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Russian Revolution a hundred years on Oct 09, 2017

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The Russian Revolution a hundred years on. To mark the centenary Tom Sutcliffe is in Moscow to discuss the forces that led to the Revolution, and to find out how far Russians today embrace or reject such a pivotal moment in their country's history. He talks to a senior member of President Putin's political party, Konstantin Kosachev. And he is joined by the journalists Mikhail Zygar and Arkady Ostrovsky and the Director of the Tretyakov Gallery, Zelfira Tregulova. Producer: Katy Hickman.

Power, the People and the Party Oct 02, 2017

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Live from Salford, during the Conservative Party conference in neighbouring Manchester, Sir David Cannadine argues that Victorian Britain was never far from revolution. He tells Andrew Marr how a century seen as conservative was actually troubled by political upheaval. Britain may have been the world's greatest empire but it was riven by self-doubt.

Novelist Anthony Powell depicted the turbulence of the 20th century in his series A Dance to the Music of Time. Powell is seen as the arch-conservative, but biographer Hilary Spurling argues that he was fascinated by power and people at every level of society.

Jane Green tracked the 2017 General Election as co-director of the British Election Study. She explains how the public judges those in power, and why political reputations are hard to shake.

And Phillip Blond, director of the think tank ResPublica, helped shape recent Conservative ideas including the "big society" and the "northern powerhouse". He fears the Conservative Party could become irrelevant unless power is shared out.

Producer: Hannah Sander.

Hard work and sweet slumber Sep 25, 2017

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Francine Stock talks to the sleep scientist Matthew Walker whose latest book is a clarion call to get more sleep, as the latest research confirms that sleeping less than six or seven hours has a devastating impact on physical and mental health.

Armed with proof that shift work is detrimental for workers, political strategist and chief executive of the RSA Matthew Taylor considers what responsibility companies have to their staff in making sure they get enough sleep and whether since industrialisation modern working practices militate against this.

Concerns about lack of sleep and remedies for improving it are nothing new: the historian Sasha Handley looks back to early modern sleep patterns and advice, and wonders why so many of our forebears slept in two distinct phases with an hour in the early hours set aside for sex, housework or reading.

The latest exhibition at the National Gallery, Reflections, co-curated by Susan Foister, shows how the medieval painter van Eyck had a huge influence on the Pre-Raphaelite painters, whose work stood in opposition to creeping industrialisation and harked back to a by-gone era of knights and sweet slumber.

Producer: Hannah Sander.

Orhan Pamuk on competing myths Sep 18, 2017

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Andrew Marr talks to the Nobel Prize-winning author Orhan Pamuk about his latest novel, The Red-Haired Woman. Set in Istanbul in the 20th century, it's a family drama which weaves together competing foundation myths of patricide and filicide and pits tradition against modernity; east and west. There are more competing ideologies in Jon Sopel's 'Notes from Trump's America' which paints a picture of a country riven by divisions between black and white, rich and poor, the urban and the rural. Reality and fantasy play a part in the choreographer Shobana Jeyasingh's critique of the orientalist ballet La Bayadere. She looks back to the moment in the 19th century when genuine Indian dancers were rejected in favour of the idealised exotic version of the temple dancer in the Western imagination. 'What Shadows' is a play that tells the story of Enoch Powell's famous 'rivers of blood' speech from 1968, and its impact on the country decades later. The play's director Roxana Silbert says the play shows how prejudice can be found across the political spectrum. Producer: Katy Hickman.

Les Misérables: novel of the century? Aug 22, 2017

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On Start the Week Andrew Marr talks to David Bellos about Victor Hugo's Les Misérables. Bellos argues that this 19th century masterpiece is the novel of the century, which demonstrates the drive to improve human life both morally and materially. Dinah Birch compares what was happening in literature on the other side of the channel, reflecting the breadth of society in Britain. Simon Callow makes the case for the composer of the century, Richard Wagner, while the singer Barbara Hannigan explains how a 12th century legend has been given a contemporary twist in the opera Written On Skin. Producer: Katy Hickman.

