Great Lives

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Factual: Life Stories

Biographical series in which guests choose someone who has inspired their lives.

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Matthew Parris

Ghosh Helen

Merlin Waterson

Christine Hall

Great Lives: Dame Helen Ghosh on James Lees-Milne

Dame Helen Ghosh on James Lees-Milne

BBC Radio 4 - Great Lives, Dame Helen Ghosh on James Lees-Milne

Matthew Parris talks to the National Trust's Dame Helen Ghosh about James Lees-Milne.

Dame Helen Ghosh  chooses  the writer, and key member of the National Trust, James Lees-Milne. With Matthew Parris. From 2015.

Matthew Parris's guest is Dame Helen Ghosh, Director General of the National Trust, who chooses as her Great Life James Lees-Milne who worked for the Trust between 1936 and 1966. He was responsible for acquiring many of the Trust's most iconic properties and his particular talent was his ability to persuade the aristocratic owners of the houses into handing them over to the Trust for protection. His other talent was in writing, and it is his deliciously indiscreet diaries for which many people know him.

Merlin Waterson, who was a friend of Lees-Milne's, is the expert witness.

Producer Christine Hall. 

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2015.

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