Page One

Taking some time out from performing at the Victoria Fringe Festival in British Columbia, Western Canada, Charles Adrian is joined for the 129th Second-Hand Book Factory by mother, artist, performance artist, independent thinker, recovering academic, dog mother, cat mother, teacher and (in some ways) activist Tasha Diamant. They talk women living in brutal circumstances, what makes an artist an artist and Aboriginal Australians.

You may notice some slightly strange background noise in this episode. I mean, quite apart from jingle jangling, mewing and sighing of cats and dogs. The strangeness is because of the way my noise-removal software interacts with the sound of cars going by outside the window.

More information about Tasha is at http://www.humanbodyproject.org/.

Episode image is a detail from the cover of The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin, published in 1988 by Penguin Books; cover design by Melissa Jacoby; cover engraving by William Blake after a drawing by Philip Gidley King, third governor of New South Wales.

Marked as explicit on iTunes because of strong language.

More info and a link to a transcript of this episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book listing:

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante (trans. Ann Goldstein)

The Woman Upstairs by Claire Masud

The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin

Joining Charles Adrian for the 128th Second-Hand Book Factory is Lithuanian performer, teacher and, recently, yoga practitioner Judita Vivas. They talk trees, language and identity, and a desire for non-Anglo writing.

Adventures In Black And White is a performance created by Judita Vivas and Miriam Gould on the subject of displacement and its aftermath: https://doubletroubletheatre.wordpress.com/adventures-in-black-and-white/. You can watch the video trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2nyXDn-gHc.

Episode image is a detail from the cover of Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, published in 2019 by Fitzcarraldo Editions; design by Ray O'Meara.

More info and a link to a transcript of this episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book listing:

The Overstory by Richard Powers

In Other Words (In Altre Parole) by Jhumpa Lahiri (trans. Ann Goldstein)

Flights by Olga Tokarczuk (trans. Jennifer Croft)

CN: poor health (coughing) - NB this episode was recorded on the 24th May, 2019, before Coronavirus began to spread.

Joining a slightly poorly Charles Adrian in Acton for the 127th Second-Hand Book Factory is Mum and facilitator of creative practice Stephanie Arsoska. They talk about creativity as an act of devotion, something nasty in the woodshed and the first poet of love.

Correction: Charles Adrian misses out the all-important word "nasty" in the Stella Gibbons quotation "Something nasty in the woodshed".

If you are interested in Anne Carson's translations of Sappho, you can also find some of these on Twitter, tweeted out by @sapphobot (https://twitter.com/sapphobot?lang=en). Sappho Bot posts every 2 hours and uses translations that include liftings from Anne Carson's If Not, Winter.

The residency on Lesvos where Charles Adrian and Stephanie spent some time in the summer of 2016 was run by Duende, whose artistic director is John Britton. You can find out more about their work here (http://www.duende-ensemble.com/).

Recorded on the 24th May, 2019.

Episode image is a detail from the cover of If Not, Winter by Anne Carson, published in 2003 by Virago Press; book design by Carole Devine Carson and Gabriele Wilson.

More info and a link to a transcript of this episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book listing:

New And Selected Poems by Mary Oliver

Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons

If Not, Winter by Anne Carson

Joining Charles Adrian in Old Amersham for the 126th Second Hand Book Factory is happy and enthusiastic Nursery Nurse, Forest School leader, Brown Owl, not to mention Charles Adrian's older sister, Shanta Gillott. They talk about long-term singleness, really well-made rom coms and love languages.

This episode was recorded in April 2019 in Old Amersham. In 2018, Old Amersham was a gold winner in the Britain In Bloom competition (https://www.amershamsociety.org/amersham-in-bloom-on-bbc-two/).

You can find out more about Charles Adrian's alter-ego Ms Samantha Mann, who is not based on Shanta, here (http://www.mssamanthamann.com/). You can also listen to Ms Samantha being interviewed for the podcast here (http://www.pageonepodcast.com/season4#/126-ms-samantha-mann/).

