McElvoy asks whether attitudes to natural disaster in Japan have changed and whether the battle against nature that human beings have always waged is itself changing. Does the onward march of modernity continue to mean the erasing of traditional knowledge and the re-learning of old hard lessons? Martin Dusinberre, Christopher Gerteis and Geoff Brumfiel discuss disaster.

Russell Banks, a twice Pulitzer finalist, discusses his latest book, The Lost Memory of Skin, in which he explores the specific plight of a young sexual offender, an online pornography addict, yet a virgin. He tells Anne why he thinks it is important to try and find humanity in people who are feared and despised.

Nick Ormerod and Declan Donnellan, founders of the Cheek by Jowl theatre company, make their film directing debut with Bel Ami, an adaptation of the 1885 novel by Guy de Maupassant. With luminous Hollywood stars Robert Pattinson, Uma Thurman, and Kristin Scott Thomas taking part in the dark story of a penniless ex-soldier's rise to power in Belle Epoque Paris - will Night Waves give a friendly review to Bel Ami? Ginette Vincendeau, Professor of Film Studies at King's College London discusses the film and the novel.

Available now

45 minutes

Broadcast

  • Thu 8 Mar 2012 22:00

Free Thinking

Free Thinking

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