Free Thinking - Writers Writing about Love
Arts & Ideas
BBC
4.2 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 21 April 2017
⏱️ 44 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Anne McElvoy invites three novelists into the studio to discuss Love - the theme of each of their latest novels. A L Kennedy's Serious Sweet examines love in later life, Tahmima Anam explores different aspects ofyoung love in The Bones of Grace and Alain de Botton says no-one lives happy ever after, we should talk a lot more about what comes next - hence the title of his book The Course of Love. Aside from whether Romanticism is plague or blessing, the writers also discuss whether writers themselves make good lovers and the challenge of making life choices in an increasingly mobile and crowded world. A L Kennedy's Serious Sweet is now out in paperback. Tahmima Anam's The Bones of Grace is out in paperback in June. Alain de Botton's The Course of Love is out in paperback in June. Producer: Jacqueline Smith Originally broadcast Thu 5 May 2016.
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. |
| 0:32.0 | Hello, I'm Anne McHawoy. Thanks for downloading this Arts and Ideas podcast from the BBC's |
| 0:37.7 | Free Thinking Team. Three writers, three novels and one theme, love on this edition of |
| 0:44.2 | free thinking. And we'll begin by three ways to fall head over heels in love, as to |
| 0:49.6 | Mima and Nam, Al-Dubotan and A Kennedy, read, in turn, a short extract from their novels, |
| 0:56.3 | the bones of grace, the course of love, and serious sweet. Tamima. |
| 1:02.7 | You turned around and saw that I was crying, and though it was dark, |
| 1:06.5 | I could see from the outline of your face that you were perfectly solemn and registered no alarm. |
| 1:12.5 | You put your palm against the sleeve of my shirt, the warmth of your touch radiating from my arm all the way across my shoulders. |
| 1:20.3 | At your touch, I felt calmed at first, and then, when the music ended and you lifted your hand away, |
| 1:25.8 | I experienced a piercing loneliness, |
| 1:28.7 | the loneliness of being the sole inhabitant of my body. |
| 1:32.7 | He feels certain that he's discovered someone endowed with the most extraordinary combination |
| 1:37.4 | of inner and outer qualities. Intelligence and kindness, humor and beauty, sincerity and courage. |
| 1:44.8 | Someone whom he would miss if she left the room, even though she'd been entirely unknown to him but two hours before. |
| 1:50.9 | Someone whose fingers currently drawing faint lines with a toothpick across the tablecloth. |
| 1:55.9 | He longs to caress and squeeze between his own, someone with whom he wants to have children and spend the rest of his life. |
| 2:03.5 | I will meet you. Fear or no fear, the thought was with her all the way in. I will meet you. It was so |
| 2:15.1 | dangerous with hope that she'd only consider it in little rushes for fear of worrying and pulling it apart. |
| 2:22.9 | For fear of fear and the way that her fear would breed further fear. |
... |
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