My Own Shakespeare - Andrew Marr

Editor's note: The 'My Own Shakespeare' series is made up of short two and a half minute programmes which are being broadcast across BBC Radio 3, 4 and 4 Extra. We asked public figures from a wide variety of spheres which was their favourite piece of Shakespeare - our interviewees included Stephen Fry, Zoe Wanamaker, Jools Holland, Gareth Malone, Benjamin Zephaniah and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams.

Andrew Marr kindly agreed to take part in the series. We asked Andrew which piece of Shakespeare he'd save from a burning building? -CM

Andrew Marr took part in My Own Shakespeare

Choosing one piece of Shakespeare is of course bonkers, but bonkers games can be fun and thought-provoking.

I'd imagined I would have to go for one of the musically captivating passages from The Tempest or A Winter's Tale, or my favourite play as a piece of entertainment, As You Like It, but found myself driven back to the great tragedies as the most extreme examples of Stratford Bill as someone almost beyond literature.

Clearly the two greatest of the greatest are Hamlet and Lear - but Lear reaches even deeper into the recesses, both of human horror and salvation through love, (and, yes "fewer quotations") which is why I ended up with that. Nothing written in that bloodiest of centuries, the twentieth, by any existentialist or poet, or any religious leader, comes close to the uncanny insight here.

Download My Own Shakespeare to hear Andrew Marr's interview in full.

• Download Andrew's My Own Shakespeare programme or to sign up for the whole series.
• Listen to Shakespeare's Restless World and watch videos of the objects featured in the series.