Being Human: The Lost Luggage Office, Ghosts and Warrior Poets.

Arts & Ideas

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 599 Ratings

🗓️ 17 November 2017

⏱️ 45 minutes

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Summary

Stories of objects, ghosts and histories lost and found recorded on location in Portsmouth's most haunted house, the site of a sacrifice in Canterbury and at the TfL Lost Luggage Office. Presenter Matthew Sweet meets academics taking part in Being Human which showcases research from universities around the UK.

How can the reflections of a warrior-poet from the distant past and the adventures of an Iron Age tribesman from the far future help us rethink our relationship with a city centre in the Britain of today? Matthew Sweet travels to Canterbury to find out. The Transport for London lost property office is a labyrinthine cornucopia hidden away under the streets of central London. A visit there leads to reflections on our complicated relationships with things in a consumer society dominated by mass-produced goods, and the history of the concept of lost property casts a revealing light on the development of the city as an ordered space. And, some say that Wymering Manor in Portsmouth is one of the most haunted houses in the country. Whether that's true or not, Matthew goes there to examine the ways in which the past of a building intrudes into its present.

Matthew's guests include: Michael Bintley and Sonia Overall in Canterbury Kate Smith and Paul Cowan at the TFL Lost Property Office Karen Fielder and Benjamin Ffrench in Portsmouth

Producer Luke Mulhall.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?
0:23.3	It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music
0:27.0	when it's out of ice cream.
0:28.8	Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.
0:32.1	Thanks for downloading this program from the free thinking team at the BBC.
0:36.6	This is the BBC.
0:42.9	Bromley South, Rochester, Chatham, Sittingbourne,
0:48.3	Canterbury West. That's all very helpful, isn't it?
0:51.3	It's a map of Kent scrolling above the door of this train carriage.
0:55.5	It tells you about all the stops on the way to Canterbury, but it doesn't tell you about the
0:59.6	stories that you're going to find there, the one about the 10th century cannibals, the one about
1:04.7	the English apocalypse. That's the ground that we're covering on tonight's edition of free-thinking.
1:10.0	This month, the Being Human Festival rides again,
1:13.1	with events up and down the country, inspired by the latest academic research.
1:17.1	And where researchers go, I'm always happy to follow, and I think you are too.
1:22.1	In the next 45 minutes, we'll descend three floors below Baker Street Station
1:26.3	and explore a haunted house on the edge of
1:28.8	Portsmouth. But this train is headed for Canterbury, where I have an appointment with two
1:33.8	academics from Canterbury Christchurch University, the Old English scholar Michael Bintley
1:38.7	and Sonia Overall, who specialises a more recent literature. Our meeting point is one of the city's most charged spots.
1:46.2	Dane John Mound, part of a Roman cemetery,
1:49.1	which then became part of a Norman castle,
	...

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