Red Thread: On Mazes and Labyrinths

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Charlotte Higgins

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Red Thread: On Mazes and Labyrinths by Charlotte Higgins: 4. Underground

4. Underground

Red Thread: On Mazes and Labyrinths by Charlotte Higgins

BBC Radio 4 - Red Thread: On Mazes and Labyrinths by Charlotte Higgins, 4. Underground

Meet a maze-maker and celebrate the most famous subterranean maze – London's Underground.

Charlotte Higgins meets with maze-maker and celebrates the most famous subterranean maze – the London Underground. From 2018.

Charlotte Higgins describes a meeting with maze-maker Adrian Fisher, who over a 30-year career has designed 42 hedge mazes and 51 mirror mazes - where glass is "set into the walls of tunnels to cast infinite reflections and to bewilder the eye completely." 

Solving mazes is a shared experience that binds families together, says Fisher - although Higgins notes that his wife Marie "is not a great one for mazes; or rather, she just likes to know she can get out of them..."

Charlotte also tells how artist Mark Wallinger chose to mark the 150th birthday of one of Britain's greatest and most famous subterranean mazes - the London Underground. 

Series exploring more of our ancient fascination with mazes and labyrinths, and reflects on their significance - in art and in mythology, in literature and in life.

Written and read by Charlotte Higgins.

Abridged and produced by David Jackson Young.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in August 2018.

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Author Charlotte Higgins explores our ancient fascination with mazes and labyrinths.

Charlotte Higgins reflects on the significance of mazes and labyrinths in art and mythology, in literature and in life.

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