Podcasts about Somerset Maugham Award

Nell Stevens writes memoir and fiction. Her debut novel, Briefly, a Delicious Life was longlisted for the 2023 Dylan Thomas Award. She is also the author of Bleaker House and Mrs Gaskell & Me, which won the 2019 Somerset Maugham Award. She was shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award in 2018. Her writing is published in The New Yorker, the New York Times, Vogue, The Paris Review, New York Review of Books, Guardian, Granta and elsewhere. Nell is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Warwick. On this episode of Little Atoms she talks to Neil Denny about her latest novel The Original. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Turning Points, Patricia Killeen speaks with husband-and-wife team Jonathan Ruppin and Emma Claire Sweeney, who run the Ruppin Agency Writers' Studio. Their retreats in Paris (https://www.ruppinagency.com/paris/) and North Wales, along with their mentoring programmes, have become sought-after experiences for writers. Their upcoming Paris retreat (18–23 May), hosted by the Véranda Association Culturelle, will take place in a stunning house in the 15th arrondissement, often featured in architectural publications. Emma Claire Sweeney is an award-winning author and senior lecturer at the Open University. Her novel Owl Song at Dawn was named Nudge Book of the Year    (literary category), and her co-authored biography A Secret Sisterhood received praise from Margaret Atwood for its contributions to literary history. Emma's work has appeared in The Paris Review, TIME, and The Washington Post, and she has won the Society of Authors, Arts Council England, and the Royal Literary Fund awards. Jonathan Ruppin is an editor and former literary agent with over 30 years of industry experience. He led the Ruppin Agency from 2016 to 2024, where every novel sold was award-nominated, with wins including the Portico Prize and the Somerset Maugham Award. He has collaborated with English PEN, the Booker Prize Foundation, and New Books in German, and served as a judge for the Costa Novel Award, Guardian First Book Award, and the RNA Awards. Check out Emma and Jonathan's site: ruppinagency.com or contact Emma and Jonathan by email at studio@ruppinagency.com to book a retreat or for literary mentoring.

Isabelle Baafi, winner of the Somerset Maugham Award for her pamphlet Ripe, constructs her debut collection Chaotic Good (Faber) around the story of an escape from a toxic marriage. ‘Chaotic Good is a debut of amazing endurance,' writes poet Will Harris. ‘Its formal pressures create a kind of kaleidoscopic intensity that – with each turn of the chamber – brings newly beautiful and painful shapes into focus.'Isabelle Baafi read from her work in the company of Lavinia Greenlaw, whose most recent book is the essay collection The Vast Extent.Find more events a the Bookshop: https://lrb.me/eventspod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today's poem is a roller-coaster of machismo and vulnerability in that most singular of places–the poetry section of a small bookstore. Happy reading.Kingsley Amis (1922–1995) was a popular and prolific British novelist, poet, satirist, and critic. Born in suburban South London, the only child of a clerk in the office of the mustard-maker Colman's, he won an English scholarship to St John's College, Oxford, where he began a lifelong friendship with fellow student Philip Larkin. Following service in the British Army's Royal Corps of Signals during World War II, he completed his degree and joined the faculty at the University College of Swansea in Wales. Lucky Jim, his first novel, appeared in 1954 to great acclaim and won a Somerset Maugham Award. Ultimately he published twenty-four novels, including science fiction and a James Bond sequel; more than a dozen collections of poetry, short stories, and literary criticism; restaurant reviews and three books about drinking; political pamphlets and a memoir; and more. Amis received the Booker Prize for his novel The Old Devils in 1986 and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1990.-bio via NYRB This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Daisy Hildyard reads her story “Revision,” from the December 23, 2024, issue of the magazine. Hildyard, a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and of one of the National Book Foundation's “5 Under 35” awards, is the author of the novels “Emergency” and “Hunters in the Snow,” and of a nonfiction book, “The Second Body.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

In this episode of The Writing Life podcast, NCW Chief Executive Peggy Hughes is joined by author Jon McGregor to discuss researching for fiction. Jon McGregor is an award-winning author and short story writer. He has been nominated for the Booker Prize for three of his novels, including his 2002 debut If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things, which also went on to win the Betty Trask Prize and the Somerset Maugham Award. His third novel, Even the Dogs (2010) earned McGregor the International Dublin Literary Award in 2012, whilst his 2017 work Reservoir 13 scooped up the Costa Book Award. His latest book Learn Fall Stand was a Waterstones Fiction Book of the Month. Together, they discuss his book Lean Fall Stand, which was inspired by his travels to Antarctica in 2004. They also touch on the challenge of writing complicated characters and storylines, how to turn real-world experience into fiction, and the importance of risk taking in writing.

Raymond Antrobus joins Kevin Young to read “A Protactile Version of ‘Tintern Abbey,' ” by John Lee Clark, and his own poem “Signs, Music.” Antrobus has received the Rathbones Folio Prize, the Ted Hughes Award from the Poetry Society, the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award, and a Somerset Maugham Award, among other honors. 

Deirdre Madden (winner of a 2024 Windham Campbell Prize for Fiction) joins Michael Kelleher to talk about Marilynne Robinson's classic novel Housekeeping, siblings, writing with a density of language, and the unacknowledged humor present even in hard times. Reading list:  Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson • Moby-Dick by Herman Melville • Carl Jung • William Shakespeare • Reading Genesis by Marilynne Robinson For a full episode transcript, click here. Deirdre Madden is a writer from Toomebridge, County Antrim, Northern Ireland. The author of eight acclaimed novels, she has twice been a finalist for the Women's Prize for Fiction (2009, 1996) and has received numerous other awards and honors, including the Hennessy Literary Awards Hall of Fame (2014), the Somerset Maugham Award (1989), and the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature (1980). Madden holds a BA from Trinity College, Dublin and an MA from the University of East Anglia. She has been a member of Aosdána, the affiliation of creative artists in Ireland, since 1997, and is currently an Associate Professor of Creative Writing and Co-Director of the M.Phil in Creative Writing at Trinity College, Dublin. The Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast is a program of The Windham-Campbell Prizes, which are administered by Yale University Library's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

In this episode, we speak to novelist and short story writer Helen Oyeyemi about her most recent novel, Parasol Against the Axe. We discuss the use of non-linearity when attempting to write about a complex city like Prague. We chat about the city as a dissociative state, and the relationship to surrealism and conflicting histories. We speak about the intimate relationship between reading, writing and desire, and the way that books can reveal details about the reader, as well as the author. We explore the book as a living object which shifts across time and space, and the use of play and perplexity across Oyeyemi's work. We discuss what it means to resist master narratives and embrace slippery, shapeshifting narrators, subverting the reader's expectations. We examine a hunger for novels which require the reader to work, and what it means to be actively involved in the process of meaning-making. Helen Oyeyeymi is the author of The Icarus Girl, The Opposite House, White is for Witching (which won a Somerset Maugham Award), Mr Fox, Boy, Snow, Bird, Gingerbread, What Is Not Yours Is Yours, and Peaces, which was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize. In 2013, Helen was included in Granta's Best Young British Novelists. References Parasol Against the Axe by Helen Oyeyemi Peaces by Helen Oyeyemi What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours by Helen Oyeyeymi Gingerbread by Helen Oyeyemi Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyeymi Mr Fox by Helen Oyeyeymi White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi The Opposite House by Helen Oyeyeymi The Icarus Girl by Helen Oyeyemi De Profundis by Oscar Wilde Prague Tales by Jan Neruda

Zapraszam na rozmowę z Timothym Gartonem Ashem, brytyjskim historykiem, profesorem Uniwersytetu w Oksfordzie, znawcą Europy Środkowo-wschodniej, zwłaszcza najnowszej historii Polski i Niemiec. Mój gość jest uznany za jednego z najbardziej wpływowych ekspertów od tematyki środkowoeuropejskiej na świecie i laureatem licznych nagród, m.in. Somerset Maugham Award z 1984 za The Polish Revolution: Solidarity, 1980–82, a także ostatnio Lionel Gelber Prize za Homelands. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/historia-jakiejnieznacie/message

Adam Thirwell is an award-winning novelist and screenwriter. Among his best-known books are Lurid & Cute, Politics, Multiples and Kapow!.His latest novel is The Future Future, which Salman Rushdie described as "A dazzling performance, unlike anything else you'll read this (or any other) year". He has twice been selected as one of Granta's Best of Young British Novelists, received a Somerset Maugham Award in 2008, and was a recipient of the EM Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2015. He wrote and directed Utopia, a short film starring Lily Cole and Lily McMenamy, for Channel 4; and wrote another short film, Everyday Performance Artists – featuring Shia LaBeouf, Gemma Chan and James Norton, and directed by Polly Stenham – which was broadcast on Channel 4 in 2016. His essays appear regularly in the New York Review of Books. He is Advisory Editor at the Paris Review, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. http://www.adamthirlwell.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit theclusterftheory.substack.com

In this episode, we chat to Andrew McMillan about his novel, Pity. We discuss intersections of masculinity, sexuality and class and the way the body might hold these ideas within fiction and poetry. We think about the ways in which the form of the novel can hold multiple truths and stories, and how this links to post-industrial identities. We explore the dangers of describing post-industrial towns by their lack or an absence, and consider what it would take to find new definitions of community. We chat about the need for more northern stories, and the idea that everyone's village, town or city is worthy of literature. We think about finding a new language to discuss the past, which honours its legacies and yet allows us to define ourselves on new terms, in order to move forwards. Andrew McMillan's debut collection physical was the only ever poetry collection to win The Guardian First Book Award. The collection also won the Fenton Aldeburgh First Collection Prize, a Somerset Maugham Award (2016), an Eric Gregory Award (2016) and a Northern Writers' award (2014). It was shortlisted the Dylan Thomas Prize, the Costa Poetry Award, The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year 2016, the Forward Prize for Best First Collection, the Roehampton Poetry Prize and the Polari First Book Prize. It was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation for Autumn 2015. In 2019 it was voted as one of the top 25 poetry books of the past 25 years by the Booksellers Association. His second collection, playtime, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2018; it was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation for Autumn 2018, a Poetry Book of the Month in both The Observer and The Telegraph, a Poetry Book of the Year in The Sunday Times and won the inaugural Polari Prize. His third collection, pandemonium, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2021, and 100 Queer Poems, the acclaimed anthology he edited with Mary Jean Chan, was published by Vintage in 2022. Physical has been translated into French, Galician and Norwegian editions, with double-editions of physical & playtime published in Slovak and German in 2022. He is Professor of Contemporary Writing at the Manchester Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University and is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His debut novel, Pity, was published by Canongate in 2024. ​ References Pity by Andrew McMillan Pandemonium by Andrew McMillan Playtime by Andrew McMillan Physical by Andrew McMillan As always, visit Storysmith for 10% discount on Andrew's work.

