Start the Week

Andrew Marr takes a satirical look at the world in Start the Week. The satirist PJ O'Rourke makes a plea to the American public, Not To Vote, in his latest angry critique of liberal politics, while the writer and comedian Armando Iannucci explores the latest chapter in the life of his Machiavellian spin doctor, Malcolm Tucker. Mikhail Bulgakov's absurdist tale of how a stray mongrel becomes human is brought to the stage by Simon McBurney. And the classicist Mary Beard delves beneath the volcanic ash to uncover everyday life in the Roman town of Pompeii.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

Andrew Marr talks to the forensic psychotherapist Dr Gwen Adshead about the medicalisation of evil. While human nature in a different guise is explored through William Boyd's literary everyman, Logan Mounstuart, who moves from the page to tv screen in the adaptation of his novel, Any Human Heart. The poet Craig Raine compares the composition of a poem to the art of dress-making: "We are waiting till it feels exact,/ ruthless till we feel the fit." And the psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist concludes that the problem with modern society can be found in the left side of our brain.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

Andrew Marr talks to the Swedish poet, Lars Gustafsson about whether writers have a responsibility to challenge the establishment. Gillian Tett, the award-winning Financial Times journalist, who predicted the financial crash, does her own challenging of the status quo. The writer Patrick Wilcken describes the great intellectual Claude Levi-Strauss, as 'the poet in the laboratory' in a new biography. And Ed Vulliamy reports, in almost anthropological detail, on the lives of those caught up in the war of drugs, gangs and guns on the US-Mexican border.

Andrew Marr looks at what the future holds for Ireland after the financial crisis, with the cultural commentator, Fintan O'Toole, who argues for wholesale reform of the political system. While the Conservative MP, Nick Boles puts forward his blueprint for a new Britain. The fate of Deborah Cadbury's family firm was sealed when it was bought out by an American company. But she looks back at a chocolate dynasty that mixed sweet success with bitter rivalry. And the cellist Steven Isserlis is on a mission to enhance the reputation of the much-maligned composer, Saint-Saens.

Producer: Eleanor Garland.

Andrew Marr talks to the Scottish writer and artist, Alasdair Gray about his life through the story of his paintings. While the director Josie Rourke brings to life the tough reality of 1930s Glasgow, in her staging of the play, Men Should Weep. David Starkey explores the history of the monarchy, showing its resilience but also fragility, over the last two thousand years. And James Stirling is considered one of the greatest British architects - Alan Berman celebrates his radical buildings while asking why the general public rarely appreciate what architects revere.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

In a special programme, Start the Week discusses morality, religion and politics. The philosopher Mary Warnock, in her latest book, Dishonest To God, argues that religion has no place in politics, and that it's a mistake to believe that religion has a monopoly on morality. To debate these issues Andrew Marr is joined by Stanley Hauerwas, named 'America's Best Theologian' by Time magazine, the philosopher, humanist and former Professor of Geriatric Medicine Raymond Tallis, and the former Conservative MP John Gummer, now Lord Deben, who converted to Catholicism in 1994.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

In a special programme recorded at the Cheltenham Literature Festival Andrew Marr talks to Bernhard Schlink, author of 'The Reader', about his latest novel to be translated, which pits youthful idealism against the reality of terrorism. Margaret MacMillan explores the uses and abuses of history, while Peter Snow tries to unpick the man from the legend in his biography of Wellington. Sebastian Faulks explores the history of the novel, and discusses the challenges in both historical and contemporary fiction.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

Andrew Marr talks to Jonathan Franzen, hailed as a 'Great American Novelist' for his latest book, Freedom. Amidst the backdrop of the war on terror, environmental disaster and class war, Franzen chronicles the lives, choices and compromises of one family. The playwright Shelagh Stephenson also explores family tensions in her new play, about what happens when a missing child returns home. Philosophy is under attack as advances in neuroscience question many of its assumptions, and yet Barry Smith argues that the science of the mind needs philosophers now more than ever, to make sense of its new discoveries. And Robert Douglas-Fairhurst celebrates the great Victorian journalist Henry Mayhew and his captivating portraits of life on the streets of London.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

Andrew Marr talks to the economist Will Hutton about the need to transform a country blighted by inequality and indebted to big finance. While Will Hutton argues for a fairer society, Lars Kroijer comes clean about the life and decisions of a hedge fund manager. Also arguing for greater fairness is Billy Ivory whose latest screenplay, Made In Dagenham, charts the walkout of the women workers at the Ford car plant who fought for equal pay in the 1960s. Women demonstrators form the backbone of Ronit Avni's new documentary film, which shows how one community organiser united both Palestinian and Israeli supporters to save his village from destruction by Israel's Separation Barrier.

Producer: Katy Hickman.

In the first programme of a new series of Start the Week the former MP Lord Hattersley charts the life and politics of David Lloyd George, the Prime Minister responsible for the creation of the welfare state, and a working class man who came to understand the pitfalls of a coalition government. Andrew Marr looks back to the 1980s with the writer Andy McSmith who argues this was the conflict decade, defined by strikes, war and riots. And the philosopher Mary Midgley also criticises the individualism of the time, maintaining that Darwin's 'survival of the fittest' was never a creed in which to live one's life. The Irish-American community in New York is the setting for Richard Bean's new play, in which he uncovers the plots and deals that lead to the American funding of the IRA.