RADIO WEEK

The picks of the best of this week’s radio

ENTERTAINMENT Spoken Stories

SUNDAY, 7PM, RTÉ RADIO ONE ★★★★

This week’s story is Easter 2036, written by Neil Jordan and read by Stephen Rea. The story is set in a futuristic, post-pandemic world in which the long-outlawed human hug has been forgotten, along with the kiss, and ultimately the capacity to love. A lowly graduate student has an answer. She makes the connection between the infectiousness of the exuberance and irrationality of love, and harnessing its contagiousness, to recalibrate the present world.

The Lyric Feature

SUNDAY, 6PM, LYRIC FM ★★★★

Singers Iarla Ó Lionaird and Peggy Seeger discuss the global journey of the human voice and ask, why do we sing and what happens when we do?

Between Ourselves

THURSDAY, 6.30PM, BBC RADIO 4 ★★★★ Writer Marian Keyes (pictured) returns with a second series of anecdotes and memories. Her life has been full of darkness — yet she draws on those dark times to create great comic prose.

FACTUAL Talking History

SUNDAY, 7PM, NEWSTALK ★★★★ Presented by Dr Patrick Geoghegan of Trinity College, this lively show takes a critical look at some of the great personalities and political, social and cultural events in history, focusing on the human side.

David Bowie In New York MONDAY, 2.30PM, BBC RADIO 4 EXTRA ★★★★

In this archive interview, recorded a few months after the 9/11 attacks, David Bowie talks about recurring themes in his work, including despair, fear, isolation and the prospect of death, which weighed heavily on his mind.

DRAMA French Like Faiza

SUNDAY, 7.30PM, BBC RADIO 3 ★★★★

After a break-up, and unhappy with the treatment of French Algerians like her in France, Faiza moves to multi-cultural London to escape her feelings of exclusion. But in Turkish-born Ilana Navaro’s play on love, faith and values, Faiza soon becomes disillusioned when she meets Mehdi, a British Pakistani.

Houses of Horror

TUESDAY ,2.30PM, BBC RADIO 4 EXTRA ★★★★

Horror buff Matthew Sweet explores the lowbudget rivalry in the 1960s and 1970s between two British film studios: the mighty Hammer, with such stars as Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, and the smaller Amicus Films. Stephanie Beacham and Inside No. 9’s Reece Shearsmith contribute.

The Eve of St Agnes

FRIDAY, 10AM, BBC RADIO 4 EXTRA ★★★★ This week is the bicentenary of the death of romantic poet John Keats, at 25. Emma Fielding and Robert Glenister star in this dramatisation of his gothic fantasy set in the Middle Ages, about the ancient folk belief that a maiden, if she performed certain rites, would see her future husband on January 20.