Elizabeth Jennings (1926-2001) was born in Boston, Lincolnshire but moved to Oxford at the age of six where she lived for the rest of her life. She studied at St. Anne's College, Oxford and worked in advertising, at the City Library and briefly in publishing before becoming a full-time writer. Her consistent devotion to poetry yielded over twenty books during her life, a New Collected Poems appearing in 2002. Although initially linked to the group of poets including Kingsley Amis, Philip Larkin and Thom Gunn known as ‘The Movement', Jennings' work doesn't share their irony or academic wit. However, the unassuming technical craft of her poetry and its emotional restraint are qualities that were praised by the poets and critics of the period and continued to be abiding characteristics of her work. An important theme is her Catholicism and many of her poems have a devotional aspect. Her intense musing on spirituality encouraged a sensitivity towards others, evident in the pained tenderness of some of her poems. Jennings' sincere and scrupulous work gradually built both critical acclaim that weathered changes in poetic fashion, and a genuine popularity. Amongst the many honours awarded her work are the W.H. Smith Literary Award, the Somerset Maugham Award and a CBE. Although consistent in its tone and concerns, her poetry continued to develop and mature – later work demonstrating a more flexible approach to form whilst retaining her clarity.-bio via Poetry Archive (where you can also hear Jennings reading her own poem) Get full access to The Daily Poem Podcast at dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

Simon and Rachel speak with the novelist and biographer Nicholas Shakespeare. He began his career as a journalist, working for the Times and the Telegraph, before turning to book-writing in the 1980s. His debut novel, "The Vision of Elena Silves" (1989), won the Somerset Maugham Award; "The Dancer Upstairs" was named the best novel of 1995 by the American Libraries Association and a film adaptation was directed by John Malkovich. "The High Flyer" (1993) and "Snowleg" (2004) were both longlisted for the Booker Prize. His non-fiction work includes an acclaimed biography of the English travel writer Bruce Chatwin. We spoke to Nicholas about his early life and living all over the world, combining novels and non-fiction, and his new biography of James Bond creator Ian Fleming.  “Always Take Notes: Advice From Some Of The World's Greatest Writers” - a book drawing on our podcast interviews - is published by Ithaka Press. You can order it via ⁠⁠⁠⁠Amazon⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠Bookshop.org⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠Hatchards⁠⁠⁠⁠ or ⁠⁠⁠⁠Waterstones⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can find us online at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠alwaystakenotes.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, on Twitter @takenotesalways and on Instagram @alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠patreon.com/alwaystakenotes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Artemis Irvine. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

5x15 and The Writers' Prize present a powerhouse line-up of international writing talent to speak with host, literary critic, and journalist Alex Clark about their recent works, all in contention for this year's Prize. Paul Murray, The Bee Sting Paul Murray, born in Dublin in 1975, authored An Evening of Long Goodbyes, Skippy Dies, The Mark and the Void, and The Bee Sting. An Evening of Long Goodbyes was shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award. Skippy Dies was shortlisted for the Costa Novel award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and longlisted for the Booker Prize. The Mark and the Void won the Everyman Wodehouse Prize 2016. The Bee Sting was shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2023. Paul Murray lives in Dublin. Zadie Smith, The Fraud Zadie Smith, born in northwest London, authored White Teeth, The Autograph Man, On Beauty, NW, Swing Time, The Embassy of Cambodia, and collections of essays and short stories. The Fraud is her first historical novel. Laura Cumming, Thunderclap Laura Cumming has been the art critic of the Observer since 1999. The Vanishing Man was longlisted for the Baillie-Gifford Prize, shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize, and won the 2017 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography. On Chapel Sands was shortlisted for several prizes. Naomi Klein, Doppelganger Naomi Klein authored international bestsellers including This Changes Everything, The Shock Doctrine, No Logo, No Is Not Enough, and On Fire. She is an associate professor at the University of British Columbia and has launched a regular column for The Guardian. Liz Berry, The Home Child Liz Berry, an award-winning poet, authored collections including Black Country, The Republic of Motherhood, The Dereliction, and The Home Child, a novel in verse. Liz has received the Somerset Maugham Award and Forward Prizes. Mark O'Connell, A Thread of Violence Mark O'Connell authored A Thread of Violence, Notes from an Apocalypse, and To Be a Machine, awarded the Wellcome Book Prize and the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature. His work appears in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Slate, and The Guardian. Jason Allen-Paisant, Self-Portrait as Othello Jason Allen-Paisant is a Jamaican writer and academic at the University of Manchester. He's the author of Thinking with Trees, winner of the OCM Bocas Prize, and Self-Portrait as Othello. His non-fiction book, Scanning the Bush, will be published in 2024. Our Host Alex Clark, a seasoned critic and broadcaster, chairs the discussion. Winners will be announced on March 13th, 2024.

The latest book from critically acclaimed writer Helen Oyeyemi, Parasol Against the Axe, is a novel set among the city of Prague's streets. It's often said that a city can feel like a character in a book but in a skilled feat of unconventional storytelling, Oyeyemi's tale uses the city as the literal narrator of its story. That  plot involves a lost weekend set around a hen party and some surreal storytelling to make outlandish ideas come alive, while also focusing in on themes such as love and addiction. Oyeyemi's previous novels and short stories have won awards including the Somerset Maugham Award for her book White is for Witching, and she's been shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize, too. Joining her in conversation for this episode is the journalist and podcaster Ruchira Sharma, host of the podcasts Everything is Content and Anatomy of a Stalker. If you'd like to get access to all of our longer form interviews and members-only content, just visit intelligencesquared.com/membership to find out more. For £4.99 per month you'll also receive: - Full-length and ad-free Intelligence Squared episodes, wherever you get your podcasts - Bonus Intelligence Squared podcasts, curated feeds and members exclusive series - 15% discount on livestreams and in-person tickets for all Intelligence Squared events - Our member-only newsletter The Monthly Read, sent straight to your inbox ... Or Subscribe on Apple for £4.99: - Full-length and ad-free Intelligence Squared podcasts - Bonus Intelligence Squared podcasts, curated feeds and members exclusive series ... Already a subscriber? Thank you for supporting our mission to foster honest debate and compelling conversations! Visit intelligencesquared.com to explore all your benefits including ad-free podcasts, exclusive bonus content, early access and much more. ... Subscribe to our newsletter here to hear about our latest events, discounts and what's coming up. https://www.intelligencesquared.com/newsletter-signup/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On this episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast, Ryan talks with English author Adam Nicolson on greek mythology, real meaning of the oceans, travel, the grand question about philosophy, that what really matters more? to understand the higher things above you, or the material actualities, along with his new book How To Be: Life Lessons from the Early Greeks Adam is an English author who has written about history, landscape, great literature and the sea. He is noted for his books Sea Room, God's Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible, The Mighty Dead, and Life between the Tides. He is also the winner of the Somerset Maugham Award, the W. H. Heinemann Award, and the Ondaatje Prize.✉️ Sign up for the Daily Stoic email: https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail

Simon and Rachel and Simon speak with the novelist Adam Thirlwell. The author of four novels - the first of which, "Politics", was published in 2003 when he was 24, and the latest of which is "The Future Future" - Adam's work has been translated into 30 languages. His essays appear in the New York Review of Books and the London Review of Books, and he is an advisory editor of the Paris Review. His awards include a Somerset Maugham Award and the E.M. Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; in 2018 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He has twice been selected - in 2003 and 2013 - by Granta as one of their Best of Young British Novelists. We spoke to Adam about his stellar university career and publishing his first novel in his early twenties, balancing fiction with working for literary magazines, and his latest work, "The Future Future".  “Always Take Notes: Advice From Some Of The World's Greatest Writers” - a book drawing on our podcast interviews - is published by Ithaka Press. You can order it via ⁠⁠⁠⁠Amazon⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠Bookshop.org⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠Hatchards⁠⁠⁠⁠ or ⁠⁠⁠⁠Waterstones⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can find us online at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠alwaystakenotes.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, on Twitter @takenotesalways and on Instagram @alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠patreon.com/alwaystakenotes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Artemis Irvine. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Kassia St Clair studied the history of women's dress and the masquerade during the eighteenth century at Bristol and Oxford. She has since written about design and culture for the Economist, House & Garden, TLS, Quartz and New Statesman, and has had a column about colour in Elle Decoration since 2013. Her first book The Secret Lives of Colour was a top-ten bestseller, a Radio 4 Book of the Week and has been translated into over a dozen languages; her second, The Golden Thread, was a Sunday Times Book of the Year and was shortlisted for the Somerset Maugham Award. She lives in London. Her new book,The Race to the Future, tells the incredible true story of a quest against the odds that shaped the world we live in today. With thanks for your support for 5x15 online! Learn more about 5x15 events: 5x15stories.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/5x15stories Facebook: www.facebook.com/5x15stories Instagram: www.instagram.com/5x15stories

This episode we're discussing The Possessed, the great, almost-lost novel by Witold Gombrowicz, arguably Poland's greatest modernist writer. The Possessed is a Gothic-infused romp set in the roaring twenties, centred around an uncanny love story between Maja, an upper class tennis player, and her coach Leszczuk, but also featuring a haunted castle, lost treasure, and a mad prince…as every good Gothic novel should.It has been published by Fitzcarraldo in a lively and highly-readable translation by Antonia Lloyd-Jones and with a sharp-witted and insightful introduction by Adam Thirlwell, who join us to discuss it. Buy The Possessed: https://www.shakespeareandcompany.com/books/the-possessed-2*Antonia Lloyd-Jones has translated works by many of Poland's leading contemporary novelists and reportage authors, as well as crime fiction, poetry and children's books. Her translation of Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Olga Tokarczuk was shortlisted for the 2019 International Booker Prize.Adam Thirlwell is the author of four novels. His work has been translated into thirty languages, while his awards include a Somerset Maugham Award and the EM Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; in 2018 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.Adam Biles is Literary Director at Shakespeare and Company. His latest novel, Beasts of England, a sequel of sorts to Animal Farm, is available now. Buy a signed copy here: https://www.shakespeareandcompany.com/books/beasts-of-englandListen to Alex Freiman's latest EP, In The Beginning: https://open.spotify.com/album/5iZYPMCUnG7xiCtsFCBlVa?si=h5x3FK1URq6SwH9Kb_SO3w Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Life is too short for s*** books and Graeme Armstrong is a highly celebrated Scottish writer. His teenage years were spent within North Lanarkshire's gang culture. His bestselling debut novel, ‘THE YOUNG TEAM', is inspired by his experiences. We chat about his book and how it came to be. The books we discuss are: The Young TeamTrainspottingAlongside overcoming struggles with drug addiction, alcohol abuse and violence, he read English as an undergraduate at the University of Stirling; where he returned to study a Masters' in Creative Writing. He is currently undertaking a PhD at the University of Strathclyde.It won the Betty Trask Award, the Somerset Maugham Award, and was Scots Book of the Year 2021. It's being adapted for screen by Synchronicity Films. In 2021, Graeme presented ‘SCOTLAND THE RAVE', a BBC documentary exploring Scotland's rave and PCDJ culture, which was subsequently nominated for a BAFTA Scotland and RTS Scotland Award 2022. Most recently, he wrote and presented ‘STREET GANGS', a BBC factual series exploring modern Scottish gang culture, drill music and his own past. In 2023, Graeme was named as one of Granta's ‘Best of Young British Novelists', a once-in-a-decade literary honour.

Set, ostensibly, in revolutionary France, The Future Future follows Celine from young womanhood as she navigates the shifting landscape—which is being transformed as much by new media, new ways of doing business, and the discovery of new territories, as by the various political insurrections. It is a novel about how women survive in a world wrought by male violence, about language—how it shapes us and how we're shaped by it—about friendship, about power, and, perhaps unsurprisingly, given the title: about time.Buy The Future Future: https://www.shakespeareandcompany.com/books/the-future-futureAdam Thirlwell was born in London in 1978. The author of three previous novels, his work has been translated into thirty languages. His essays appear in the New York Review of Books and the London Review of Books, and he is an advisory editor of the Paris Review. His awards include a Somerset Maugham Award and the E. M. Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; in 2018 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He has twice been selected by Granta as one of their Best of Young British Novelists. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Buy Up Late: https://www.shakespeareandcompany.com/books/up-lateReeling in the face of collapsing systems, of politics, identity and the banalities and distortions of modern living, Nick Laird confronts age-old anxieties, questions of aloneness, friendship, the push and pull of daily life. At the book's heart lies the title sequence, a profound meditation on a father's dying, the reverberations of which echo throughout in poems that interrogate inheritance and legacy, illness and justice, accounts of what is lost and what, if anything, can be retrieved. Laird is a poet capable of heading off in any and every direction, where layers of association transport us from a clifftop in County Cork to the library steps in New York's Washington Square, from a face-off between Freud and Michelangelo's Moses to one between the poet and a squirrel in a Kilburn garden. There is conflation and conflagration, rage and fire, neither of which are seen as necessarily destructive. But there is great tenderness, too, a fondness for what grows between the cracks, especially those glimpses into the unadulterated world of childhood, before the knowledge or accumulation of loss, where everything is still at stake and infinite, 'the darkness under the cattle grid'.Nick Laird was born in County Tyrone in 1975. A poet, novelist, screenwriter, critic and former lawyer, his awards include the Betty Trask Prize, the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award and a Guggenheim fellowship. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

EPISODE 1586: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Maggie O'Farrell, author of THE MARRIAGE PORTRAIT, about childhood, art, money and marriage in 16th Century Florence Maggie O'Farrell, FRSOL, is the author of HAMNET, Winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction 2020, and the memoir I AM, I AM, I AM, both Sunday Times no. 1 bestsellers. Her novels include AFTER YOU'D GONE, MY LOVER'S LOVER, THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US, which won a Somerset Maugham Award, THE VANISHING ACT OF ESME LENNOX, THE HAND THAT FIRST HELD MINE, which won the 2010 Costa Novel Award, INSTRUCTIONS FOR A HEATWAVE and THIS MUST BE THE PLACE., and THE MARRIAGE PORTRAIT. She is also the author of two books for children, WHERE SNOW ANGELS GO and THE BOY WHO LOST HIS SPARK. She lives in Edinburgh. Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Writers choose a Black Country scene to reveal something of this strangely hidden region. Poet Liz Berry is taking a nighttime drive to the top of a hill in the Black Country to visit the ghosts of her childhood in Sedgley. Liz's first book of poems, Black Country, a ‘sooty, soaring hymn to her native West Midlands' (Guardian) was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, received a Somerset Maugham Award, the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Award and Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Liz's pamphlet The Republic of Motherhood was a Poetry Book Society Pamphlet Choice and the title poem won the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem. In her latest book, The Home Child, a novel in verse, Liz reimagines the story of her great aunt Eliza Showell, one of the many children forcibly migrated to Canada as part of the British Child Migrant schemes. Producer: Rosie Boulton A Must Try Softer Production A co-funded project between the BBC, The Space and Arts Council England.

