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, it's 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 at some level of genius. It also helps

that it's a long time ago, right? It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream

van plays music when it's out of ice cream. Listen to evil genius on BBC sounds. This is a download

from the BBC. For more information and our terms of use, go to BBC.co.uk slash radio three.

When Margaret Atwood embarked on a writing career in Canada in the 1960s, the country produced only a handful of published novelists.

In a career as prolific poet, essayist and author since then, she's established herself not only as

Canada's prime literary export, but as a distinctive voice on a multiplicity of contemporary

ethical dilemmas. Her 1985 novel The Handmaid's Tale, set in a theocratic dictatorship

with feminism consigned to history, made the bestseller lists

worldwide. She's been garlanded with international prizes, including the Booker Prize in 2000

for the Blind Assassin. Atwood's long been inspired by science fiction as a way of combining

imaginative prediction with serious ethical dilemma.

The potential of science and technology for good and evil is a theme she weaves through her latest trilogy,

which begins with Orix and Crake, published in 2003,

continues with the Year of the Flood,

and now complete with the publication of Mad Adam.

The novel is set in a post-apocalypse world and it explores what the human condition might be like after the fundamentals of existence

have been distorted by Faustian biotechnologists. Mad Adam focuses on Toby, a female survivor of

the maelstrom,

who teaches the Crakers, a bioengineered new species,

the power of the story, and with it recorded memory.

Created by Crake, the bioengineer readers met in the first volume of the trilogy, the Crakers are the otherworldly product of noble aspirations,

...