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Harriett Gilbert and friends present global arts, culture and entertainment.

This programme is no longer on-air, listen to our archive of available episodes online. The Strand brings you news and reviews from the best in arts, culture and entertainment.

*** This programme is no longer on-air, but please listen to our archive of available episodes online ***

The Strand is a daily 18 minute programme highlighting the best of what's going in the arts. Wide-ranging and with eclectic interests, The Strand reflects the artistic response to the BBC's news agenda. Presented by Harriett Gilbert and friends, it features discussions, reviews, big-name interviews and location reports as well as live studio performances and Hollywood, Bollywood gossip.

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The Strand Archive: Hilary Mantel interview

Hear My Country

18/01/2013

Hilary Mantel interview

BBC World Service - The Strand Archive, Hilary Mantel interview

'I have never experienced terror like that again' - Hilary Mantel

Author Hilary Mantel explains how the supernatural permeates her work, from visions of malevolent spirits in her childhood to dealing with witchcraft whilst living in Botswana

The best of the world's arts, film, music and literature brought to you every day.  Presented by Harriett Gilbert

The prize-winning writer Hilary Mantel joins Harriett Gilbert on The Strand to discuss how the supernatural permeates her work in mysterious ways.

From her own childhood visions of malevolent spirits and her adult experience of witchcraft in Botswana, to her 16th Century English protagonist Thomas Cromwell’s beliefs in an afterlife and a judgement day – Hilary Mantel ponders the existence of ghosts and whether or not she is haunted by the characters in her historical fiction.

Having already won the Man Booker prize for Wolf Hall (in 2009) and Bring Up the Bodies (in 2012), we’re just days away from finding out if the second book in her epic Cromwell trilogy will be selected as the Costa Book of the Year (to be announced on 29th Jan).

(Photo: Writer Hilary Mantel. Credit: John Haynes)

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