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 | In Our Time
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 |  |  | The big ideas which form the intellectual agenda of our age are illuminated by some of the best minds in the world. Melvyn Bragg and three guests investigate the history of ideas and debate their application in modern life. |  |  |  |  | LISTEN AGAIN  |  |  | |
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|  |  |  | | "I'm fascinated by the fact that we live in a time when so many people are doing fantastic work, and thinking in areas which it's not remotely possible for me to keep up with & and these people are prepared to talk about it. They're prepared to come on In Our Time and other programmes on Radio 4 and try and talk to the rest of us ..." |
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 |  |  | THE HOLY GRAIL
Tennyson wrote:
“A cracking and a riving of the roofs, And rending, and a blast, and overhead Thunder, and in the thunder was a cry. And in the blast there smote along the hall A beam of light seven times more clear than day: And down the long beam stole the Holy Grail”.
The sacred allure of the Grail has fascinated writers and ensnared knights for a thousand years. From Malory to Monty Python, it has the richest associations of any artefact in British myth. But where does the story spring from? What does it symbolise and why are its stories so resolutely set in these Isles and so often written by the French?
Contributors
Dr Carolyne Larrington, Tutor in Medieval English at St John’s College, Oxford
Jonathan Riley-Smith, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University
Dr Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh at the University College of Wales in Cardiff
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