The Symbols of Bliss

RADIO 4FM, 11.30AM

The poet Michael Symmons Roberts presents an unusual and inspiring essay on the work of Charles Bliss, who created a visual language based on diagrams, which he hoped would end world conflict by simplifying communication. Bliss was inspired by his horrific experiences as a young man witnessing pogroms and being imprisoned in the Nazi concentration camps. Though his language didn’t take off globally, Bliss’s work has had another significant legacy, instead becoming a crucial means of communication in special needs education.