Published in 1899, Heart of Darkness tells the story of Marlow, a sailor, who is sent on a mission up the Congo River to find out what has happened to the brilliant agent, Kurtz. The story is closely based on Joseph Conrad's own time in the Congo nine years earlier, an experience which scarred him both mentally and physically for the rest of his life. Barely 100 pages long, the novel has cast a giant shadow over western literature ever since, and haunts our consciousness of colonial guilt and racism. Dense and hypnotic, half narrative and half dream, it is one of Conrad's very greatest achievements. But how did he manage to create such a work when English was his third language? What had really happened to Kurtz? How does Marlow deal with the horror? Why are professional qualifications so important? And how do we feel today about the issues around race which the novel inevitably raises? Join Rupert and Charlie as they discuss this seminal book and the extraordinary man who wrote it. 

The slow burn love affair between Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy is one of the best known and best loved stories in the English language, fuelled by multiple films, TV series and spin offs in recent years. In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen's rendering of the changeability of human feelings and the delicacy of social situations is at its most acute. But who was proud, and who was prejudiced? How important are first impressions? How rich was Mr Darcy? Why can some people understand their shortcomings, while others can't? And why do we take such delight in the disasters of our neighbours? Join Rupert and Charlie as they discuss what is probably Jane Austen's most celebrated novel. 

A short episode to update everyone - we started Book In a couple of months ago, with a plan to do 8 episodes and see how we got on. The response has been terrific, and so now we're planning what to do next. Tune in to find out, and also to learn about a man you've never heard of called F.R.Leavis, and for a very brief intro from Charlie on Literary Criticism. 

In 1606, James 1st had been King of England for three years. Most of his Stewart ancestors had met bloody and violent deaths, so for Shakespeare to write a play about the murder of a Scottish King was a bold move. The play was MacBeth; dramatic, fast moving and brutal, it contains some of the greatest speeches in the English language. But was MacBeth always going to be a murderer, or did the witches make him do it? Why did his marriage go wrong? What was an equivocator? And was it all OK in the end? Join Rupert and Charlie as they give you an insight into the strange and terrifying world of the supernatural, and the titanic struggle between good and evil which is the background to this gripping drama. 

Hamlet is one of the most famous, most performed and most analysed pieces of literature ever written. Every generation sees something of themselves in the anguished and tortured figure of the Prince of Denmark, as he grapples with his conscience and agonises over the right thing to do. But why does the play continue to resonate? What are the fundamental questions it asks? Why do so many people seem to go mad? What was the theatre like in Shakespeare's day, and who went to it? And why do some of the greatest actors find the part of Hamlet impossible to perform? Join Charlie and Rupert as they discuss these and many other questions.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner was the first poem in Lyrical Ballads, the groundbreaking volume of poetry published by Coleridge and Wordsworth in 1798, and composed and written during the year the two young men spent together in the Quantock Hills in Somerset. Hauntingly beautiful, its mesmeric rhythms and rhymes create a unique atmosphere of mysticism and strangeness. But how did the poem come to be written? What was Wordsworth's contribution? Is there a Christian message, or is it really about Coleridge's drug addiction? And why did Coleridge and Wordsworth fall out in the end? Join Rupert and Charlie as they talk about Coleridge's life, and why he never wrote anything quite this good ever again. 

Published in 1922, T.S.Eliot's poem The Wasteland is a definitive text of modernism, and one of the towering cultural achievements of the twentieth century. Revolutionary, obscure and beautiful, it took the literary world by storm, and was enthusiastically received by legions of academics and students across the world. But why was it so important, and is it still so today? How did Eliot get away with borrowing so much material? How much of the poem is really his? Did he understand it himself? And why on earth did this brilliant man work for a bank? Join Charlie and Rupert as they try to answer some of these questions. 

Emily Bronte was one of six children brought up on the bleak Yorkshire moors, and was described by her sister Charlotte as “not a person of demonstrative character”. Yet in her late twenties, this solitary and introverted woman wrote one of the strangest and most remarkable novels in the English language; the story of the doomed love of Cathy and Heathcliff resonates down the generations to the present day. How on earth did such a woman write such a book? Was it based on her personal experience, or did it come entirely from her imagination? Why is it so full of violence and misery? How can a child survive in a world of hatred? Was Emily a better writer than her sister? And why did they all die young? Join Rupert and Charlie as they explore the extraordinary story of the Earnshaws and the Lintons, and the effect that Heathcliff had on them all. 

Emma is one of only six novels that Jane Austen completed, and yet she is among the very greatest of all English writers. How did an obscure spinster living in a modest house in Hampshire come to create these extraordinary books, and what is it that is so special about them? Rupert and Charlie look at arguably the greatest of them all, the story of Emma Woodhouse. Set in the modest provincial town of Highbury, and charting the day to day lives and concerns of ordinary people, she explores the very depths of human nature, and how we relate to each other. But is Emma a sympathetic heroine or a manipulative schemer? Why can’t she see that the man for her isn’t the smooth chancer who dazzles her for a while, but the solid and kind friend who has always had her interests at heart? And why is she so rude to poor old ladies on picnics? Charlie will explain it all. 

Rupert and Charlie look at George Orwell’s masterpiece Nineteen Eighty-Four. Austere, prescient, terrifying and ultimately profoundly moving, the novel has exercised an extraordinary hold on the western consciousness with its portrayal of a society where the state controls everything, even your mind. Many words and phrases from the book have passed into everyday language, including Big Brother, Room 101, the Thought Police, Doublethink and the Proles, and the adjective Orwellian is regularly used today to describe the encroachment and surveillance of the State. But is there any hope? Can the Party be defeated? What sort of man was George Orwell? And are there any good jokes in the book? Rupert and Charlie answer all of these questions and much more.