From Darwin to Big Data with Richard Dawkins Jul 03, 2017

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On Start the Week Andrew Marr asks whether scientists have failed in their task to communicate their work to the wider public. The 'passionate rationalist' Richard Dawkins has spent his career trying to illuminate the wonders of nature and challenge what he calls faulty logic. But he wonders whether Darwin would consider his legacy now with 'a mixture of exhilaration and exasperation'. The child psychologist Deborah Kelemen has been working with young children to find out what they make of adaptation and evolution with the storybook, How the Piloses Evolved Skinny Noses, and is encouraged by the sophistication of their understanding. The mathematician Cathy O'Neil says it's time people became more aware of the mathematical models and algorithms that dominate everything we do online and in finance, and yet are increasingly opaque, unregulated and left unchallenged. While Alex Bellos looks to improve numeracy with puzzles and brainteasers which have been entertaining and frustrating people for centuries. Producer: Katy Hickman.

Power: Fleet Street and Whitehall Jun 26, 2017

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On Start the Week Tom Sutcliffe talks to the former Conservative MP and last Governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of the handover of Hong Kong from Britain to China. In a candid memoir Patten looks back at his political life. He lost his seat in the 1992 election, despite the Sun newspaper claiming the Tory landslide with the headline, "It's The Sun Wot Won It". James Graham's new play goes back to the birth of this ruthless 'red top' tabloid, when a young and rebellious Rupert Murdoch burst on to Fleet Street, to launch a newspaper devoted to giving the people what they want. Fleet Street is no more and following this month's general election some critics have questioned the continuing influence of the mainstream media. Kerry-Anne Mendoza is the Editor-in-chief of the left-wing political blog, The Canary, and believes new forms of media online are disrupting the status quo in the UK. Baroness Tessa Blackstone was regarded as a kaftaned radical in the 1970s by the Whitehall establishment when she was part of a review of Central Policy which challenged the very workings of Britain's powerful diplomatic corps. Producer: Katy Hickman

Image: The Sun daily newspaper on June 14, 2016, with a headline urging readers to vote 'Leave' in the June 23 EU referendum. Credit: DANIEL SORABJI /AFP/ Getty Images.

Health Inequality: TB, Trauma and Technology Jun 19, 2017

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On Start the Week Andrew Marr explores killer diseases and the health of the world. Kathryn Lougheed focuses on one of the smartest killers humanity has ever faced - TB. It's been around since the start of civilisation and has learnt how to adapt to different environments, so today more than one million people still die of the disease every year. As with many diseases it's the poor who are most at risk. But Sir Michael Marmot explains how it's not just those at the bottom who are adversely affected, as health and life expectancy are directly related to where you are on the socio-economic ladder. The psychiatrist Lynne Jones also explores how far mental well-being is connected to human rights and the social and political worlds in which we live. She trained in one of Britain's last asylums and has travelled the world treating traumatised soldiers and civilians. Professor John Powell is interested in how far the digital world can help improve health and access to health care - from interventions for heart attacks to the treatment of depression. There are more than two hundred thousand health apps on the internet, but just how effective are they?

Producer: Katy Hickman.

Crossing the Boundaries of Gender, Race and Class Jun 12, 2017

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On Start the Week Kirsty Wark asks what it is to be a man, and to belong to a tribe. Thomas Page McBee has sought answers as he's transitioned from female to male, and explored how far the violent men of his youth are models of masculinity. Fatherhood and aggression take centre stage in Gary Owen's play, Killology, in which he's created a video game that allows players to live out their darkest fantasies. The poet Kayo Chingonyi moved to Britain when he was a child and in his debut collection he translates the rites of passage of his native Zambia to his new home. In the TV drama Ackley Bridge, filmmaker Penny Woolcock imagines a new school that throws together two communities, segregated along ethnic lines, in a fictional Yorkshire mill town. Producer: Katy Hickman Image: Missy (Poppy Lee Friar) and Nasreen (Amy Leigh Hickman) in Ackley Bridge on Channel 4 Photographer: Matt Squire.

Inventing the Self: Fact and Fiction Jun 05, 2017

Show notes

On Start the Week, Andrew Marr explores where truth ends and invention begins in the story of the self. The theatre director Robert Lepage has spent decades creating other worlds on stage; now his one-man show recreates his childhood home in 1960s Quebec, with truth at the mercy of memory. Rebecca Stott has written the story of her family that her father left unfinished, including the Christian cult that inspired their devotion, until doubt led them astray. Miranda Doyle casts doubt on the veracity of memoir itself, by writing a series of lies to get at the truth of her family story. Andrew O'Hagan has examined three lives existing more fully online than offline: the Wikileaks founder Julian Assange; the fabled inventor of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto and 'Ronald Pinn'- an experiment in identity theft that disrupts the very notion of the self. Producer: Katy Hickman

Image: Robert Lepage on stage in 887 by Ex Machina/ Robert Lepage Photographer: Eric Labbé.

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