Timothy Garton Ash's Homelands: A Personal History of Europe (The Bodley Head - Penguin Books) charts events in recent European history from the end of the Second World War in 1945 to the Brexit referendum of 2016, with personal insights and anecdotes from the memories of the author. Homelands explores “Europe” beyond the borders of the EU, navigating the continent's accomplishments and crises over the past 80 years. As a European expert, and a Briton who feels that Europe is home, Timothy Garton Ash speaks to the IIEA about the personal, as well as the political, effects of Brexit as well as the wider state of play in European politics. Timothy Garton Ash is Professor of European Studies in the University of Oxford, Isaiah Berlin Professorial Fellow at St Antony's College, Oxford, and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is the author of ten books of political writing, most recently Homelands: A Personal History of Europe. Mr Garton Ash also writes a column on international affairs in the Guardian, and is a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books, amongst other journals. Awards he has received for his writing include the Somerset Maugham Award, Prix Européen de l'Essai and George Orwell Prize.

For episode 56 we're joined by Daisy Hildyard, the author of two novels – Emergency (2022) and Hunters in the Snow (2013) – and one work of nonfiction, The Second Body (2017). Daisy's first novel, Hunters in the Snow, received the Somerset Maugham Award and a ‘5 under 35' honorarium at the USA National Book Awards. Her essay The Second Body, a brilliantly lucid account of the dissolving boundaries between all life on earth, was published by Fitzcarraldo Editions in 2017. She lives with her family in North Yorkshire, where she was born. Emergency was published last year by Fitzcarraldo Editions: https://fitzcarraldoeditions.com/books/emergency This episode took us on a ride through shutting out the world during your writing time, having a spouse as your first reader, how notes come together, and the different nudges that fiction and non-fiction give you as a writer. Find us on Twitter: @UnsoundMethods - @JaimieBatchan - @LochlanBloom Jaimie's Instagram is: @jaimie_batchan Or at jaimiebatchan.com and lochlanbloom.com We have a store page on Bookshop, where you can find our books, as well as those of previous guests: https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/unsoundmethods Thanks for listening, please like, subscribe and rate Unsound Methods wherever you get your podcasts. Our website is: https://unsoundmethods.co.uk/

In-depth, frank, and fascinating exploration of contemporary literature's response to current environmental crises, with Scottish writer Martin MacInnes, author of the recently published novel, In Ascension. Martin believes literature is profoundly implicated in the crises, and that it has a responsibility to challenge certain assumptions regarding the human and the non-human; he shares his interest in exploring how the novel might do this. He suggests literature should not be limited to traditional forms and structures but should explore new ways of storytelling, for example by using non-linear narratives or multiple perspectives to explore environmental themes, creating compelling stories that challenge readers' assumptions and encourages them to think critically about their relationship with the living world.Martin MacInnes is a writer of experimental and science fiction novels. He won the Somerset Maugham Award for his debut novel, Infinite Ground (2016. His second novel, Gathering Evidence, was published in 2020 and earned him a place on the Guardian/British Council's list of ten writers shaping the UK's future. His latest novel, In Ascension, which came out recently, is a exploration of some of the deep philosophical questions of our time, delving into the secrets of the ocean and the cosmos, and our relationship with the living world.

Blake Morrison is a poet, novelist and journalist. His non-fiction books include And When Did You Last See Your Father? (1993), which won the J. R. Ackerley Prize and the Esquire/Volvo/Waterstone's Non-Fiction Book Award, As If (1997), about the murder of the toddler James Bulger in Liverpool in 1993, and a memoir of his mother, Things My Mother Never Told Me (2002). His poetry includes the collections Dark Glasses (1984), winner of a Somerset Maugham Award, and Shingle Street (2015). He is a regular literary critic for the Guardian. His new book, Two Sisters, is a heartbreaking memoir about his late sister and half-sister, along with sibling relationships in literature and those of literary figures. 5x15 brings together five outstanding individuals to tell of their lives, passions and inspirations. There are only two rules - no scripts and only 15 minutes each. Learn more about 5x15 events: 5x15stories.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/5x15stories Facebook: www.facebook.com/5x15stories Instagram: www.instagram.com/5x15stories

Simon and Rachel speak with the novelist Ian McEwan, the critically acclaimed author of 17 novels and two short-story collections. His first published work, a collection of short stories, "First Love, Last Rites", won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1976. Ian's novels include "The Child in Time", which won the Whitbread Novel of the Year Award in 1987; "The Cement Garden"; "Enduring Love"; "Amsterdam", which won the Booker Prize in 1998; "Atonement"; "Saturday"; "On Chesil Beach"; "Solar"; "Sweet Tooth"; "The Children Act"; "Nutshell"; and "Machines Like Me", which was a number-one bestseller. "Atonement", "Enduring Love", "The Children Act" and "On Chesil Beach" have all been adapted into films. We spoke to Ian about his experience as the first-ever student on the University of East Anglia creative-writing course, his extraordinary run of success in the 1990s and early 2000s, and about his new novel, "Lessons." You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways and on Instagram @alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is patreon.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Artemis Irvine. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

It can  be unfair to quote a line from a writer's work out of context.  But the words 'Truths are unpopular. Lies are famous' capture the weird maelstrom of social media posturing, fake news, politicians who'll promise whatever it takes to get elected, and over-friendly corporate messaging we're bombarded by today. The lines come from Akeem Balogun's 'Nothing too Serious,'  published at Written Gallery, and written in a different context. But imaginative fiction can show us future possibilities as well as risks. Akeem's debut short story collection, The Storm, won the Somerset Maugham Award and "shows us the often questionable ways that people deal with extreme crisis and how ordinary human relationships can become distorted in severe conditions."I met Akeem three years ago at the Hallam Enterprise Awards where his reading of a piece from The Storm met with a standing ovation, and the small press he co-founded, Okapi Books, secured a £1000 award for 'best pitch' voted by the audience.So I was delighted to interview him and hear about an exciting event he's curated as part of Sheffield's Off The Shelf Festival – Words, Vision and Sound – on 22 October at Event Central, Fargate, Sheffield."Delight" and the joy of immersion in words, music and visuals will underpin the event, Akeem explains in this interview, which also covers the near-future imaginative writing he specialises in, two new, recently published stories about social care and some of Akeem's thoughts on Sheffield as a writing hub.Enjoy the interview and get yourself tickets for Words, Vision and Sound.0 -3:17 introduction3:17 Akeem Balogun interview31:26 Funding and events for entrepreneurs, social entrepreneurs and freelancersFind Akeem at https://www.writtengallery.com/stories/ and get tickets for Words, Vision and Sound here https://offtheshelf.org.uk/event/words-vision-sound/

In conversation with Wesley Stace ''The most psychologically astute writer working today, our era's Jane Austen'' (Esquire), Ian McEwan won the Booker Prize for his novel Amsterdam. His 16 other novels include Atonement, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and later adapted into an acclaimed Oscar-nominated film; The Comfort of Strangers and Black Dogs, both Booker Prize finalists; and Nutshell. McEwan's other work includes two children's books, a work of nonfiction, two plays, five screenplays, and four short story collections, including First Love, Last Rites, winner of the Somerset Maugham Award. His new novel tells the story of a man careening through some of the 20th century's most turbulent events as he searches for answers about his family history. (recorded 9/21/2022)

Lessons, Ian McEwan's new novel, works from an intimate perspective, but on an epic scale. We accompany Roland Baines at different moments of his life—military brat, baby boomer, failed poet, pubescent boarder, single father, lounge pianist for hire—as he lives and relives some of the experiences—both domestic and world-historical—that moulded him. But as the years go by, and Roland's sense of exactly how he was shaped and by whom changes, we readers come to understand how much our own apprehension of the past is tinted by our experience of the present.Buy Lessons here: https://www.shakespeareandcompany.com/product/7495498/mcewan-ian-lessons*SUBSCRIBE NOW FOR BONUS EPISODESLooking for Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses? https://podfollow.com/sandcoulyssesIf you want to spend even more time at Shakespeare and Company, you can now subscribe for regular bonus episodes and early access to Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses.Subscribe on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/sandcoSubscribe on Apple Podcasts here: https://podcasts.apple.com/fr/podcast/shakespeare-and-company-writers-books-and-paris/id1040121937?l=enAll money raised goes to supporting “Friends of Shakespeare and Company” the bookshop's non-profit, created to fund our noncommercial activities—from the upstairs reading library, to the writers-in-residence program, to our charitable collaborations, and our free events.*Ian McEwan is the critically acclaimed author of seventeen novels and two short story collections. His first published work, a collection of short stories, First Love, Last Rites, won the Somerset Maugham Award. His novels include The Child in Time, which won the 1987 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award; The Cement Garden; Enduring Love; Amsterdam, which won the 1998 Booker Prize; Atonement; Saturday; On Chesil Beach; Solar; Sweet Tooth; The Children Act; Nutshell; and Machines Like Me, which was a number-one bestseller. Atonement, Enduring Love, The Children Act and On Chesil Beach have all been adapted for the big screen.Adam Biles is Literary Director at Shakespeare and Company. Buy a signed copy of his novel FEEDING TIME here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/S/9781910296684/feeding-timeListen to Alex Freiman's Play It Gentle here: https://open.spotify.com/album/4gfkDcG32HYlXnBqI0xgQX?si=mf0Vw-kuRS-ai15aL9kLNA&dl_branch=1 Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jenna Clake's debut collection of poetry Fortune Cookie won the Melita Hume prize in 2016, and was published in 2017 by Eyewear. It received an Eric Gregory Award from the Society of Authors in 2018, and was shortlisted for a Somerset Maugham Award in the same year. Her second collection Museum of Ice Cream was published by Bloodaxe in 2021. Her debut novel Disturbance will be published by Trapeze (UK) and Norton (US) in 2023. Follow her on Twitter.This week's Southword poem is 'The Quarry Lake' by Bernadette McCarthy, which appears in issue 41. You can buy single issues, subscribe, or find out how to submit to Southword here.

