Aristotle's Poetics

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961), who was part of the movement known as phenomenology. While less well-known than his contemporaries Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, his popularity has increased among philosophers in ...  Show more

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Plato's Crito and Phaedo, his accounts of the last days of Socrates in prison in 399 BC as he waited to be executed by drinking hemlock. Both works show Socrates preparing to die in the way he had lived: doing philosophy. In the Crito, Plato shows ...  Show more

In the Rhetoric and Poetics, Aristotle explores persuasive speech and engages with ancient tragedy 

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the remarkable achievement of Aristotle (384-322BC) in the realm of biological investigation, for which he has been called the originator of the scientific study of life. Known mainly as a philosopher and the tutor for Alexander the Great, who repo ...  Show more

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Aristotle's ideas on what happiness means and how to live a good life. Aristotle (384-322BC) explored these almost two and a half thousand years ago in what became known as his Nicomachean Ethics. His audience then were the elite in Athens as, he a ...  Show more

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Plato's Symposium, one of the Greek philosopher's most celebrated works. Written in the 4th century BC, it is a dialogue set at a dinner party attended by a number of prominent ancient Athenians, including the philosopher Socrates and the playw ...  Show more