Free Thinking

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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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Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

The ideas shaping our lives today - with artists and thinkers in debates and interviews.

The ideas shaping our lives today - with leading artists and thinkers in extended interview and debate.

Free Thinking: China, Freud, War and Sci-Fi

China

China, Freud, War and Sci-Fi

BBC Radio 4 - Free Thinking, China, Freud, War and Sci-Fi

From AI and fan fiction to 1930s replica antiquities: new ways of thinking about China.

Megan Walsh on Chinese science fiction, Craig Clunas on Freud's collection of Chinese art, and Melissa Fu's new novel on the impact of war on China and its diaspora.

The bombing of Chongqing, Freud’s collection of ancient Chinese artefacts, the boom in science fiction amongst Chinese readers and an increasingly influential generation of educated tech-savvy millennials. We look at how Chinese culture and history looks different, when we look at it through the eyes of Chinese readers and writers, its innovators and its consumers. 

Freud and China is curated by Craig Clunas, Professor Emeritus of the History of Art at the University of Oxford and it runs at the Freud Museum in London from 12th February to 26th June 2022. 

Melissa Fu’s novel Peach Blossom Spring is available from 17th March 2022.

The Subplot: What China Is Reading and Why It Matters by Megan Walsh is published in paperback on February 24th  

Producer: Ruth Watts

Cultural recommendations:
Novels: Tang Jia San Shao, Master of Demonic Cultivation; Liu Cixin, The Three Body Problem; Yan Ge, Strange Beasts of China
TV (all available on YouTube): Nothing But Thirty; Da Ming Feng Hua; and, In The Name Of The People 

There’s plenty more about China in the Free Thinking archives. You can find Xue Xinran exploring China's recent history through the lives and relationships of one family: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0002h89 Is the Shadow of Mao still hanging over China? https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000bmty Frank Dikott considers Mao in a programme looking at ideas about leadership and dictators https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0009bf3 – including a discussion of how Cantonese poetry has fuelled Hong Kong’s democracy movement. 

Image: Readers perusing books at Zhonshuge bookstore in Shanghai.
Image credit: Costfoto/Barcroft Media via Getty Images

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Free Thinking

China, Freud, War and Sci-Fi

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