Nadifa Mohamed in conversation with Tommy Orange, celebrating the release of her new novel "The Fortune Men," published by Alfred Knopf. This event was originally broadcast via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis. You can purchase copies of "The Fortune Men" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/fortune-men/ Nadifa Mohamed was born in 1981 in Hargeisa, Somaliland. At the age of four she moved with her family to London. She is the author of "Black Mamba Boy" and "The Orchard of Lost Souls." She has received both The Betty Trask Award and the Somerset Maugham Award, and in 2013, she was named as one of Granta‘s Best of Young British Novelists. Her work appears regularly in The Guardian and the BBC. A fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she lives in London. Tommy Orange is a novelist and writer from Oakland, California. His first book "There There" was one of the finalists for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize and received the 2019 American Book Award. Orange is a citizen of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma. He attended Institute of American Indian Arts and earned the Masters in Fine Arts. He was born and raised in Oakland, California, and makes his home in Angels Camp, California. This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

James Dixon is a London-born, Glasgow-based novelist, poet, and playwright. His debut novel, The Unrivalled Transcendence of Willem J. Gyle (Thistle, 2017) was shortlisted for the 2018 Somerset Maugham Award by the Society of Authors. His debut children's novel, The Billow Maiden,  is published by Guppy publishing.Nikki Gamble caught up with James to talk about The Billow Maiden and writing for children,About The Billow MadenAilsa's mum is ill, not the first time, so they spend the summer with her aunt and uncle. Aunt Bertha, Uncle Nod, and their dog Moxie live on an island off the coast, by a beautiful fishing village surrounded by beaches and clifftops. Ailsa and Moxie spend their whole time there exploring these beaches and cliffs, until one day, they find a hidden cave.Inside the cave, they find Hefring, a strange woman not keen on strangers. Ailsa slowly gets to know who Hefring is. She is a selkie, a mermaid, a billow maiden from ancient myth.However, she is stuck on land and slowly dying. It is up to Ailsa and her new friend Camilla to save her, but there are plenty of obstacles in the way - not least Ailsa's own fears and her mum's illness. The Billow Maiden is a beautifully told tale of friendship, family, healing, and transformation from a stunning new writer for children.

Liz Berry was born in the Black Country which gave her first collection its title. Black Country won a chorus of praise, not to mention a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, a Somerset Maugham Award, the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Award and Forward Prize for Best First Collection. The collection is characterised by poems written in the Black Country dialect. Her recent pamphlet The Republic of Motherhood was a Poetry Book Society Pamphlet choice and was shortlisted for the Michael Marks Award, while its title poem won the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem 2018.  Recorded at the StAnza Poetry Festival in St Andrews, Berry talks about the lack of poetry that tells the truth about the experience of childbirth and rearing, the Black Country accent and pigeons.

It took William Boyd three failed attempts at writing a novel before he hit gold with A Good Man in Africa, which won him both the Whitbread Book Award for a first novel and the Somerset Maugham Award. That was in 1981, and Boyd hasn't stopped to draw breath since. His 16th novel, Trio, has just been published in paperback, and another novel will be published this year. Among his other achievements is bringing James Bond back to life, in the novel Solo–in which the martini-swigging spy undertakes a mission to the fictional country of Zanzarim, then in the midst of a civil war. As it happens, a fictional country on the brink of civil war is the conceit for Scoop, Evelyn Waugh's famous comic novel of war reporters in the field, one of two books that Boyd has chosen for this episode of Shelf Life. The other is Muriel Spark's A Far Cry from Kensington, a gimlet eyed portrait of London's post-war publishing world. 

Thomas Nigel Kneale was a British screenwriter who wrote professionally for more than 50 years, was a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award, and was twice nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best British Screenplay. This year is the 100 anniversary of his birth.Predominantly a writer of thrillers that used science-fiction and horror elements, he was best known for the creation of the character Professor Bernard Quatermass.. Kneale wrote well-received television dramas such as The Year of the Sex Olympics and, the 3rd highest scoring General Witchfinders classic, The Stone Tape in addition to the Quatermass serials. He has been described as "one of the most influential writers of the 20th century", and as "having invented popular TV".Part One: The RoadThe Road is a 1963 British television play by Kneale. It was broadcast as part of the BBC Television anthology drama series First Night. An Australian remake was aired the following year. However, no recordings of the play, renowned as "one of the great missing masterpieces of British television." are known to exist having been tragically wiped by the BBC.So… we listened to the  BBC Radio 4 audio adaptation, written by Toby Hadoke and directed by Charlotte Riches, aired on 27 October 2018. The production starred Mark Gatiss as Gideon Cobb, Adrian Scarborough as Sir Timothy Hassall and Hattie Morahan as Lady Lavinia Hassall.Part Two:  Beasts: BabyBeasts is a 1976 British television series. Written by Nigel Kneale, it is an anthology of six self-contained episodes that feature the recurring theme of bestial horror. The series was made by ATV for the ITV Network.We watch the most infamous of the series, episode 4 titled ‘Baby' Starring Simon ‘Manimal' MacCorkindale as a newlywed whose wife (played by Midsumer Murders Jane Wymark - Daughter of Patrick Wymark as seen in The Witchfinder General)  sees her pregnancy falls foul of ancient witchcraft.$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$ Just in case anyone has too much money and wants to give a bit to us to help with our hosting n stuff. It would be amazing if you fancied sending us some pennies - thank you.https://supporter.acast.com/general-witchfinders $£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£$£ Get bonus content on PatreonSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/general-witchfinders. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Pages 190 - 196 │Lestrygonians, part I│Read by Adam ThirlwellAdam Thirlwell, born in 1978, is a novelist and essayist. His work has been translated into 30 languages. His essays appear in the NYRB and LRB; and he is an Advisory Editor of the Paris Review. His awards include a Somerset Maugham Award and the EM Forster Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; in 2018 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His most recent novel is Lurid & Cute. www.adamthirlwell.com*Looking for our author interview podcast? Listen here: https://podfollow.com/shakespeare-and-companySUBSCRIBE NOW FOR EARLY EPISODES AND BONUS FEATURESAll episodes of our Ulysses podcast are free and available to everyone. However, if you want to be the first to hear the recordings, by subscribing, you can now get early access to recordings of complete sections.Subscribe on Apple Podcasts here: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/channel/shakespeare-and-company/id6442697026Subscribe on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/sandcoIn addition a subscription gets you access to regular bonus episodes of our author interview podcast. All money raised goes to supporting “Friends of Shakespeare and Company” the bookshop's non-profit.*Discover more about Shakespeare and Company here: https://shakespeareandcompany.comBuy the Penguin Classics official partner edition of Ulysses here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/d/9780241552636/ulyssesFind out more about Hay Festival here: https://www.hayfestival.com/homeAdam Biles is Literary Director at Shakespeare and Company. Find out more about him here: https://www.adambiles.netBuy a signed copy of his novel FEEDING TIME here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/S/9781910296684/feeding-timeDr. Lex Paulson is Executive Director of the School of Collective Intelligence at Université Mohammed VI Polytechnique in Morocco.Original music & sound design by Alex Freiman.Hear more from Alex Freiman here: https://open.spotify.com/album/4gfkDcG32HYlXnBqI0xgQX?si=mf0Vw-kuRS-ai15aL9kLNA&dl_branch=1Follow Alex Freiman on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/alex.guitarfreiman/Featuring Flora Hibberd on vocals.Hear more of Flora Hibberd here: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5EFG7rqfVfdyaXiRZbRkpSVisit Flora Hibberd's website: This is my website:florahibberd.com and Instagram https://www.instagram.com/florahibberd/ Music production by Adrien Chicot.Hear more from Adrien Chicot here: https://bbact.lnk.to/utco90/Follow Adrien Chicot on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/adrienchicot/Photo of Adam Thirlwell by Peter Marlow/Magnum Photos See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In conversation with Geoffrey Dyer Tessa Hadley's many ''strange, unsettling-eerily beautiful, discomfiting, stay-up-late-addictive, sometimes hair-raising'' (San Francisco Chronicle) novels about the complexities of family relationships include Clever Girl, Accidents in the Home, The Past, and Everything Will be All Right. Two of her short story collections, Sunstroke and Married Love, were New York Times Notable Books and her fiction regularly appears in The New Yorker. A creative writing professor at England's Bath Spa University and a regular reviewer for the London Review of Books, Hadley has twice been longlisted for the Orange Prize and the Wales Book of the Year. Free Love tells the story of a compliant homemaker's intellectual and sexual awakening in a vibrant 1960s London. Geoffrey Dyer is the author of four novels and numerous works of nonfiction. Writer-in-residence at the University of Southern California, a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, his honors include the National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism, the Somerset Maugham Award, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship. (recorded 2/16/2022)

This week's guest is Booker-shortlisted Nadifa Mohamed discussing The Fortune Men a gripping fictional portrayal of a real miscarriage of justice in 1950s Cardiff.Buy The Fortune Men here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/I/9780241466940/the-fortune-men-shortlisted-for-the-costa-novel-of-the-year-awardBrowse our online store here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/15/online-store/16/bookstore*SUBSCRIBE NOW FOR BONUS FEATURESIf you want to spend even more time at Shakespeare and Company, you can now subscribe for regular bonus episodes including: An initiation into the world of rare book collecting; The chance to expand your reading horizons as our passionate booksellers recommend their favourite titles; Handpicked classic interviews from our archive; And an insight into what makes your favourite writers tick as they answer searching questions from our Café's Proust questionnaire.Subscribe on Spotify here: https://anchor.fm/sandcoSubscribe on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/sandcoSubscribe on Apple Podcasts here: https://podcasts.apple.com/fr/podcast/shakespeare-and-company-writers-books-and-paris/id1040121937?l=enAll money raised goes to supporting “Friends of Shakespeare and Company” the bookshop's non-profit, created to fund our noncommercial activities—from the upstairs reading library, to the writers-in-residence program, to our charitable collaborations, and our free events.*Mahmood Mattan is a fixture in Cardiff's Tiger Bay, 1952, which bustles with Somali and West Indian sailors, Maltese businessmen and Jewish families. He is a father, chancer, some-time petty thief. He is many things, in fact, but he is not a murderer. So when a shopkeeper is brutally killed and all eyes fall on him, Mahmood isn't too worried. It is true that he has been getting into trouble more often since his Welsh wife Laura left him. But Mahmood is secure in his innocence in a country where, he thinks, justice is served. It is only in the run-up to the trial, as the prospect of freedom dwindles, that it will dawn on Mahmood that he is in a terrifying fight for his life - against conspiracy, prejudice and the inhumanity of the state. And, under the shadow of the hangman's noose, he begins to realise that the truth may not be enough to save him.*Nadifa Mohamed was born in Hargeisa, Somaliland, in 1981 and moved to Britain at the age of four. Her first novel, Black Mamba Boy, won the Betty Trask Prize; it was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award, the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, the Dylan Thomas Prize and the PEN Open Book Award. Her second novel, Orchard of Lost Souls, won a Somerset Maugham Award and the Prix Albert Bernard. Nadifa Mohamed was selected for the Granta Best of Young British Novelists in 2013, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. The Fortune Men was shortlisted for the 2021 Booker Prize. Nadifa Mohamed lives in London.Adam Biles is Literary Director at Shakespeare and Company. Buy a signed copy of his novel FEEDING TIME here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/S/9781910296684/feeding-timeListen to Alex Freiman's Play It Gentle here: https://open.spotify.com/album/4gfkDcG32HYlXnBqI0xgQX?si=mf0Vw-kuRS-ai15aL9kLNA&dl_branch=1 Get bonus content on Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Becoming a parent is impossible to prepare for. Jack Underwood describes “feeling that there should have been more paperwork. We signed a form or two and then they just sort of let us take you away. A human child”.  Parenthood changes our relationships, our view of the world, our sense of self. It's rare in the whirlwind of night wakings and nappies, though, that anyone has the time to sit down and think about what exactly it is that's happened to them.  In this episode, Andrew talks to Jack Underwood, a poet, writer and critic, about how and why he writes about fatherhood, his interest in the concept of uncertainty, and the complexities of modern masculinity.  Jack Underwood lives and works in London. As well as being a poet and author, he works as a senior lecturer in creative writing at Goldsmiths University of London. His most recent collection of poetry is A Year in the New Life, which in October 2021 was shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize. Jack Underwood is also the author of Not Even This, a meditation on the theme of uncertainty inspired by his anxieties about becoming a parent. His 2015 debut collection of poetry, Happiness, won the Somerset Maugham Award.  Follow Up Join our Supporters Club to access exclusive behind-the-scenes content, fan requests and the chance to ask Andrew your own questions. Membership starts at just £4.50. Read A Year in the New Life or Not Even This: Poetry, parenthood & living uncertainly or Happiness by Jack Underwood Follow Jack Underwood on Twitter and Instagram @jundermilkwood Get Andrew's advice on creating change in your life and relationships in his book Wake Up and Change Your Life: How to Survive a Crisis and Be Stronger, Wiser and Happier If you're a lover of poetry, you could also listen to Andrew's interview with Brighton poet John McCullough on Seven Ways Poetry Could Make Your Life Richer, Deeper and More Meaningful Andrew offers regular advice on love, marriage and finding meaning in your life via his social channels. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube @andrewgmarshall 

NADIFA MOHAMED was born in 1981 in Hargeisa, Somaliland. At the age of four she moved with her family to London. She is the author of Black Mamba Boy and The Orchard of Lost Souls. She has received both The Betty Trask Award and the Somerset Maugham Award, and in 2013, she was named as one of Granta‘s Best of Young British Novelists. Her work appears regularly in The Guardian and the BBC. A fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she lives in London. Her latest novel is called The Fortune Men. Mahmood Mattan is a fixture in Cardiff's Tiger Bay, 1952, which bustles with Somali and West Indian sailors, Maltese businessmen and Jewish families. He is a father, chancer, petty criminal. He is a smooth-talker with rakish charm and an eye for a good game. He is many things, but he is not a murderer.

