Radio Oldie

Stephen Clarke Author of How The French Won Waterloo or think they did talks at the renowned Oldie Literary Lunch at Simpsons on the Stand, London W1. Clarke paints the French version of Wellington and Blucher's victory in 1815.

Benjamin West and the Struggle to be Modern

Margaret Thatcher was elected Prime Minister in 1979, the first woman to hold the position, and the first woman in the Western world to lead a nation.

Within two years she was beset by troubles, and it seemed her historic government would be short-lived. In 1981 unemployment had risen to levels not seen since the 1930s and public finances foundered in their worst state since 1945. The 'no hope' budget delivered by Chancellor Geoffrey Howe in March marked the beginning of a six-month period which witnessed pressures in Northern Ireland, hunger strikes, urban riots and unprecedented unrest within the Conservative Party.

By the Cabinet reshuffle of 14 September, in which mutinous grandees were removed, Thatcher had firmly reasserted her authority. This extraordinary six-month period would come to define the Conservative Party's most successful and divisive modern figure: to her detractors a harsh, uncaring and dogmatic leader who made the country a more unequal, materialistic and brutal place; to her supporters, the saviour of a Britain which was becoming an ungovernable socialist state. The 1983 general election would prove a triumph.

Kwasi Kwarteng here captures this shopkeeper's daughter's unique leadership qualities - from her pulpit style and New Testament imagery to her emphasis on personal moral responsibility - in some of the most adverse conditions facing any statesman in modern peacetime to offer a compelling study of arguably the most significant six months in British post-war history.

Sponsored by Doro, number one in the senior mobile market

'A cul-de-sac, a dead-end track, A sandbanked strand to sink a fleet, A bay, a bar, a strip, a trap, A wrecking ground, that's Shingle Street.' Blake Morrison's first two collections, Dark Glasses (1984) and The Ballad of a Yorkshire Ripper (1987) established him as one of our most inventive and accomplished contemporary poets. In his first full-length collection for nearly thirty years, Shingle Street sees a return to the form with which he started his career. Set along the Suffolk coast, the opening poems address a receding world - an eroding landscape, 'abashed by the ocean's passion'. But coastal life gives way to other, more dangerous, vistas: a wave unleashes a flood-tide of terror; a sequence of topical poems lays bare pressing political issues; while elsewhere portraits of the past bring forth the dear and the departed. Ardent and elegiac, and encompassing an impressive range of mood and method, this is a timely offering from a poet of distinct talents.

Sponsored by Doro, number one in the senior mobile market

Robert Douglas-Fairhurst on 'The Story of Alice: Lewis Carroll and the Secret History of Wonderland' at The Oldie Literary Lunch at Rye Arts Festival

Oliver Kamm on 'Accidence will Happen: The Non-Pedantic Guide to English Usage' at The Oldie Literary Lunch at Rye Arts Festival

Harry Mount on 'Harry Mount's Odyssey: Ancient Greece in the Footsteps of Odysseus' at The Oldie Literary Lunch at Rye Arts Festival

Valerie Grove talks about her new book, The Loves of Laurie Lee, at the prestigious Oldie literary lunch at Simpson’s in the Strand.

Helen Lederer talks about her new book, Losing It, at the prestigious Oldie literary lunch at Simpson’s in the Strand.

Ferdinand Mount talks about his new book, The Tears of the Rajas: Mutiny, Money and Marriage in India, at the prestigious Oldie literary lunch at Simpson’s in the Strand.