This episode is marked as explicit on iTunes because of strong language.

Episode image is a detail from the cover of The 5 Love Languages: The Secret To Love That Lasts by Gary Chapman, published in 2010 by Northfield Publishing; cover design : Smartt Guys design; Cover photo composite: Michael Powers/Photolibrary (beach), Eric Horan/Photolibrary (couple).

More info and a link to a transcript of the episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book listing:

The Ladybird Book Of Dating by Jason Hazeley and Joel Morris

Remember Me by Sophie Kinsella

The 5 Love Languages: The Secret To Love That Lasts by Gary Chapman

In honour of Krista Tippett, whose podcast On Being both Tim and Charles Adrian listen to and enjoy, this is an unedited recording of their conversation released in parallel with the edited version that appears in your feeds.

Recorded on the 5th October, 2018.

Speaking to Charles Adrian for a particularly dreamy 125th Second-Hand Book Factory in his own studio in Mile End is artist Tim Spooner. They talk some difficult poetry, the Berlin Wall and rule-bound beauty.

Episode image is a detail from the cover of The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino, published by Penguin Modern Classics in 2010; cover image is a detail from The Last Judgement: The Stars Fall And Everything Is Turned Upside Down, Italian School, 15th century/Fol 149va Biblioteca Reale, Turin, Italy (Alinari/The Bridgeman Art Library).

Correction: Charles Adrian talks about the 29th anniversary of the falling of the Berlin Wall, which he says happened on a Wednesday. In fact, he is thinking of the Tag der Deutschen Einheit, celebrated on the 3rd of October, which was a Wednesday in 2018. The 29th anniversary of the falling of the Wall was the 9th of November 2018, which was a Friday. In any case, what is true is that, at the time of recording this episode, about 29 years had passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

If On A Winter's Night A Traveller is also a book by Italo Calvino, translated into English by William Weaver.

The story from The Cosmicomics that Charles Adrian tries to remember is called The Form Of Space, which is included in this Penguin Classics collection of The Complete Cosmicomics in a translation by William Weaver; the story that Tim talks about, translated by Martin McLaughlin in this collection, is called Shells And Time.

The unedited version of this recording includes a long digression on Mile End Green and environs and a longer discussion of Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov than is kept in the edited version. There is also mention of a show Charles Adrian had recently in Berlin; this was Die Zukunft Von Gestern by Nico And The Navigators. More information (in German) about that show here: http://navigators.de/index.php?id=602&L=54#c2119

More info and a link to a transcript of this episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book Listing:

New Impressions Of Africa by Raymond Roussel (trans. Ian Monk) Funeral In Berlin by Len Deighton Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov If On A Winter's Night A Traveller by Italo Calvino (trans. William Weaver) The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino (trans. William Weaver, Tim Parks and Martin McLaughlin)

Recorded on the 5th October, 2018.

Speaking to Charles Adrian for a particularly dreamy 125th Second-Hand Book Factory in his own studio in Mile End is artist Tim Spooner. They talk some difficult poetry, the Berlin Wall and rule-bound beauty.

Episode image is a detail from the cover of The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino, published by Penguin Modern Classics in 2010; cover image is a detail from The Last Judgement: The Stars Fall And Everything Is Turned Upside Down, Italian School, 15th century/Fol 149va Biblioteca Reale, Turin, Italy (Alinari/The Bridgeman Art Library).

(Correction: Charles Adrian talks about the 29th anniversary of the falling of the Berlin Wall, which he says happened on a Wednesday. In fact, he is thinking of the Tag der Deutschen Einheit, celebrated on the 3rd of October, which was a Wednesday in 2018. The 29th anniversary of the falling of the Wall was the 9th of November 2018, which was a Friday. In any case, what is true is that, at the time of recording this episode, about 29 years had passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall.)

(If On A Winter's Night A Traveller is also a book by Italo Calvino, translated into English by William Weaver.)

