John Bowen
Professor of English Literature at the University of York
6 episodes
Appears in multiple episodes with: Rosemary Ashton
Covers topics in categories such as:
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Orwell's dystopian novel where the state rewrites history, war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength - and Big Brother is watching you
15 September 2022
Also featuring: David Dwan, Lisa Mullen
CultureBritish novels adapted into filmsNovels set in LondonBritish novels adapted into television showsEnglish novelsBritish science fiction novelsCensored booksNovels adapted into operasNovels set in fictional countriesNovels adapted into balletsDystopian novelsSocial science fictionNovels adapted into radio programsBritish political novels, Novels about propaganda, Novels about revolutionaries, Novels about totalitarianism, Novels by George Orwell, Secker & Warburg booksBritish novels adapted into playsThe Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Anne Bronte's story of the mysterious Helen Graham who seeks a new independent life as an artist after escaping her abusive, alcoholic husband.
30 September 2021
Also featuring: Alexandra Lewis, Marianne Thormählen
Middlemarch
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss George Eliot's Study of Provincial Life, set before the Reform Act 1832 in a small, fictional town in the Midlands surrounded by farmland.
18 April 2018
Also featuring: Rosemary Ashton, Kathryn Hughes
Wuthering Heights
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Emily Bronte's story of Heathcliff and Cathy, of love, hatred, revenge and self-destruction across two generations in a remote moorland home.
28 September 2017
Also featuring: Karen O'Brien, Alexandra Lewis
CultureBritish novels adapted into filmsVictorian novels1847 British novelsBritish novels adapted into television showsFrame storiesNonlinear narrative novels1840s fantasy novels, Ghost novelsNovels adapted into operasBritish Gothic novelsNovels set in the 18th centuryNovels adapted into balletsNovels set in YorkshireNovels about revengeWorks published under a pseudonymFiction with unreliable narratorsFiction about suicideLove storiesDecline and Fall
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Evelyn Waugh's comic novel Decline and Fall, published when the author was 25.
21 February 2013
Also featuring: David Bradshaw, Ann Pasternak Slater
Dickens
Melvyn Bragg discusses the achievements of Charles Dickens What is his political and literary legacy to our age?
12 July 2001
Also featuring: Rosemary Ashton, Michael Slater
English travel writersEnglish prisoners and detaineesEnglish male dramatists and playwrightsEnglish AnglicansLiteracy and society theoristsAnglican writersEnglish male short story writersWriters of Gothic fictionEnglish philanthropistsEnglish historical novelistsTrope theoristsBurials at Westminster AbbeyVictorian novelists19th-century English novelists19th-century travel writers19th-century English non-fiction writers19th-century British journalists19th-century English historians19th-century British philanthropistsEnglish male novelistsBritish critics of religionsCritics of the Catholic ChurchPeople from Somers Town, LondonEnglish male poets19th-century pseudonymous writersLecturersEnglish reformers19th-century English dramatists and playwrights19th-century English poets19th-century British short story writersEnglish satiristsWriters about activism and social changeEnglish male non-fiction writersWriters from the London Borough of Camden19th-century English essayistsBritish social reformersBritish male essayists