In conversation with Rabih Alameddine, National Book Award nominated author of An Unnecessary Woman, The Angel of History, The Hakawati, and most recently, The Wrong End of the Telescope. Somali-British author Nadifa Mohamed is the writer of the renowned novels Black Mamba Boy and The Orchard of Lost Souls. A regular contributor to The Guardian and the BBC, she is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and is a lecturer in creative writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. Mohamed is the recipient of the Somerset Maugham Award, and was named one of Granta's best young British novelists of 2013, and was a part of the 2014 Africa39 list of the most promising writers under the age of 40 from sub-Saharan Africa. A finalist for the 2021 Booker Prize, The Fortune Men is a novel about Mahmood Mattan, a young Somali sailor falsely accused of a violent crime in 1950s Cardiff, Wales. ''Nadifa Mohamed's The Fortune Men is a blues song cut straight from the heart. It tells about the unjust death of an innocent Black man caught up in a corrupt system. Nadifa's masterful evocation of the full life of Mahmood Mattan, the last man executed in Cardiff for a crime he was exonerated for forty years later, is brought alive with subtle artistry and heartbreaking humanity. In one man's life Mohamed captures the multitudes of homelands, dialects, hopes, and prayers of Somalis, Jews, Maltese and West Indians drawn in by the ships that filled Wales' Tiger Bay in the 1950's, all hoping for a future that eludes Mattan.''-Walter Mosley, author of Devil in a Blue Dress (recorded 12/15/2021)

This week we're delighted to share this wonderful, nourishing conversation with novelist, playwright and short story writer Helen Oyeyemi! Helen's debut, The Icarus Girl was called "a masterly first novel" by the New York Times. White is For Witching won a Somerset Maugham Award, while What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours won the PEN Open Book Award. Her latest novel is the eagerly anticipated Peaces. We talked to her about rereading Little Women, Emily Dickinson's jokes, unreliable memoirists and bunking off school to read Ali Smith.BOOKSDaisy Buchanan - InsatiableDaisy Buchanan - CareeringHelen Oyeyemi - PeacesAli Smith - Hotel WorldE Nesbit - Five Children and ItAlbert Camus - PlagueHerman Melville - Moby DickPG Wodehouse - Jeeves & WoosterZdeněk Jirotka - SaturninMrs Beeton - Book of Household ManagementEM Delafield - Diary of a Provincial LadyCharles Reznikoff - TestimonyFélix Fénéon - Novel in Three LinesTessa Dare - When a Scot Ties the KnotKristi Coulter - Nothing Good Can Come From ThisF Scott Fitzgerald - Great GatsbyJD Salinger - Catcher in the RyeEmily Dickinson - LettersLouisa May Alcott - Little WomenMargaret Atwood - TestamentsMargaret Atwood - Handmaid's TaleBenjamin Moser - Susan SontagSigrid Nunez - Sempre SusanSigrid Nunez - What Are You Going ThroughSigrid Nunez - The FriendSusan Sontag - Against InterpretationDiana Vreeland - DVVisit @YBooked on Twitter for the full list See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

  (If you don't see the audio player above, visit http://Strokecast.com/Antarctica) Click here for a machine generated transcript   I don't see many novels that deal with stroke and aphasia. Memoirs, sure, but not novels. That's one of the things that makes Jon McGregor's novel, Lean Fall Stand,* interesting. That, pls the fact that Jon himself is not a stroke survivor. He's someone who has taken an interest in our community an endeavored to learn more. Jon's novel follows the story of Robert, a research scientist in Antarctica. Robert gets caught in a storm , suffers a stroke, and acquires aphasia. The novel chronicles Robert and his wife's adventures as they enter and then adjust to living in stroke world. Jon and I talk about the book, Jon's research, his adventure in Antarctica, writing beyond an author's personal experience, and more. About Jon McGregor Jon McGregor is the winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the Costa Book Award, the Betty Trask Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters E. M. Forster Award, and has been long-listed three times for the Man Booker Prize, most recently for his novel, Reservoir 13. His latest novel, Lean Fall Stand*, is out from Catapult in September 2021. He is professor of creative writing at the University of Nottingham, England, where he edits The Letters Page, a literary journal in letters. Jon's Resources Jon talks a lot about the research he did to understand the experience of stroke and aphasia. He met with therapists. He talked with survivors. He attended support groups. The Stroke Stories podcast is another resource he used to learn about Aphasia and stroke from a survivor's perspective. It's a show that tells stories more as news type pieces rather than in a traditional podcast interview. You can find it in popular podcast apps. A couple years ago, I was lucky enough to be a guest on the show. You can listen to that episode here: Stroke Stories Episode 50 - Bill Monroe The Aphasia Access Conversations podcast is another one Jon found helpful. It's a show focusing on the education, experience, and thoughts of speech therapists who work with folks who have aphasia. For more stroke related podcasts, visit http://Strokecast.com/StrokeRelatedPodcasts. Jon also learned from Sara Scott's YouTube channel. Sarah survived a stroke at age 18, about 12 years ago. Since then she has posted videos recognizing various strokeaversaries. You can watch her progress in dealing with aphasia over the decade and see her recovery over the years. Sarah Scott 10 years living with Aphasia (If you don't see the embedded video, visit http://Strokecast.com/Antarctica) Edwyn Collins is a Scottish musician who made it onto the worldwide charts in the 80s with his post-punk band Orange Juice. He survived a stroke with aphasia in 2005. Jon drew inspiration from the documentary of Edwyn's story, "The Possibilities are Endless" The Possibilities Are Endless (Official Trailer) (If you don't see the embedded video, visit http://Strokecast.com/Antarctica) Jon also learned from the Stroke Odyssey production from Rosetta life: SO Trailer 7 (If you don't see the embedded video, visit http://Strokecast.com/Antarctica) Artists' Residencies Artist residencies are a fascinating thing. In the one Jon talked about, he applied to go to Antarctica. He would be provided transportation, lodging, and access to the work of research scientists. In return, he would, eventually, make a thing. In Seattle a couple years ago, the city offered space in a draw bridge that an artist could have for months to make a thing inspired by the space. The variety of residencies available to artists is kind of amazing. It's an interesting intersection of public relations, marketing, public art, patronage, and other elements. If you feel a desire to create but want space, education, or inspiration, it may be worth exploring the idea of residencies. Writing About Marginalized Communities We discussed the idea of writing about marginalized communities in this interview, specifically about disabled people or people with disabilities.   A lot of the same concerns apply when writing about folks of a different race, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, cultural background, etc. When you write a character who is of a different group, especially if the character is part of a historically marginalized group, the writer has a special obligation to get it right -- to make sure they can write about the character and the character's experiences with honesty, accuracy, and individuality, without reducing them to a series of stereo types. I've read parts of Lean Fall Stand* (Jon's team sent me a copy) and so far, his portrayal seems good. Of course, my experience with aphasia is all second hand. I'd encourage you to check it out and share your thoughts. Become a better writer Jon is a long time novelist and a professor of creative writing. You might expect him to have advanced models and techniques for becoming a better writer and telling better stories. But what is Jon's advice? Read more. Write more. It's that simple. Sure you need to read deliberately and think about the choices a writer makes in the pieces you read. To get better at walking, we need to walk more. To get better at moving our fingers we have to move our fingers more. To get better at speaking, we have to speak more. To get better at writing, we have to write more. More reading and more writing. Hmm. I can get behind that. Hack of the Week Jon talked with as bunch of folks with aphasia and cited two things they did that were helpful. First, the used their phones and tablets to help communicate. It wasn't just about typing out messages or using special apps, though. It was about using other tools for communication. For example, telling the story of travelling to a city by using the maps app. It was about thinking of different ways to share the story without strictly telling the story. Second, a lot of the folks Jon spoke with carried a card that explained they have aphasia and explains what aphasia is. There are still millions of people out in the world who have never heard of aphasia and folks with aphasia still have to deal with them. A simple card can make a big difference. Links (If you don't see the list of links below, try visiting http://Strokecast.com/Antarctica) Where do we go from here? Follow Jon on Instagram and Twitter. Take a look at Lean Fall Stand on Amazon* Share this episode with the book or writing lover in your life by giving them the link http://Strokecast.com/Antarctica Subscribe to the Strokecast newsletter at http://Strokecast.com/News Don't get best…get better.

Hi, and welcome to episode #70!Jon McGregor is the winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the Costa Book Award, the Betty Trask Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters E. M. Forster Award, and has been long-listed three times for the Man Booker Prize, most recently for his novel, Reservoir 13. He is a professor of creative writing at the University of Nottingham, England, where he edits The Letters Page, a literary journal in letters.About Jon's latest novel Lean Fall StandRemember the training: find shelter or make shelter, remain in place, establish contact with other members of the party, keep moving, keep calm.Robert 'Doc' Wright, a veteran of Antarctic surveying, was there on the ice when the worst happened. He holds within him the complete story of that night—but depleted by the disaster, Wright is no longer able to communicate the truth. Instead, in the wake of the catastrophic expedition, he faces the most daunting adventure of his life: learning a whole new way to be in the world. Meanwhile  Anna, his wife, must suddenly scramble to navigate the sharp and unexpected contours of life as a caregiver.From the Booker Prize-longlisted, American Academy of Arts & Letters Award-winning author of Reservoir 13, this is a novel every bit as mesmerizing as its setting. Tenderly unraveling different notions of heroism through the rippling effects of one extraordinary expedition on an ordinary family, Lean, Fall, Stand explores the indomitable human impulse to turn our experiences into stories—even when the words may fail us. Lean Fall Stand, Jon McGregor (signed copies) Jon McGregor Twitter Lean Fall Stand UK book launch at Five Leaves Bookshop A Ghost in the Throat, Doireann Ní Ghríofa  Support the show (https://paypal.me/TheBookshopPodcast?locale.x=en_US)

Rachel and Simon speak with William Boyd, bestselling novelist and prolific screenwriter. William was born in Ghana and grew up there and in Nigeria. His novels include "A Good Man in Africa," "The New Confessions," "Any Human Heart," "Restless" and most recently "Trio." He has won the Somerset Maugham Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the Prix Jean Monnet. Twenty of his screenplays have been filmed, including "The Trench", which he also directed, and he has published five collections of short stories. We spoke to William about starting out as a novelist while working as an academic, his parallel screenwriting career and the experience of writing a James Bond novel. You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is patreon.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Artemis Irvine. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Fiona Mozley is arguably one of Britain's most exciting young writers. The former bookseller catapulted to fame when her debut novel ‘Elmet' was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. It went on to earn plaudits across the board as well as winning the Somerset Maugham Award and the Polari First Book Prize. Her latest novel, ‘Hot Stew', is a fascinating story that examines the difficulties of overdevelopment and gentrification in London through the lens of sex workers in Soho.

