Meet the Writers
Georgina Godwin in conversation with top authors. Explore their inspirations, writing processes, and the stories behind their books.
Latest Episodes
Lemn Sissay
Lemn Sissay is a poet, playwright and broadcaster. He has read poetry all over the world and was awarded an MBE for services to literature. He is chancellor of The University of Manchester and was the first poet commissioned to write for the London Olympics. Sissay is a regular contributor…
Monocle Reads: Alison Finch
Alison Finch is a prolific reader, which is handy seeing as she’s the main filtering point for all books coming into BBC Radio 4. She decides which writers will be featured and the programmes that will interview them. Finch gives us a fascinating insight into what’s behind the books output…
Adam Nicolson
Towards the end of the 1790s, Coleridge and Wordsworth – then young, aspiring poets – lived in Somerset, dreaming of a world changed by poetry. Adam Nicolson spent a year living there so that he could fully explore the genesis of the poems that came from that place and which…
Monocle Reads: Nicholas Blincoe
This week Georgina sits down with Nicholas Blincoe. He’s written several novels and is also a critic, journalist and screenwriter. His latest book, ‘More Noble Than War: The Story of Football in Israel and Palestine’, takes a look at the history of the beautiful game in the divided region.
Monocle Reads: DJ Taylor
DJ Taylor is a British critic, writer and novelist. He has written award-winning biographies of George Orwell and William Thackeray, as well as being longlisted for the 2011 Man Booker prize for his novel ‘Derby Day’. His latest book, ‘Lost Girls: Love, War and Literature 1939–1951’, explores the remarkable lives…
Lalage Snow
Georgina Godwin talks to Lalage Snow, a freelance war correspondent, photographer and film-maker. Her first book, ‘War Gardens: A Journey Through Conflict in Search of Calm’, is a surprising, tragic and beautiful journey through the darkest places of the modern world that reveals the ways people make time and space…
Henry Porter
Henry Porter is the former UK editor of ‘Vanity Fair’ and a long-standing campaigner for civil liberties. He has written five internationally bestselling thrillers. In this episode he talks to Georgina Godwin about journalism, press freedom, activism and his most recent book ‘White Hot Silence’, a prescient story of financial…
Monocle Reads: Andy Cope Zest
This week Georgina sits down with Andy Cope. Andy is a British author, keynote speaker and former academic, and is the author of ‘Zest: How to Squeeze the Max Out of Life’. The author’s message is simple: “Life is a short and precious gift. Don’t send it back unwrapped.”
Louise Doughty
English novelist and screenwriter Louise Doughty joins Georgina Godwin in the studio. Doughty is the author of 10 novels, including ‘Platform Seven’, recently filmed for ITV, and the bestseller ‘Apple Tree Yard’, adapted for BBC One. She also wrote and created the hit 2022 BBC drama ‘Crossfire’. Her latest novel,…
Monocle Reads: William Clegg
William Clegg is a British lawyer specialising in serious crime. He’s recently released a gripping behind-the-scenes memoir called ‘Under the Wig: A Lawyer’s Stories of Murder, Guilt and Innocence’. The book revisits some of Clegg’s most intriguing trials and, in the process, touches on the secrets of his profession as…
