Editor's note: In Thursday's programme Melvyn Bragg and his guests discussed Pascal. As always the programme is available to listen to online or to download and keep.
Pascal
Hello
After the programme Michela Massimi – whose accent beguiled almost as many listeners as did her erudition – pulled out her copy of Pascal's 'Pensées' in Italian, which she had read at the age of 18 and which made her decide to study philosophy. She said that she had made marginal notes. When I flicked through it I saw that almost EVERY line had been marked in a firmly wielded pencil. David Wootton heaved in to talk about what we write in a book when you violently disagree with the author (it all revolves around exclamation marks). As he'd already said that Voltaire hated Pascal but read him obsessively, we wondered whether there's a copy of the 'Pensées' somewhere, containing Voltaire's marginalia. In fact, for a few minutes, we went marginalia mad. Tom offered examples of his father's method when reviewing books about music. I remembered seeing a copy of 'Lyrical Ballads' with De Quincey's marginalia. (I owned that copy. It was stolen about fifteen years ago. I'm sure I know who did it. Alas he's dead.) There just may be, marginally, a programme in it.
I'm sitting on a bench at the station of Exeter St Davids, looking at a sign which says Hello Exeter. I never saw it. I've just been to the literary festival at Budleigh Salterton. I never saw that either. It's all the fault of In Our Time. This morning we did the live programme on Pascal, followed by a rare event, a recorded programme for next week on the Mamluks, because I'll be in Russia next week. The train was late. The drive was difficult. I arrived five or ten minutes late to an extremely patient audience. The literary tribes of the literary festivals are not only patient, they are sophisticated, intelligent and they give the lie to dumbing down, a cliché which haunts some of the pages of our newspapers. But the original intention was so much richer. I was going to leave at my leisure after the live programme. I was going to see Exeter Cathedral and its extraordinary nave. I was going to look at the sea in Budleigh Salterton and walk in the footsteps of Hilary Mantel, who we recently filmed there. I was going to get sea breeze and ozone. All that was not to be.
Summer was so long and crowded and difficult that I'm going to draw the blinds. Back in London and around Broadcasting House seems every bit as lively as ever. I walked through Regent's Park on the way to work and there were many tricycles specially designed for disabled children. They were whizzing up and down the promenades, each one with a carer beside them, whooping and spinning and turning, and filled with joy at this marvellous machine which gave them speed and fresh air. How nice to live in a country where such a thing is possible.
Best wishes
Melvyn Bragg
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