Hi, it's Nicola Cochlin. Young people have been making history for years, but we don't often hear about them. My brand new series on BBC Sounds sets out to put this right. In history's youngest heroes, I'll be revealing the fascinating stories of 12 young people who've played a major role in history and who've helped shape our world. Like Audrey Hepburn, Nelson Mandela, Louis Braille and Lady Jane Grey, history's youngest heroes with me, Nicola Cochlin.

Listen on BBC Sounds.

Hello, I'm Krista Young and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive.

For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

The program was originally broadcast in 2006,

and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Music My castaway this week is an actress. She's one of the great ladies of the British stage and has been at the forefront of her profession since she first appeared at the Royal Court Theatre in London half a century ago.

In those days she was identified with the new wave appearing in plays by writers such as Arnold Wesker and John Osborne.

She went on to make her name in more established roles, winning actress of the year for her performance as Shaw's St. Joan.

And then through her marriage to Lawrence Olivier, became closely associated

with his work at Chichester and the Foundation of the National Theatre. They were married for 28 years.

Since his death in 1989, she's added a career in film to her theatre work. She was nominated

for an Oscar for her performance in Enchanted April, and her latest film, Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont,

will be released later this year.

In it, the eponymous heroine says,

most of my life I have been somebody's daughter,

somebody's wife, and somebody's mother.

I would like to spend the rest of my time here being simply myself.

A line that she might perhaps identify with in real life. She is,

of course, Dame Joan Plowright. Do you identify with Mrs. Palfrey, Joan, do you relish now in your

mid-70s being fully your own person? Yes, I think I do. I don't think all my life has actually

been spent as Mrs. Palfre's was,

...