Free Thinking – Philip Hoare and Elizabeth Jane Burnett on wild swimming. Jake Arnott on Joe Orton
Arts & Ideas
BBC
4.2 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 5 July 2017
⏱️ 45 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Matthew Sweet talks to Philip Hoare about literary history and the ocean. Poet Elizabeth Jane Burnett performs snippets from her collection, Swims. Writer Jake Arnott reassesses the film Prick Up Your Ears as it's re-released in cinemas. Continuing the 'Queer Icon' series, Philip Hoare plumps for Cecil Beaton's image of Stephen Tennant.
Philip Hoare's new book is called RISINGTIDEFALLINGSTAR
Queer Icons is a project to mark the 50th anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in which 50 leading figures choose an LGBTQ artwork that is special to them. You can find more details on the Front Row website on BBC Radio 4 and in the Gay Britannia collection of programmes from radio and television.
The BFI is holding a series of Joe Orton events: Obscentities in Suburbia through August when Prick Up Your Ears is re-released in cinemas along with a Gross Indecency Season focusing on television and film made after the 1968 Act which partially decriminalised homosexuality.
Drama on 3 - a Joe Orton double bill: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08wn0lm
Producer: Craig Templeton Smith
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 |
| 0:21.2 | it. It's a long time ago, right? It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream |
| 0:26.1 | van plays music when it's out of ice cream. Listen to evil genius on BBC sounds. Thanks for downloading |
| 0:33.1 | this program from the free thinking team at the BBC. Well, hello, come on in, the water's lovely. Well, |
| 0:40.4 | lovely in the sense of being inimical to all human life. The sea is utterly indifferent to what |
| 0:46.2 | you feel about it, utterly indifferent to whether you live or die. But there are people like that, |
| 0:52.0 | and they manage to acquire lovers, and so does the sea. |
| 0:55.5 | Two are bobbing around in this studio. |
| 0:57.9 | The poet, Elizabeth Jane Burnett, she swims, she sings, |
| 1:01.4 | and the writer, whale watcher, and master of the front crawl, Philip Haw, |
| 1:05.6 | who will talk to us of dolphins and guano and the lives of the drowned. |
| 1:10.2 | And for an encore, examine the queer space of Cecil Beaton's portrait of the socialite Stephen Tennant. |
| 1:17.1 | Not the only queer space will examine on this programme. |
| 1:20.3 | Let's add the Criterion Theatre to that list. |
| 1:23.3 | And the Gents Labs on Islington Green and number 23, Noel Road, London, N-1. |
| 1:31.6 | Joe! |
| 1:33.6 | Joe! |
| 1:38.0 | That was Paul McCartney. |
| 1:44.3 | Was it? Oh, Kenneth, you are going to have some memories. |
| 1:49.3 | Alfred Molina as Kenneth Halliwell and Janet Dale as the landlady of 23 Noel Road. |
| 1:55.0 | In the 1987, Joe Orton biopic, prick up your ears. |
| 1:58.8 | Trolling back into the cinemas this summer. The novelist |
... |
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