(The story from The Cosmicomics that Charles Adrian tries to remember is called The Form Of Space, which is included in this Penguin Classics collection of The Complete Cosmicomics in a translation by William Weaver; the story that Tim talks about, translated by Martin McLaughlin in this collection, is called Shells And Time.)

More info and a link to a transcript of the episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book Listing:

New Impressions Of Africa by Raymond Roussel (trans. Ian Monk)

Funeral In Berlin by Len Deighton

Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov

If On A Winter's Night A Traveller by Italo Calvino (trans. William Weaver)

The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino (trans. William Weaver, Tim Parks and Martin McLaughlin)

Joining Charles Adrian for the 124th Second-Hand Book Factory is Windrush scion, Black British Christian, storyteller and fellow Family Tree performer Azariah France-Williams. They talk a compassionate engagement with the world and a quest for silence.

Azariah France-Williams and Charles Adrian are both featured on the magical realist podcast The Family Tree in which Azariah plays himself and Charles Adrian plays the Revd Philip Beech: http://thefamilytreepodcast.co.uk/

You can learn more about the phrase "Water your herbs even if they are going to die tomorrow" and what it means to Charles Adrian by listening to the 8th episode of his Muselings podcast: http://muselings.uk/

Episode image is a detail from the cover of A Book of Silence by Sara Maitland, published by Granta Books in 2008; cover design by Dan Mogford.

More info and a link to a transcript of this episode is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book listing:

Nonviolence: The History Of A Dangerous Idea by Mark Kurlansky

The Master by Colm Toibín

A Book of Silence by Sara Maitland

As is, by now, firmly traditional, the first episode of the new season of the podcast finds Charles Adrian chatting to Vera Chok, who is neither fancy nor a storyteller. They talk relatable self-help, a book to make you cry and an early Renaissance guide to health.

Clarification 1: The audio version of Brené Brown's Rising Strong that Vera mentions having listened to is, in fact, a recording of a talk given by Brené Brown called Rising Strong As A Spiritual Practice. There is also an audio version of the book, Rising Strong, read by Brené Brown.

Clarification 2: "The Tacuinum Sanitatis is a richly illustrated guide to health. Made in Padua in the 1450s, it contains 130 miniatures illustrating substances and activities conducive to health and happiness, ranging from food and drink to singing, sleep and sex. Its scribe and artists enjoyed the patronage of a circle of humanists who flourished in the Veneto in the 1450s and 1460s, including the Venetian governer of Padua, Jacopo Antionio Marcello, and his great friend King René of Anjou. A window into the everyday lives of affluent Italians in the fifteenth century, the Tacuinum Sanitatis brings to life the fascinating domestic arena of the early Renaissance." (From the back cover of Tacuinum Sanitatis: An Early Renaissance Guide to Health by Alixe Bovey.)

Episode image is a detail from the cover of Tacuinum Sanitatis: An Early Renaissance Guide To Health by Alixe Bovey, published to accompany an exhibition of miniatures from the Liechtenstein Tacuinum Sanitatis at Sam Fogg, 15d Clifford Street, London, 1-29th July, 2005.

podcast homepage: http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Book list:

Rising Strong by Brené Brown

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Tacuinum Sanitatis: An Early Renaissance Guide to Health by Alixe Bovey

Season 6 of Page One is on its way. In fact, the first episode - Page One 149 featuring Vera Chok - will already be in your podcast feed by the time you finish listening to this.

More information about the podcast and links to transcripts of all the season 6 episodes is at http://www.pageonepodcast.com/.

This is a re-release of a conversation from May 2014 with Dave Pickering as a way of plugging his book, Mansplaining Masculinity, which is being crowd-funded through Unbound. Please check it out and consider supporting the project.

Mansplaining Masculinity: https://unbound.com/books/mansplaining-masculinity/

Dave's Comment Is Free article: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/01/tough-choice-cut-job-enfield-children-centres-austerity

Dave's website: http://dave-pickering.squarespace.com/

Podcast website (for book listings and more info): http://www.pageonepodcast.com/

Episode image is a detail from the cover of No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July, published by Scribner in July 2008.