In conversation with Nicole Galland, historical novelist and author of Master of the Revels and creator of Shakespeare for the Masses With a ''gift for combining intricate, engrossing plots with full-bodied characterizations'' (Washington Post), Irish–British novelist Maggie O'Farrell is the author of After You'd Gone, The Distance Between Us, The Hand That First Held Mine, and Instructions for a Heatwave, among several others. A former journalist in Hong Kong, deputy literary editor of the Independent on Sunday, and creative writing teacher, she is also a bestselling author. O'Farrell's work has won the Somerset Maugham Award, the Betty Trask Award, the Costa Award, and has been translated into more than 30 languages. Hamnet, winner of the 2020 Women's Prize for Fiction, tells the Elizabethan-era tale of William Shakespeare's family including his force–of–nature wife, Shakespeare's journey as a rising star, and the shared grief over the loss of their son Hamnet whose name Shakespeare would later use in his play Hamlet. Books available through the Joseph Fox Bookshop (recorded 6/3/2021)

Imagination, influence and the invention of infernal desire machines . . . Edmund Gordon, biographer of Angela Carter, guides the Slightly Foxed team through her colourful works and explores the wider realms of magical realism. Witty and wilfully idiosyncratic, Carter conjured sex and death from fairy tales in The Bloody Chamber, used her Somerset Maugham Award money to leave her husband and go to Japan to write, and absorbed the Latin American influences of Jorge Luis Borges and Gabriel García Márquez. We hear how she enlisted the Marquis de Sade as an ally of feminism, embraced pulp genres and opened doors for David Mitchell, China Miéville, Helen Oyeyemi and more, while always attending to the grammar of the folk story. And, to finish, there are the usual wide-ranging recommendations for reading off the beaten track.Please find links to books, articles, and further reading listed below. The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 42 minutes; 50 seconds)Books MentionedWe may be able to get hold of second-hand copies of the out-of-print titles listed below. Please get in touch with Jess in the Slightly Foxed office for more information. The Invention of Angela Carter, Edmund Gordon (2:27) Shadow Dance, Angela Carter (7:40) The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman, Angela Carter (8:46)  Fireworks, Angela Carter (8:51) The Magic Toyshop, Angela Carter (10:08) The Bloody Chamber, Angela Carter (10:27) The Uses of Enchantment, Bruno Bettelheim (11:29)  Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado (13:47)  Nights at the Circus, Angela Carter (16:29) One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez (25:50)  Beloved, Toni Morrison (26:21) Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez (27:24)  Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead, Barbara Comyns (27:37) The Sadeian Woman, Angela Carter (29:50) Shaking A Leg: Collected Journalism and Writings, Angela Carter (31:22) Burning Your Boats: Collected Short Stories, Angela Carter (31:24) A Card from Angela Carter, Susannah Clapp is currently out of print. A reprint is under consideration (36:12) Extinction, Thomas Bernhard (37:06) Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel (38:15)  Kiss Myself Goodbye: The Many Lives of Aunt Munca, Ferdinand Mount (40:20)  Related Slightly Foxed Articles Keeping it Real, Maggie Fergusson interviews the novelist Ali Smith, Issue 54 (9:48) Sophia Fairclough and Me, Sophie Breese on the novels of Barbara Comyns, Issue 42 (27:35) Other Links The Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize (2:30) Keats House, Hampstead, London (33:50) Opening music: Preludio from Violin Partita No.3 in E Major by Bach The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable

Today our guest is Steven Hall, author of The Raw Sharks Texts a seminal and amazing book that was released almost 14 years ago and published in pretty much every language in the world. It won the Somerset Maugham Award and should be a movie soon. Steven has written for Granta and Lonely Planet and build tons of video games. But today we will be talking about Maxwell’s Demon, Steven’s new book which is being released on April 6th in the US by Grove. Thomas Quinn is having a hard time. A failed novelist, he's stuck writing short stories and audio scripts for other people's characters. His wife, Imogen, is working on a remote island halfway around the world, and talking to her over the webcam isn't the same. The bills are piling up, the dirty dishes are stacking in the sink, and the whole world seems to be hurtling towards entropic collapse. Then he gets a voicemail from his father, who has been dead for seven years. Thomas's relationship with Stanley Quinn--a world-famous writer and erstwhile absent father--was always shaky, not least because Stanley always seemed to prefer his enigmatic assistant and prot g Andrew Black to his own son. Yet after Black published his first book, Cupid's Engine, which went on to sell over a million copies, he disappeared completely. Now strange things are happening to Thomas, and he can't help but wonder if Black is tugging at the seams of his world behind the scenes. Absurdly brilliant, wildly entertaining, and utterly mind-bending, Maxwell's Demon triumphantly excavates the ways we construct meaning in a world where chaotic collapse looms closer every day.

Since the publication of her first novel while she was still in her twenties, Nadifa Mohamed has been a writer to watch. Her second novel, The Orchard of Lost Souls, won her the Somerset Maugham Award and gave her a place on the prestigious Granta List of Best Young Novelists. She’s about to publish her third novel, and is also turning it into an opera – a commission from the Royal Opera House. What’s striking in all her work is the epic sweep of her storytelling, which explores themes of exile and survival: her characters are caught up by war and love. Nadifa herself left Somali-land in northern Somalia when civil war broke out and she was only four when she came to Britain in 1985. She talks to Michael Berkeley about her dramatic family history, and about her father, who was a travelling troubadour in Sudan. She pays tribute too to the Somali musician Hudeidi, who died of Covid this last April. He was her teacher on the oud for seven years, and her mentor, and she spent many evenings jamming with him in his west London flat. Her musical choices range from Pergolesi, Purcell and Vaughan Williams to Max Richter, Toumani Diabate and Louis Armstrong. Produced by Elizabeth Burke A Loftus Media production for BBC Radio 3

Jackie Kay is the national poet of Scotland and has taken her Makar duties seriously. She has written a weekly poem during lockdown, brought art into people’s homes with the broadcast Makar to Makar and written about the Black Lives Matter protests. She joins Richard Coles and Bridgitte Tetteh to discuss the timely reissue of her play The Lamplighter which follows five characters who are sold into the British slave trade. Emily Kolltveit was the lead singer of a goth metal band for nearly a decade before she joined the priesthood. Her tour schedule saw her perform in beautiful churches around Europe, awakening an interest in God. Emily has started her new role at a church in Primrose Hill, London where she wants to spread the message of social justice. Personal trainer Ben Mudge has always lived with the threat of a deadly lung infection, having grown up with Cystic Fibrosis. Despite this, he has been the cover model for Men’s Fitness magazine and, because he looks remarkably like the Marvel character Thor, he dresses up to inspire children and other people with Cystic Fibrosis. Writer and performer Amrou Al-Kadhi founded the drag troupe Denim, whilst studying at Cambridge. Amrou recently won the Somerset Maugham Award for young writers for their memoir Life as a Unicorn which describes their transformation from a god-fearing Muslim boy to a drag queen, strutting the stage in seven-inch heels and saying the things nobody else dares to. And we have the Inheritance Tracks of singer and ex-Spandau Ballet frontman Tony Hadley. Producer: Laura Northedge Editor: Eleanor Garland

Amy Sackville was born in 1981. She studied English and Theatre Studies at Leeds, and went on to do an MPhil in English at Exeter College, Oxford, and an MA in Creative & Life Writing at Goldsmiths. Her first novel was The Still Point, which was longlisted for the Orange Prize and won the 2010 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and her second was Orkney, which won a 2014 Somerset Maugham Award. Her latest novel is Painter to the King. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The writing life of two authors who should have been sharing a stage at the Bare Lit Festival. Irenosen Okojie and Nadifa Mohammed talk to Shahidha Bari in a conversation organised with the Royal Society of Literature. And 2020 New Generation Thinker Seren Griffiths describes a project to use music by composer at an archaeological site to mark the summer solstice and the findings of her dig. The Somali-British novelist Nadifa Mohamed featured on Granta magazine's list "Best of Young British Novelists" in 2013, and in 2014 on the Africa39 list of writers under 40. Her first novel Black Mamba Boy won a Betty Trask Award. Her second novel The Orchard of Lost Souls won the Somerset Maugham Award and contributed poems to the collection edited by Margaret Busby in 2019 New Daughters of Africa. Irenosen Okojie's debut novel, Butterfly Fish, won a Betty Trask Award and was shortlisted for the Edinburgh First Book Award. Her short story collection, Speak Gigantular was shortlisted for the Edgehill Short Story Prize, the Jhalak Prize, the Saboteur Awards and nominated for a Shirley Jackson Award. Her most recent book is called Nudibranch. You can find more information about the Bare Lit Festival http://barelitfestival.com/ and about the Royal Society of Literature https://rsliterature.org/ Irenosen is one of the voices talking about Buchi Emecheta in this programme https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09r89gt Caine Prize 2019 winner Lesley Nneka Arimah is interviewed https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0006mtb Caine Prize 2018 winner Makena Onjerika https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b89ssp Billy Kahora a Caine nominee https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02tw6fg The music used by Seren Griffiths is by https://jonhughesmusic.com/ and you can find out about the dig https://bryncellidduarchaeology.wordpress.com/the-bryn-celli-ddu-rock-art-project/ and the minecraft https://mcphh.org/bryn-celli-ddu-minecraft-experience/ New Generation Thinkers is the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select ten academics each year to turn their research into radio. Producer: Robyn Read

Simon speaks with the travel writer Guy Stagg. In 2013 Guy, who had grown up in Paris, Heidelberg, Yorkshire and London, walked from Canterbury to Jerusalem. "The Crossway," an account of this journey, was published by Picador in 2018. The book won an Edward Stanford Travel Award and was shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize, the RSL Ondaatje Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award, and the Deborah Rogers Foundation Award. We spoke to Guy about travel writing in the age of Tripadvisor, his long walk to Jerusalem, and how that experience turned into a book. https://www.guystagg.co.uk/ https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1509844597/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is patreon.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Nicola Kean. Our social media is run by Eoin Redahan. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

The Observer called Rachel Cusk’s Outline trilogy ‘a landmark in twenty-first century English literature, the culmination of an artist’s unshakeable efforts to forge her own path’. The essays in her latest book Coventry explore other writers who forged their own path – among them Natalia Ginzburg, Olivia Manning and D.H. Lawrence – and wider themes political, personal and ethical. The discussion focussed on the themes that she has explored in her impressive body of work to date: the thinking and philosophy that have driven her to these positions, how her thinking is evolving and the new challenges that she is exploring. Cusk was in conversation with Chris Power, author of Mothers (Faber and Faber). Rachel Cusk is the author of the trilogy Outline, Transit, Kudos; the memoirs A Life’s Work, The Last Supper and Aftermath; and several other novels: Saving Agnes (winner of the Whitbread Award), The Temporary, The Country Life (winner of the Somerset Maugham Award), The Lucky Ones, In the Fold, *Arlington Park* and The Bradshaw Variations. She was chosen as one of Granta’s 2003 Best Young British Novelists. She has been shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize three times, most recently for Kudos. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In an ongoing collaboration with BBC Radio 3, Wellcome Collection's Reading Room is the setting for a series of 'The Essay' devoted to the bodily organs. 'Body of Essays' invites five writers to ruminate on a different organ of the body. This strange proposition has a mysterious allure: the organs are hidden, buried from view, and yet are at the very core of our physical functioning as well as our mental and emotional world. Suctioned together in dark flesh, the organs can be all the more puzzling and intriguing. William Fiennes is recipient of the Hawthornden Prize and Somerset Maugham Award for his book The Snow Geese, and more recently a tender account of growing up in the family estate with his epileptic brother Richard in The Music Room. A sufferer of Crohn's disease, William focuses on his bowel.

