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Front Row: Kirk Douglas remembered, American Dirt, Daniel Kehlmann

06/02/2020

Kirk Douglas remembered, American Dirt, Daniel Kehlmann

BBC Radio 4 - Front Row, Kirk Douglas remembered, American Dirt, Daniel Kehlmann

Kirk Douglas tribute, author Daniel Kehlmann, American Dirt controversy.

Kirk Douglas tribute; Daniel Kehlmann on his new novel Tyll; the controversy about Jeanine Cummins's novel American Dirt.

We look at the career of Kirk Douglas who has died at the age of 103. Not only was he a fine actor - and one of the last of the Hollywood Golden Age - he was also a fearless campaigner for social causes who tried to break through the restrictions imposed by the Hollywood system. 

American Dirt, a novel about a mother and son attempting to cross the Mexico/US border, has been the subject of fierce debate over the last fortnight. One of the 2020s' most hotly-anticipated releases, its white author Jeanine Cummins has been accused of exploitation, pedalling clichés and being culturally ‘tone deaf’ to the plight of the lives of Mexican migrants which the book attempts to explore. Ignacio Sanchez Prado, Professor of Latin American Culture, and Telegraph book critic Jake Kerridge, explore the issues.

Daniel Kehlmann, author of the global bestseller Measuring the World, speaks to Samira about his new historical epic Tyll, about a wandering performer and court jester who lives through the Thirty Years War.

Presenter Samira Ahmed
Producer Oliver Jones

Main image: Kirk Douglas
Photo credit: Silver Screen/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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