8 April 2006
Saturday 8 April 2006 22:15-23:00 (Radio 3)
The spotlight is on award winning playwright Kay Adshead and her new radio play, Of the End, inspired by Samuel Beckett. Plus a celebration of the bard of Orkney - storyteller and poet George McKay Brown.
Programme Details
BBC Radio 3's celebration of the centenary of the birth of Samuel Beckett continues apace this week on The Verb with yet another new take on his work. Following on from last week's stunning new play from Anthony Minghella, tune in for the second of three commissioned plays paying homage to Beckett. This week Kay Adshead presents a play she's written especially for the programme, which she performs along with the wonderful Michael Jayston.
Also The Verb celebrates another late, great writer, with a look back on the work of Orkney poet George Mackay Brown. In a writing life that lasted over forty years, he meditated on the landscape and seascape of Orkney, but was also concerned in a strongly spiritual way, not just with the world around him, but with how we live our very lives. The Scottish poet WN Herbert joins The Verb to perform a newly commissioned poem of commemoration, and reflects on Mackay Brown's legacy with the author of a new biography, Maggie Fergusson.
Also on the programme, punk psycho-geographer, poet, activist and electrifying performer Sean Bonney joins The Verb to present his own rather different view of the world, as he seeks to address our personal political lives with his unique brand of poetry.
And the prize-winning novelist Tash Aw shares his worldly experiences of his recent journey to Beijing. He describes the changes in the literary landscape in this rapidly developing country, and the thoughts to be found in the writer's notebooks and literary tea houses of China .
That's all in The Verb with Ian McMillan at 10.15pm here on BBC Radio 3
Additional Information:
Blade Pitch Control Unit by Sean Bonney is published by Salt
Bad Shaman Blues by W.N. Herbert is published by Bloodaxe
George Mackay Brown: The Life by Maggie Fergusson is published by John Murray
The Harmony Silk Factory by Tash Aw is published by Fourth Estate
Producers: Ariane Koek and Laura Thomas