Robert Twigger is an author, adventure traveller and apprentice micromaster. His first book, Angry White Pyjamas, about a year spent in a Japanese martial arts dojo, won the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award and the Somerset Maugham Award. He has lectured on risk management, polymathics and leadership at Oxford Brookes Business School, Oxford University, the Royal College of Art, and to companies including P&G, Maersk shipping, Oracle computing and SAB Miller. We talk about his new book Micromastery, which is about mastering a small, discrete, learnable chunk of something much bigger and more inchoate. It provides several crucial things: a way into the new subject, a fun bitesized chunk, a model of how to proceed and most importantly- motivational nutrition. Connect with Robert: https://www.amazon.com/Micromastery-Learn-Small-Hidden-Happiness/dp/0241280044 http://www.roberttwigger.com/ Connect with Nick Holderbaum: www.primalosophy.com @primalosophy Subscribe on Itunes

Liz Berry was born in the Black Country which gave her first collection its title. Black Country won a chorus of praise, not to mention a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, a Somerset Maugham Award, the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Award and Forward Prize for Best First Collection. The collection is characterised by poems written in the Black Country dialect. Her recent pamphlet The Republic of Motherhood was a Poetry Book Society Pamphlet choice and was shortlisted for the Michael Marks Award, while its title poem won the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem 2018.  Recorded at the StAnza Poetry Festival in St Andrews, Berry talks about the lack of poetry that tells the truth about the experience of childbirth and rearing, the Black Country accent and pigeons.

This week’s podcast continues the theme of managing stress and this week we look at living with long term stress – be it illness, family dynamics or other situations that aren’t necessarily that easy to change or walk away from. Earlier this week it was announced that over 40% of businesses have seen a rise in people taking time off work last year due to stress and that 90% of cases seen by GPs are stress related. The numbers are clearly increasing when it comes to anxiety and depression so, what can we do to manage our busy lifestyles and the stress that results from it? This week we look at the example of author Maggie O Farrell and how she lives with a long term stress caused by her childhood illness and also how her family lives in a state of high alert as one of her children suffers with multiple extreme allergic reactions, sometimes life threatening, on a regular basis. I have two coping mechanisms to share with you, one for short and one for long term stress – and this is where the water and coffee come in: WATER – MANAGING MELTDOWNS AND SHORT TERM STRESS Walk away – find something that totally distracts my mind from what just happened in order to let the stress levels drop Attention – focus my attention on something positive to bring balance back into my mind Time -is my friend, we are so much more able to deal with stress once some water has passed under the bridge Emotion check – am I tired, hungry, hormonal, already stressed by something else Remind myself that I’m enough, I am a good person and this situation doesn’t define me COFFEE – COPING WITH LONG TERM LIFE STRESSES Choose your battles and compartmentalise Organise and plan Fear check – face your fears by asking what’s the worst that could happen and pre empt where possible Fun – have fun, make memories and allow yourself some space from what is going on Eat and sleep – without it we pretty much can’t function well Exercise – increase the blood flow and oxygen, giving your body the best chance to help you manage I find these help us develop resilience and determination, like Maggie O Farrell and still live our lives to the full. Links mentioned in this episode: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w172wx8kc0srb4l https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-devon-47884268/baking-was-my-escape-from-anxiety   https://www.stepjockey.com/workplace-stress-a-21st-century-health-epidemic And take a look at Maggie’s books here http://www.maggieofarrell.com/ AFTER YOU'D GONE MY LOVER'S LOVER THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US, which won a Somerset Maugham Award, THE VANISHING ACT OF ESME LENNOX THE HAND THAT FIRST HELD MINE - 2010 Costa Novel Award, INSTRUCTIONS FOR A HEATWAVE - shortlisted for the 2013 Costa Novel Award THIS MUST BE THE PLACE I AM, I AM, I AM

Adam Foulds most recent books are In the Wolf's Mouth; The Quickening Maze, which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, and won the Encore Award and the European Union Prize for Literature; and The Broken Word, which won the Costa Poetry Award and the Somerset Maugham Award. His latest book is Dream Sequence. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Bella Bathurst and Face2Face host David Peck talk about her new book Sound: A Memoir of Hearing Lost and Found, murmurations, non-verbal cues, recognizing the moment, hearing loss, phantom smells, and ordinary miracles. Synopsis In this surprising and moving book, award-winning writer Bella Bathurst shares the extraordinary true story of how she lost her hearing and eventually regained it and what she learned from her twelve years of deafness. Diving into a wide-ranging exploration of silence and noise, she interviews psychologists, ear surgeons, and professors to uncover fascinating insights about the science of sound. She also speaks with ordinary people who are deaf or have lost their hearing, including musicians, war veterans, and factory workers, to offer a perceptive, thought-provoking look at what sound means to us. If sight gives us the world, then hearing—or our ability to listen—gives us our connections with other people. But, as this smart, funny, and profoundly honest examination reveals, our relationship with sound is both more personal and far more complex than we might expect. Biography Bella Bathurst is a writer, photojournalist, and furniture maker. She has written four non-fiction books, including The Lighthouse Stevensons, which won the 1999 Somerset Maugham Award, and a novel, Special, which was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. Part of her time is dedicated to time make and design furniture. Her writing has appeared in the Guardian, the Observer, and many other outlets. She lives in Herefordshire, England.And Head here to read more about Bella and her work. Image Copyright: Bella Bathurst. Used with permission. For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here. With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Andrew McMillan's debut poetry collection, Physical, was the first ever poetry collection to win the Guardian First Book Award. It also won a Somerset Maugham Award, and Eric Gregory Award and a Northern Writers Award, was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Award, the Costa Poetry Award, the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year 2016, the Forward Prize for Best First Collection, the Roehampton Prize and the Polari First Book Prize. His second collection, Playtime, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2018 and is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation for Autumn 2018. A doctor of neuroscience by training and a former Royal Society fellow at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Rachel Genn's debut novel The Cure was published by Corsair in 2011. Her second novel, What You Could Have Won, is due for publication in 2019 by Sheffield-based publisher And Other Stories. She teaches creative writing MA programmes at Sheffield and the Manchester Writing School.

Jessie Greengrass published a collection of short stories called, An Account of the Decline of the Great Auk, According to One Who Saw It in 2015. It won a Somerset Maugham Award and the Edge Hill Short Story Prize.

Amy Sackville was born in 1981. She studied English and Theatre Studies at Leeds, and went on to do an MPhil in English at Exeter College, Oxford, and an MA in Creative & Life Writing at Goldsmiths. Her first novel was The Still Point, which was longlisted for the Orange Prize and won the 2010 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and her second was Orkney, which won a 2014 Somerset Maugham Award. Her latest novel is Painter to the King. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Simon speaks to Clare Conville, the co-founder of literary agency C+W (formerly Conville and Walsh). Listed by the Observer as one of “Our top 50 players in the world of books”, Clare previously worked as an editor at Random House, before co-founding Conville & Walsh in 2000. Between them Clare’s clients have won or been nominated for nearly every major literary prize in the UK, including the Man Booker Prize, the Orwell Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award and the Orange Prize for Fiction. We discussed the development of Clare's career, her long standing interest in children's writing, the art of selling a book and the change in the literary climate fostered by creative writing courses. http://cwagency.co.uk/agent/clare-conville http://cwagency.co.uk/ You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is patreon.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Nicola Kean. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Horror novelist and keen bird watcher Stephen Gregory returns for a second instalment selecting favourite episodes from the Tweet of the Day back catalogue. As a keen birdwatcher all of his novels have some elements of an ornithological theme. With either birds in the title such as Wakening the Crow from 2014, or have birds as subject to build the tension into his world of macabre such as The Waking That Kills featuring swifts and the folklore that provided inspiration. His first novel The Cormorant based on observing cormorants in Wales received the 1987 Somerset Maugham Award. In this episode Stephen recalls how he and his wife loved to watch swiftlets nesting underneath their house in Brunei, or the hornbills that visited the garden in the afternoons. You can hear more thought's from Stephen via the Tweet of the Week podcast available on the Radio 4 website. Producer by Maggie Ayre.

Horror Fiction writer and keen bird watcher Stephen Gregory sets out on his first week selecting favourite episodes from the Tweet of the Day back catalogue. As a keen birdwatcher all of his novels have some elements of an ornithological theme. With either birds in the title such as Wakening the Crow from 2014, or have birds as subject to build the tension into his world of macabre such as Blood of Angels featuring a jackdaw with a broken beak. His first novel The Cormorant based on observing cormorants in Wales received the 1987 Somerset Maugham Award. Stephen recalls how the cormorant bird inspired his work and also how he was impressed by the harpy eagle in South America. Producer by Maggie Ayre.

Lucy Wood is the critically acclaimed author of Diving Belles, a collection of short stories based on Cornish folklore, and Weathering, a debut novel about mothers, daughters and ghosts. She has been longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award and the Dylan Thomas Prize, shortlisted for the Edge Hill Prize, and was runner-up in the BBC National Short Story Award. She has also received a Betty Trask Award, a Somerset Maugham Award and the Holyer an Gof Award. Weathering was named as one of The New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2016. Lucy’s latest collection of short stories is The Sing of the Shore. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Autumn and Kendra chat with Maggie O'Farrell about her first work of nonfiction, her memoir I Am, I Am, I Am. O'Farrell talks about why she wanted to write a memoir after seven novels and about her own relationship with mortality, which inspired her to share the stories her seventeen brushes with death. Author Bio Maggie O'Farrell is the author of seven novels, After You'd Gone, My Lover's Lover, The Distance Between Us, which won a Somerset Maugham Award, The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, The Hand That First Half Mine, which won the 2010 Costa Novel Award, Instruction for a Heatwave, which was shortlisted for the 2013 Costa Novel Award, This Must Be the Place and I Am, I Am, I Am. She lives in Edinburgh. Buy the Book Website | Facebook   Check out our Patreon page to learn more about our book club and other Patreon-exclusive goodies. A special thanks to our patrons Carley T. and Stephanie W.  And be sure to subscribe to our newsletter for more new books and extra book reviews!   CONTACT Questions? Comments? Email us hello@readingwomenpodcast.com. SOCIAL MEDIA Reading Women Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Website   Music “Reading Women” Composed and Recorded by Isaac and Sarah Greene Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ian McMillan and our Poetry Book Club audience are joined by Douglas Dunn to discuss his debut collection 'Terry Street', and his latest, 'The Noise of a Fly' (Faber) Douglas Dunn, the author of over ten poetry collections, is in conversation with Ian McMillan. He published his debut in 1969, whilst working in the Brynmor Jones Library at Hull under Philip Larkin. The book, Terry Street, won the Somerset Maugham Award. His latest collection, The Noise of a Fly, was published last year and has been shortlisted for the TS Eliot award. Among other awards he received the Whitbread Book of the Year in 1985 for Elegies, a moving account of his wife's early death from cancer. Dunn was awarded the OBE in 2003 and is an Honorary Professor at St Andrews. Producer: Cecile Wright Presenter: Ian McMillan.

Mohsin Hamid writes regularly for The New York Times, the Guardian and the New York Review of Books, and is the author of The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Moth Smoke, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia and Discontent and its Civilisations. Born and mostly raised in Lahore, he has since lived between Lahore, London and New York. His latest novel Exit West was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize. Jon McGregor is the author of four novels and a story collection. He is the winner of the IMPAC Dublin Literature Prize, Betty Trask Prize, and Somerset Maugham Award, and has twice been longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. He is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Nottingham, where he edits The Letters Page, a literary journal in letters. Jon's latest novel Reservoir 13 was longlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize, and then won the 2017 Costa Prize for Best Novel. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In this podcast, I interview Francis Spufford. Francis is a former Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year (1997) and has authored five highly praised books of non-fiction. His first book, 'I May Be Some Time: Ice and the English Imagination' was awarded the Writers Guild Award for Best Non-Fiction Book of 1996 and a Somerset Maugham Award. His second book 'The Child That Books Built' gave Neil Gaiman “the peculiar feeling that there was now a book I didn't need to write”. In 2007, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and his first novel, 'Golden Hill', was published in 2016 and won the Costa First Novel Award. He’s also a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths University, and for this podcast, I visited his office to speak about his deeply funny and profound 2012 book 'Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Sense.'

