Mariella Frostrup with the best new fiction and non-fiction, talking to authors and publishers and unearthing lost classics on BBC Radio 4’s Open Book on Sundays at 4pm. Programmes are permanently available from the Open Book archive
There was a special feature during July that focused on the history of women’s writing. All these programme are now available on the Open Book archive so if your reading group is reading any women’s fiction this summer, you can find some very interesting contextual information there.
Programme 1
The literature of the suffrage movement and why the names of so many groundbreaking suffrage writers have been erased from our literary history. Features Shirley Williams.
Programme 2
Mariella explores fiction of the 1930s and 40s – a time when the vote had been won but sexual inequality was still rife – with the help of writers and critics including Hermione Lee, Virginia Woolf’s biographer, and feminist publisher Carmen Calil.
Programme 3
Mariella investigates the era of sexual liberation in the 1960s and 70s and how it ignited feminist fiction, and the explosion in feminist literary theory. Features AS Byatt.
Programme 4
Women’s writing since Bridget Jones’ Diary. Features Kate Mosse, playwright Lucy Caldwell, with contributions from Helen Fielding and Margaret Drabble.
