Fashionable intellectuals
Monday 30 April 2007 21:45-22:30 (Radio 3)
Playlist
Fashionable Philosophers
Why have certain intellectuals, from Jean-Paul Sartre to Herbert Marcuse to Jacques Derrida, become globally fashionable, inspiring not just scholarly studies but biographical books, hagiographic films and even fashion items as if they were high-brow pop stars?
A new film featuring Slavoj Zizek - the so-called Elvis of cultural theory - is about to hit our screens. Night Waves invites Julian Baggini and Andy Martin to untangle fashionable philosophers and philosophy as fashion.
John Maeda
Matthew Sweet talks to the digital artist and computer scientist John Maeda. He discusses his new show in London and his search for a balance between simplicity and complexity.
Scott Walker
There'll be something of a musical interlude too as the singer Barb Jungr assesses a documentary about that icon of pop, Scott Walker - and explains why she thinks the baritone deserves all the fuss.
Revenge
And finally revenge - a dish we're always told is best enjoyed cold.Matthew will be asking why writers and film makers seem to be specially drawn to this subject at the moment. Could it be a queasy response to our unstable world?