January is a month of resolutions and fresh starts, of gyms and diets. This week Ian McMillan and guests tackle the language of Wellbeing and Self-Care. Poets are not generally known for their physical prowess, but in George Szirtes new collection 'Thirty Poets Go To The Gym' (Candlestick). What happens when famous poets from Lord Byron to John Berryman and from Emily Dickinson to Elizabeth Bishop try to get into shape? What are the strongest influences on the ways we chose to live our lives? Does taking care of someone meaning letting them take care of themselves? These issues are at the heart of Kendall Feaver's new play 'The Almighty Sometimes', starring Julie Hesmondhalgh. Julie discusses her role with Ian, and also examines what wellbeing means to an actor. The poet Melissa Lee-Houghton won the Somerset Maugham Award for her debut collection 'Sunshine' (Penned in the Margins), an intensely personal collection dealing with her experience of abuse, addiction and mental health issues. Melissa discusses how she protects herself when publishing such personal work. Producer: Cecile Wright Presenter: Ian McMillan.

Kate Clanchy is the author of two prize-winning collections of poetry, 'Slattern' which won the Forward Poetry Prize (Best First Collection) and a Somerset Maugham Award, and 'Samarkand', which was shortlisted for the Forward Poetry Prize (Best Poetry Collection of the Year) and won a Scottish Arts Council Book Award. Her poetry has been broadcast by BBC Radio and published in The Scotsman, the New Statesman and Poetry Review. She writes for radio and broadcasts on the World Service and BBC Radio 3 and 4. Her poetry collection 'Newborn' covers pregnancy, birth and caring for a new baby, and she wrote a poetic picture book for children, 'Our Cat Henry Comes to the Swings'. 'What Is She Doing Here?: A Refugee's Story' (2008) won the 2008 Writers' Guild Award (Best Book) and in 2013 her first novel 'Meeting the English' was published.

Liz Berry's debut collection, Black Country (Chatto & Windus, 2014), was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, received a Somerset Maugham Award, won the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Award and won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection 2014. Black Country was chosen as a book of the year by The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Mail, The Big Issue and The Morning Star. Liz’s poems have been broadcast on BBC Radio, television and recorded for the Poetry Archive. She has been a judge for major prizes including The Forward Prizes for Poetry and Foyle Young Poets. Liz works as a tutor for The Arvon Foundation, Writer’s Centre Norwich and Writing West Midlands. Mona Arshi is a poet and lawyer. Her poem 'Hummingbird' won first prize in the Magma Magazine poetry competition in 2012. She also was one of the Competition winners for the World Events Young Artists Festival in September 2012. She was also an award winner in the Troubadour International Competition for her poem ‘Bad day in the Office’. In 2014, she was joint winner of the Manchester Creative Writing Competition. A portfolio of her poems appeared in TEN-THE NEW WAVE in 2014 by Bloodaxe books. Mona’s poetry has been published widely in magazines including Poetry Review, Magma, Rialto and the Sunday Times. Her début collection of poem ‘Small Hands’ was published by Liverpool University in 2015 and won the Forward Prize for best first collection. Mona was one of ten poets selected for the ‘Complete Works’, a national development programme funded by the Arts Council.

Marcel Theroux is the author of five novels: A Blow to the Heart, A Stranger in the Earth, The Paperchase (winner of the 2002 Somerset Maugham Award), Far North (shortlisted for America's prestigious National Book Award), and Strange Bodies. His latest novel is The Secret Books. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Kirsty Young's castaway is the poet and writer Jackie Kay. Born in Edinburgh in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father, she was adopted as a baby by a white Scottish couple, Helen and John Kay, and grew up in Bishopbriggs, Glasgow. Her father worked for the Communist Party and her mother was the Scottish secretary for CND. She began to write seriously at the age of 17 when recovering from a moped accident, and while reading English at the University of Stirling she became a feminist and politically active in the arena of gay and lesbian rights and racial equality. Her first book of poetry, the partly autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991 and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. She won the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, the Guardian Fiction Prize for Trumpet and in 2010 published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her biological parents. She is now Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University and Chancellor of Salford University and was appointed Makar - Scotland's Poet Laureate - in March 2016. Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

Kirsty Young's castaway is the poet and writer Jackie Kay. Born in Edinburgh in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father, she was adopted as a baby by a white Scottish couple, Helen and John Kay, and grew up in Bishopbriggs, Glasgow. Her father worked for the Communist Party and her mother was the Scottish secretary for CND. She began to write seriously at the age of 17 when recovering from a moped accident, and while reading English at the University of Stirling she became a feminist and politically active in the arena of gay and lesbian rights and racial equality. Her first book of poetry, the partly autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991 and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. She won the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, the Guardian Fiction Prize for Trumpet and in 2010 published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her biological parents. She is now Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University and Chancellor of Salford University and was appointed Makar - Scotland's Poet Laureate - in March 2016. Producer: Cathy Drysdale.

The 1930s saw a resurgence of interest in local knowledge and traditions, and intense debate about how it might be possible to 'go modern' while honouring the past. Alexandra Harris looks back on her research for Romantic Moderns, remembering how she followed modern British artists and writers as they went 'on pilgrimage in England'. She also shows how that pilgrimage led her far back into Roman and Anglo-Saxon history in a quest to find out how the English weather has been differently imagined across the centuries.Alexandra Harris is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Liverpool, a BBC New Generation Thinker, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. She won the Guardian First Book Award and a Somerset Maugham Award for her first book, Romantic Moderns: English writers, artists and the imagination, from Virginia Woolf to John Piper. Her literary history of English weather will be published this autumn.

This podcast was recorded at and in partnership with the 2014 StAnza International Poetry Festival. Jennifer Williams talks to Jacob Polley about meaning and lack thereof, about resisting the idea of ‘home’, about remaining open to possibility when you’re writing and much more. Jacob Polley is the author of three acclaimed poetry collections, The Brink, Little Gods and, most recently, The Havocs, as well as a Somerset Maugham Award-winning novel, Talk of the Town. Born in Cumbria, he lives in Scotland where he teaches at the University of St Andrews. http://jacobpolley.com/ Many thanks to James Iremonger for the music in the podcast: https://jamesiremonger.wordpress.com/tabla/ Image by Mai Lin Li

Horatio Clare on going down to the sea in ships... Horatio Clare was born in London, but grew up on a hill farm in the Black Mountains of South Wales. He is the bestselling author of two memoirs including Running for the Hills, which tells the story of his rural childhood and was the winner of the 2007 Somerset Maugham Award. He also wrote the travel book A Single Swallow – which follows the birds' migration from South Africa to the UK – and a novella, The Prince's Pen, a retelling of a Mabinogion tale. An award-winning journalist, occasional teacher, former radio producer, sometime broadcaster and Fellow in Creative Writing at the University of Liverpool, Horatio writes regularly on nature for the Daily Telegraph and on travel for various international publications. His most recent book is Down to the Sea in Ships (2014). 5x15 brings together five outstanding individuals to tell of their lives, passions and inspirations. There are only two rules - no scripts and only 15 minutes each. Learn more about 5x15 events: 5x15stories.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/5x15stories Facebook: www.facebook.com/5x15stories Instagram: www.instagram.com/5x15stories

Ian McEwan talks about errors in fiction and the realist novel. Ian McEwan is a writer of short stories and novels whose work has won him worldwide critical acclaim. His first published work, a collection of short stories, First Love, Last Rites, won the Somerset Maugham Award. His novels include The Child in Time, which won the 1987 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award, The Cement Garden, Enduring Love, and Amsterdam, which won the 1998 Booker Prize. His novel Atonement was adapted into an Oscar-nominated film by director Joe Wright, starring Keira Knightley, James McAvoy and Vanessa Redgrave. In 2006, he won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel Saturday, and his novel On Chesil Beach was named Galaxy Book of the Year at the 2008 British Book Awards. McEwan has been named the Reader's Digest Author of the Year for 2008, the 2010 Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award, and in 2011 was awarded the Jerusalem Prize. He was awarded a CBE in 2000. His most recent novel is Sweet Tooth. 5x15 brings together five outstanding individuals to tell of their lives, passions and inspirations. There are only two rules - no scripts and only 15 minutes each. Learn more about 5x15 events: 5x15stories.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/5x15stories Facebook: www.facebook.com/5x15stories Instagram: www.instagram.com/5x15stories

Continuing our series of podcasts on the Best of Young British Novelists 4, we hear from Steven Hall. Born in Derbyshire, Hall’s first novel, The Raw Shark Texts, won the Borders Original Voices Award and the Somerset Maugham Award, and has been translated into twenty-nine languages. ‘Spring’ and ‘Autumn’, in the issue, are excerpts from his upcoming second novel, The End of Endings. Here he spoke to online editor Ted Hodgkinson about how the internet is, to his mind, disturbing the possibility of a novel with a single continuous narrative thread, writing from memory and the significance of Ian the cat in his first novel.

In our latest instalment of podcasts featuring our Best of Young British Novelists, we speak to Helen Oyeyemi. Oyeyemi is the author of The Icarus Girl and The Opposite House. Her third novel, White is for Witching, was awarded a 2010 Somerset Maugham Award, and her fourth, Mr Fox, won the 2012 Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation Award. ‘Boy, Snow, Bird’, in the issue, is an excerpt from a new novel of the same title, published in 2014 by Picador in the UK and Riverhead in the US. Here Oyeyemi spoke to online editor Ted Hodgkinson about the joys of writing from a male perspective, the role of magic in her work, some of her influences from Alfred Hitchcock to Jeanette Winterson and how as a young girl she would write alternate endings in the margins of the classics.

Ryan Van Winkle gets 2013 off to a great start with his third Bookmarked podcast, which has him talking about kids' wild imaginations with author and illustrator John Fardell, discovering the world of football with Rodge Glass and rubbing shoulders with the League of Extraordinary Booklovers.Podcast highlights: Somerset Maugham Award-winning author Rodge Glass talks about sports and his new book, Bring Me the Head of Ryan Giggs John Fardell takes a break from creating a mural at the Mitchell Library to share what it's like to be an illustrator-in-residence, how kids constantly surprise him and who his favourite illustrators are 2012 New Writers Award winners Andrew Sclater and Roy Gill discuss how the award changed their lives and their writing and what we can expect from them in the future Karen Cunningham, head of Glasgow libraries, speaks about the future of books during Book Week Scotland Three members of the League of Extraordinary Booklovers talk about how they were chosen, what their mission is and what books they were eager to recommend  LINKSBook List: 10 Books About the Beautiful GameBook Week ScotlandDuncan Wright: The League of Extraordinary BookloversJohn FardellNew Writers AwardsRodge Glass

Kate and Zoe are British Olympic cyclists and friends. Kate's family duties keep her away from the 2004 Olympics in Athens as Zoe goes for the gold. Fast forward to 2012, as Kate and Zoe train for their last Olympics in London. Meanwhile, Kate copes with her seriously ill daughter and Zoe contends with loneliness. Chris Cleave's captivating novel explores friendship, rivalry, and the private cost of public victory.Chris Cleave is the author of Incendiary and the international bestseller Little Bee. Incendiary won numerous awards, including the 2006 Somerset Maugham Award. Little Bee has sold more than two million copies worldwide. Cleave lives in London.(www.chriscleave.com) Recorded On: Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Librarian by training, poet by vocation, Professor Dunn’s many achievements in poetry include the Somerset-Maugham Award winning Terry Street, Love or Nothing and the acclaimed Elegies. Reading from poems new and old, with some classic West Port accompaniment from builders outside and the odd fire engine, join Douglas as he entertains a crowded Edinburgh Books. Incidental music is the track "Trouble Scene" from MWD, http://www.budabeats.com/bube007.htm

Chris Cleave was born in London and spent his early years in Cameroon. He studied Experimental Psychology at Balliol College, Oxford, and now writes a column for the Guardian newspaper. His debut novel Incendiary won a 2006 Somerset Maugham Award, was shortlisted for the 2006 Commonwealth Writers Prize, and is now a feature film. Chris lives in London with his wife and two children. We met to talk about his engaging, important new novel Little Bee. Topics discussed include masks, truth-telling, trauma, trust, happiness, the struggle to survive, Maslow's hierarchy of needs and its deficiencies, asylum seekers are true heroes, engaging with the developing world, people in transition, life-changing events, sexual adventurousness, making sense of life retrospectively, inane reality TV shows and the need for refugees to tell their heroic stories convincingly.