Last Word Podcast
Radio 4's weekly obituary programme, telling the life stories of those who have died recently
Episodes to download
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Molly Parkin, Kristina Gjerde, Michael Barton, Eva Schloss
Friday
Matthew Bannister on an artist, an activist, a BBC executive and a holocaust survivor.
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Brigitte Bardot, Sir Alec Reed, Alwyn Crawshaw, Dame Shân Legge-Bourke
Fri 2 Jan 2026
Jon Kay on an actor, a businessman, an artist, a landowner
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Antony Price, Sister Stan Kennedy, Ena Collymore Woodstock, John Carey
Boxing Day 2025
Jon Kay on a fashion designer, a nun, a barrister, a literary critic
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Rob Reiner, Joanna Trollope, Stanley Baxter, Sophie Kinsella
Fri 19 Dec 2025
Matthew Bannister on a film-maker, a comedian and two authors.
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Iain Douglas-Hamilton, Vera Weisfeld, Frank Gehry, Martin Parr
Fri 12 Dec 2025
Matthew Bannister on a zoologist, a businesswoman, an architect and a photographer.
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Sir Tom Stoppard, Pam Hogg, Yanxin He, Jack Shepherd
Fri 5 Dec 2025
Matthew Bannister on a playwright, a designer, a language speaker and an actor.
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Jimmy Cliff, Charlotte Bingham, Skye Gyngell, David Bellos
Fri 28 Nov 2025
Kirsty Lang on a musician, a writer, a chef and a translator.
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Baroness Newlove, Zoe Wicomb, Sir Geoffrey Bindman KC, Professor Roland Paxton
Fri 21 Nov 2025
Matthew Bannister on a campaigner, an author, a lawyer and a civil engineer.
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James Watson, Pauline Collins, Judith Vidal-Hall, Dugald Ross
Fri 14 Nov 2025
Matthew Bannister on a scientist, an actor, a journalist and a fossil hunter.
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Dick Cheney, Yvonne Brewster, Mary McGee, Peter Watkins
Fri 7 Nov 2025
Matthew Bannister on a US politician, a theatre director, a campaigner and a film-maker.
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Prunella Scales CBE, Gillian Tindall, Roger Smith, Anthony Grey
Fri 31 Oct 2025
Matthew Bannister on an actor, a writer, an outdoors champion, a journalist
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SPECIAL EDITION: Prunella Scales
Fri 31 Oct 2025
Matthew Bannister talks to Samuel West about his mother Prunella Scales
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Raila Odinga, Bill Colley, Baroness Rosalind Howells, Sister Marion Irvine
Fri 24 Oct 2025
Matthew Bannister on a Kenyan politician, a boat builder, a campaigner, a nun'
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Peter Gurney, Diane Keaton, Peter Hall, Angela Bond
Fri 17 Oct 2025
Matthew Bannister on a bomb disposal expert, an actor, a winemaker and a theatre manager.
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Patrick Bradley, Dame Jilly Cooper, Sara Jane Moore, Dame Patricia Routledge
Fri 10 Oct 2025
Matthew Bannister on an electoral officer, an author, an attempted assassin and an actor.
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Dame Jane Goodall, Tony Harrison, Lord Menzies Campbell, Danny Thompson
Fri 3 Oct 2025
Matthew Bannister on a primatologist, a poet, a politician and a bass player.
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Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, John Stapleton, Mary Elizabeth Dodd, Claudia Cardinale
Fri 26 Sep 2025
Matthew Bannister on an architect, a TV presenter, a physiotherapist and an actor.
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Robert Redford, Barbara Harvey, Rosa Roisinblit, Stuart Craig
Fri 19 Sep 2025
Matthew Bannister on a film star, a historian, a campaigner and a designer.
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The Duchess of Kent, Giorgio Armani, Valerie Pearlman, Rick Davies
Fri 12 Sep 2025
John Wilson on a duchess, fashion designer, judge and a singer.
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Joe Bugner, Ann McManus, Angela Mortimer Barrett, Frank Strang
Fri 5 Sep 2025
John Wilson on a boxer, a writer, a tennis player and an entrepreneur.
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David Richardson, Doris Lockhart Saatchi, Dame Annette Brooke, Byron Rogers
Fri 29 Aug 2025
John Wilson on a broadcaster, an art collector, a former MP and a biographer.
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Terence Stamp, Stephanie Shirley, Kay Dunbar, Eric Midwinter
Fri 22 Aug 2025
John Wilson on an actor, tech pioneer, literacy festival founder, a polymath
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Jim Lovell, Biddy Baxter, Razia Jan, Iris Williams
Fri 15 Aug 2025
Matthew Bannister on an astronaut, an editor, an educator, a singer
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Dame Stella Rimington, Sylvia Young, Sir Jamie McGrigor, Joan Anderson
Fri 8 Aug 2025
Matthew Bannister on an spy boss, a drama school founder, a politician and a craze starter
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Dame Cleo Laine, Hulk Hogan, Margaret Boden, Tom Lehrer
Fri 1 Aug 2025
Matthew Bannister on a singer, a wrestler, a cognitive scientist and a satirist.
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Ozzy Osbourne, Connie Francis, Jacqui Browne, Douglas Chamberlain
Fri 25 Jul 2025
Matthew Bannister on two singers, a campaigner and a cardiologist.
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Sir Ian Blair, Jennie Street, Dr Anna Ornstein, Muhammadu Buhari
Fri 18 Jul 2025
Matthew Bannister on a police commissioner, a farmer, a psychoanalyst and a president.
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Lord Tebbit, Daphne Boden, James Leprino, Sir Francis Graham-Smith
Fri 11 Jul 2025
Matthew Bannister on a politician, a harpist, a businessman and an astronomer.
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Courtney Griffiths KC, Sara Venn, Nina Kuscik, Mohammad Hussain
Fri 4 Jul 2025
Matthew Bannister on a barrister, a gardener, a runner and a soldier.
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Michael Lachmann, Pik-sen Lim, Leon Krier, David 'Syd' Lawrence
Fri 27 Jun 2025
Matthew Bannister on a director, an actor, an architect and a cricketer.
