Free Thinking

Increasing resistance to antibiotics is a threat to Britain which could be as dangerous as terrorism. That's the argument put by Professor Dame Sally Davies in her Free Thinking lecture at Sage Gateshead. She is joined on stage by Professor Hugh Pennnington and Dr Andrew Sails to talk about strategies for combatting infection and improving the nation’s health. Recorded on Saturday 26th October 2013 in an event hosted by Anne McElvoy in front of a live audience at Sage Gateshead.

Award-winning novelist and poet Helen Dunmore and the writer Simon Heffer discuss the myths and realities behind the idea of the Lost Generation of World War 1.

Nature writers Miriam Darlington and Horatio Clare join Rana Mitter to discuss the Scottish author of Ring of Bright Water Gavin Maxwell on his centenary. Readings by Scott Handy.

The current National Poet of Wales Gillian Clarke and the painter Peter Blake celebrate the centenary of the birth of Dylan Thomas. The reader is Trystan Gravelle.

The poet and playwright Tony Harrison talks to Matthew Sweet about his passionate commitment to the classics, poetic language and political writing over the last fifty years.

The poet Craig Raine discusses the ways in which borrowing and reshaping existing phrases is a feature of music and literature and why writers adopt a magpie approach to language.

On the centenary of Britain's entry into the First World War Dame Shirley Williams and Colonel Tim Collins introduce an anthology of poetry from the war. Recorded in front of an audience at the Royal College of Music, before this evening's Prom, and featuring actors Roslyn Hill and Monty d'Inverno.

Rana Mitter talks to the actors Janet Suzman and Alexandra Gilbreath about Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. Both women have played the part of Kate -- both in acclaimed RSC productions and both made it their own. They'll be discussing the play's sexual politics and what Shakespeare has to say to audiences today.

Poet and librettist Michael Symmons Roberts and broadcaster Reverend Richard Coles on the literature which inspired John Tavener from George Herbert and John Donne to Blake.

The Booker prize winning novelist Pat Barker, author of the Regeneration Trilogy on the subject of the First World War, and the poet Owen Sheers discuss writers', musicians' and painters' responses to war including the work of Keith Douglas, UA Fanthorpe, David Jones, Alun Lewis and the paintings of CW Nevinson. The reader is Samuel West.