Presented by Ian Hamilton J. G. Ballard 's Empire of the Sun is based on his childhood experiences in Shanghai, when interned by the Japanese during the war. His fellow prisoners compare their memories with his fiction. Seamus Heaney reads from his collection of poems, Station Island, his first for five years. For over half a century D. H. Lawrence 's novel Mr Noon lay unpublished, until this year.
Bryan Appleyard retraces the novel's landscape and pieces together the clues it offers to Lawrence's early life. Producer JENNY COWAN
Executive producer TIMOTHY GARDAM