主播大秀

Marilynne Robinson
Mariella Frostrup talks to the American writer Marilynne Robinson, whose Pulitzer prize-winning novel Gilead, about an elderly priest in small-town Iowa, had critics reaching for the superlatives. She explains why she's chosen to return to the same events in her new book, 主播大秀 - and also reveals the reasons for the twenty-five year silence which followed the publication of her rapturously-received first book Housekeeping.

David Foster Wallace
The book critic John Freeman joins Mariella to pay tribute to the work and lasting influence of the novelist David Foster Wallace, who died this week, aged 46.

Book Collecting
Margaret Willes, the author of a new history of book culture, and the novelist Iain Sinclair discuss the history and quirks of book collectors, from 16th-century aristocrats to modern-day bibliomanes.

Irene Nemirovsky
The writer and founder of Virago Carmen Callil joins Mariella to give a reader's guide to the work of Irene Nemirovsky, whose rediscovered 1942 novel Suite Francaise caused a literary sensation when first published a few years ago.