Hello, this is Jeremy Bowen, the International Editor of BBC News and I'm here because I want

to talk to you about an event I'm doing with Intelligent Squared on the 2nd of November in London

and I'm going to be talking about the more than 30 years that I've spent reporting on major

events in the Middle East with my great friend and colleague over many, many years just in web

and I'm sure we'll talk about a few other things as well, just in and I started at the BBC

on the same day in 1984. So if you'd like to join us either in person or online then visit

IntelligentSquared.com to find out more. Welcome to the Intelligent Squared podcast. I'm producer

Catherine Hughes. In her new book Hags the Demonization of Middle-aged Women, author Victoria Smith

confronts the disdain and vitriol she encountered as a woman entering midlife and she dissects the

ageism and misogyny that have historically plagued older women, shedding light on its resurgence

in recent years. In conversation with Hadley Freeman from the Sunday Times, the examines societal

dismissal of women who dare to exist beyond the compines of youth and desirability, rendering them

seemingly superfluous. Here's Hadley with more. As a fully paid up member of the Kingdom of Haddom,

I'm completely thrilled to be talking to Victoria Smith, author of Hags this evening. Victoria,

I'm sure as many of you out there know, is very accomplished at Brilliant Journalist. She blogs

up to the name Glosswitch and I've been reading her for years and I just completely devoured Hags.

Thank you so much, Victoria, for taking the time to talk to us this evening.

Thank you for having me. Well, first of all, congratulations on the book. I've wondered if we could

start with, I read recently that you are part of a trend. Janice Turner of the Times recently

cited you alongside Kathleen Stock, Mary Harrington, Julie Bindle, Louise Perry, and Helen Joyce

as being at the vanguard of what she calls material feminism, which she defines as a feminism that

asserts the primacy of biological reality on women's lives and obviously citing that in particular

...