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The big ideas which form the intellectual agenda of our age are illuminated by some of the best minds. Melvyn Bragg and three guests investigate the history of ideas and debate their application in modern life. |
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LISTEN AGAIN |
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PRESENTER |
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BIOGRAPHY
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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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PROGRAMME DETAILS |
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ABELARD AND HELOISE
Read audience reactions to this edition to In Our Time.
Use our research page to find out more about this subject.
The story of Abelard and Heloise is a tale of literature and philosophy, theology and scandal, and above all love in the high Middle Ages. They were two of the greatest minds of their time and Abelard, a famous priest and teacher, wrote of how their affair began in his biography, Historia Calamitatum, “Her studies allowed us to withdraw in private, as love desired, and then with our books open before us, more words of love than of reading passed between us, and more kissing than teaching. My hands strayed oftener to her bosom than to the pages; love drew our eyes to look on each other more than reading kept them on our texts”.
Years later, when she was an Abbess at the head of her own convent, Heloise wrote to Abelard: “Even during the celebration of Mass, when our prayers should be purer, lewd visions of those pleasures take such a hold upon my unhappy soul that my thoughts are on their wantonness instead of on prayers”.
Contributors
Anthony Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birbeck College, University of London
Henrietta Leyser, Medieval Historian and Fellow of St Peter’s College, Oxford
Michael Clanchy, Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the Institute of Historical Research
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