BBC Radio 4: In Our Time – a new podcast for every subject with shows from the past 14 years

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Our friend Anne has added a wonderful new post to his Anne Is A Man blog about podcasts. Says Anne:

“I used to write that one should always download the In Our Time podcasts and keep for ever. The BBC used to keep only the last episode in the feed. In case one had not kept the episode, the only option to listen was to go to the on-line archive and listen while streaming. While that has become less and less of a bother with WiFi all around and capable smartphones, it still was a pity you had no option. All of this now belongs to the past; the archive is also available for download and one can lay ones hands on any chapter ever.”

The archive has been categorized into five separate feeds, sorted by subject:

BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time - CultureIn Our Time Archive – Culture
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history of ideas. Topics in the Culture feed include: architecture, the Renaissance, writing forms (like the novel, the sonnett and biography), as well as a multitude of specific persons.

Podcast feed: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/iotc/rss.xml


BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time - HistoryIn Our Time Archive – History

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history of ideas. Topics in the History feed include: The Wars of the Roses, specific battles, a multitude of historical personages, as well as the history of tea.

Podcast feed: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/ioth/rss.xml


BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time - PhilosophyIn Our Time Archive – Philosophy

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history of ideas. Topics in the Philosophy feed include: just war, rhetoric, great thinkers (Confucius, Popper, Socrates) as well as specific works of philosophy.

Podcast feed: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/iotp/rss.xml


BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time - ReligionIn Our Time Archive – Religion

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history of ideas. Topics in the Religion feed include: fundamentalism, prayer, the Devil, paganism, the Holy Grail, and the Spanish Inquisition.

Podcast feed: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/iotr/rss.xml


BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time - ScienceIn Our Time Archive – Science

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the history of ideas. Topics in the Religion feed include: genetic engineering, artificial intelligence (and regular intelligence), quantum gravity, oceanography, aliens and cryptography.

Podcast feed: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/iots/rss.xml

Posted by Jesse Willis

George Orwell’s Animal Farm (a 1954 animated movie like an audiobook)

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio News

One piece of criticism I like about this 1954 animated film adaptation of Animal Farm is from an IMDB reviewer named “bob the moo” who wrote: “the narration-heavy delivery makes it more like an audio book than a film.”

I can’t quite agree, it is a movie, but it does certainly leans heavily on the narration.

Most reviewers seem to think it’s a pretty good adaptation, Leonard Maltin gave it four stars, and it is fairly faithful to the novel’s plot. Despite being one of Britian’s first animated features it was apparently funded by the CIA.

[via OpenCulture.com]

Posted by Jesse Willis

AboutSF Audio: The Deadly Mission Of Phineas Snodgrass by Frederik Pohl

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The Deadly Mission Of Phineas Snodgrass

When Frederik Pohl took over the editorship of Galaxy magazine in the early 1960s one of his first editorials read like fiction. The Deadly Mission Of Phineas Snodgrass was Pohl’s response to L. Sprague de Camp’s 1941 novel Lest Darkness Fall.

About SF AudioThe Deadly Mission Of Phineas Snodgrass
By Frederik Pohl; Read by Geoffrey A. Landis
1 |MP3| – Approx. 9 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: AboutSF Audio
Podcast: October 26, 2011
Phineas Snodgrass, a time traveler inspired by L. Sprague de Camp’s Lest Darkness Fall, travels back to 1 BCE and teaches modern medicine to the Romans. First published as an editorial in Galaxy Science Fiction, June 1962.

Podcast feed: http://aboutsf.podomatic.com/rss2.xml

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

Posted by Jesse Willis

KCRW: The Treatment: Interview with Mark Waid about Irredeemable

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The TreatmentKCRW’s The Treatment interviewed comics author Mark Waid about Irredeemable back in August. Elvis Mitchell, the host, does a solid interview. With him Mark Waid makes a compelling case for comics and Irredeemable in particular.

|MP3|

I sought out the interview after reading the first trade paperback (Irredeemable Vol. 1). I’d heard some good things about Mark Waid’s Irredeemable and I picked up the first trade paperback (Irredeemable Vol. 1) despite my not caring much for superhero comics. Other than the stunning work in Greg Rucka and J.H. Williams III’s Batwoman the closest I normally get to supe comics is seeing them get their asses kicked in Garth Ennis’ The Boys.

Irredeemable is a kind of anti-superhero book – the premise being a Superman-like superhero, named The Plutonian, goes crazy and begins murdering his former allies, destroying whole cities and drowning millions of people. The Plutonian is on an unstoppable rampage. The supervillains, his former enemies, want to court him, those who knew him before he turned want to stop him, but both are potential targets of The Plutonian’s unstoppable and god-like superpowers.

I must admit Boom! Studios first collection, issues 1-4, delivers a pretty great story. And though we only get some hints about the solution to the mystery of why such a humanitarian hero would stop, reverse course, and then kill instead of save – is not answered. I’ll probably have to pick up the next volume – though from the sounds of it it’d be good one to pick up at a library as there’s a price jump from Volume 1 to Volume 2 of $7.

Irredeemable - Volume 1

Posted by Jesse Willis

AboutSF AUDIO: Day Million by Frederik Pohl

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Day Million by Frederik Pohl - illustration by Jack Gaughan

In 1966 Rogue published one of the classics of 20th century SF, a short story named Day Million. It is a story that feels both incredibly old and stunningly fresh at the same time. The oldness is caused by its addressing itself to its contemporary audience, a very specific group, the heterosexual men who read men’s magazines. Apparently this group drove red sports cars, drank fine spirits, didn’t care much for “queers”, and most importantly liked looking at sexy women in the pages of something called “magazines.” The plot of the story itself is a romance, set in a world not entirely unlike our own, but also one of the most astonishingly futuristic I’ve ever read. Despite the audience having caught up, at least in these parts, to the liberal mindset Pohl seems to have had in 1966, the story is probably less accessible now because of its need to address its heterosexual 1960s male audience.

In Robert Silverberg’s Worlds Of Wonder (aka Science Fiction 101) Silverberg wrote of Day Million: “Each paragraph of the story – each sentence, in fact – demonstrates that Pohl has devoted most of his life to attaining the broadest and deepest possible understanding of the universe as we comprehend it today.”

Day Million is a five page story that shows the power of Science Fiction.

The podcast below features Frederik Pohl’s own narration, made specifically for AboutSF AUDIO.

About SF AudioDay Million
By Frederik Pohl; Read by Frederik Pohl
1 |MP3| – Approx. 19 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: About SF
Podcast: June 6, 2011
First published in the February-March 1966 issue of Rogue.

Podcast feed: http://aboutsf.podomatic.com/rss2.xml

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

Posted by Jesse Willis

Convention panel (Readercon 2011): Capturing the Hidden History of Science Fiction

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio News

Here’s a convention panel from Readercon 2011 entitled “Capturing the Hidden History of Science Fiction.” It was recorded back in July 2011 and the panelists include Fred Lerner, Barry N. Malzberg, Jamie Todd Rubin, Darrell Schweitzer and Eileen Gunn. Apparently one of the panelists objected to it’s existence on YouTube, but it’s up and online again.

[via SFSignal]

Posted by Jesse Willis