Open Book

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Programme looking at new fiction and non-fiction books

Programme looking at new fiction and non-fiction books, talking to authors and publishers and unearthing lost classics

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Open Book: Belfast in the Blitz

10/04/2022

Belfast in the Blitz

BBC Radio 4 - Open Book, Belfast in the Blitz

Two historic novels about Belfast, literary spinsters, and dissident Russian writers.

Chris Power on new novels by Lucy Caldwell and Louise Kennedy set in historic Belfast.; the new face of fictional "spinsters"; and the plight of dissident Russian writers today.

Chris Power talks with novelists Lucy Caldwell and Louise Kennedy about their new novels, both set in Belfast at intense moments of 20th century history, both treatments of women's lives at a time of war and conflict: Lucy Caldwell's These Days is the story of sisters Emma and Audrey during the terrifying Belfast Blitz of 1941, while Louise Kennedy's Trespasses is about a relationship between an older Protestant man and a younger Catholic woman during the Troubles.

Journalist Emma John discusses how the role and depiction of unmarried women or "spinsters" has changed in fiction.

As the war in Ukraine continues, Sasha Dugdale, a distinguished translator of Russian literature, talks with Chris about the difficult role of dissident Russian writers under Putin's regime.

Producer: Beaty Rubens


Book List – Sunday 10 April and Thursday 14 April

These Days by Lucy Caldwell
Trespasses by Louise Kennedy 
Self-Contained: Scenes from a Single Life by Emma John 
In Memory of Memory by Maria Stepanova: Translated by Sasha Dugdale 
War of the Beasts and the Animals by Maria Stepanova: Translated by Sasha Dugdale 
Second Hand Time by Svetlana Alexievich

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