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BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

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The Essay Podcast

The Essay

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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

Leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond, themed across a week - insight, opinion and intellectual surprise.

The Essay: New Generation Thinkers

The Essay: New Generation Thinkers: Episode 5: The Rise and Fall of the Hairdresser

The Rise and Fall of the Hairdresser

Episode 5

Episode 5: The Rise and Fall of the Hairdresser

New Generation Thinkers

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New Generation Thinker Seán Williams on the depiction of hairdressers in prints and prose

New Generation Thinker Seán Williams considers the depiction of hairdressers in prints and prose and the role they have played in society, from ETA Hoffman to Balzac and beyond.

In 1815 an anonymous author published "Memoirs of an Old Wig" and lamented the influx of French hairdressers to England. From the writings of ETA Hoffmann and Charles Dickens, from Hans Christian Andersen to Balzac and beyond, New Generation Thinker Seán Williams considers the depiction of hairdressers in prints and prose and what it tells us about a transformative period in British and European history. 

The Essay is recorded in front of an audience as part of Sound Frontiers: BBC Radio 3 live at Southbank Centre celebrating 7 decades of pioneering music and culture. 

New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to find academics who can turn their research into radio. 

Producer: Jacqueline Smith.

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Series of reflections presented by the 2016 New Generation Thinkers

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