:00:11. > :00:19.Tonight, celebrity and the media, from Marilyn Monroe to a Prime
:00:19. > :00:24.Minister, blackmailed into bizarre sex, live on TV.
:00:24. > :00:29.In a week when contemporary stars talked about the price of fame, the
:00:29. > :00:34.new film explores Marilyn Monroe's inner demons, and her conflict with
:00:34. > :00:38.celebrity. All people ever see is Marilyn Monroe.
:00:38. > :00:43.The public's appetite for scandal is laid bear in Charlie Brooker's
:00:43. > :00:49.parable of a Prime Minister's terrible dilemma. Do we secretly
:00:49. > :00:53.relish media intrusion. I will be executed.
:00:53. > :01:01.Plus, hidden treasures brought to light at the Ashmolean museum in
:01:01. > :01:04.Oxford. The long lost first novel of Jack
:01:05. > :01:12.Kerouac. "the sea stretching around the horizon, the rich clean sound
:01:12. > :01:21.of the bow spliting the water. Music from Beer Jacket.
:01:21. > :01:25.# The blows hard in your dead heart # Captain of the soul
:01:25. > :01:32.I'm joined tonight by the actress, Maureen Lipman, the journalist
:01:32. > :01:34.Sarfraz Manzoor, writer and critic, Paul Morley, and Sarah Churchwell,
:01:34. > :01:40.Professor of American literature at the university of East Anglia. Join
:01:40. > :01:43.in the discussions at home by sending in tweets, we read each one.
:01:43. > :01:47.All through this week we have heard celebrities and others expose the
:01:47. > :01:51.underhand tactics of the tabloids, but they feed a public appetite,
:01:51. > :01:56.which is hardly anything new. In the 1950s, Marilyn Monroe could
:01:56. > :01:59.barely walk down a street without being mobbed. A new film, My Week
:01:59. > :02:08.With Marilyn, aims to uncover more about the real woman behind the
:02:08. > :02:11.public figure. She's here, said the headlines,
:02:12. > :02:16.everyone now it meant the American film star with the famous shape and
:02:16. > :02:21.wiggley walk. Marilyn Monroe visited the UK only once, in 1956
:02:21. > :02:27.the world's most famous movie star, boarded a plane with her new
:02:27. > :02:31.husband, Arthur Miller. She had come here to make The
:02:31. > :02:34.Prince and the Showgirl, with the acclaimed actor and director,
:02:34. > :02:39.Lawrence Olivier, it was her first film as producer and star, and
:02:39. > :02:44.crucially, a chance to prove herself as a serious actress. But
:02:44. > :02:46.the production wasn't a happy time for Monroe, who was becoming
:02:46. > :02:50.increasingly addicted to prescription drugs and alcohol. She
:02:50. > :02:55.and Olivier clashed over everything, from her lateness on set to her
:02:55. > :03:01.obsession with method acting. With the marriage to Miller already
:03:01. > :03:06.crumbling, Monroe felt very vulnerable. Enter 23-year-old
:03:06. > :03:10.assistant director, Colin Clark, the old Eatonian son of art
:03:10. > :03:14.historian, Keneth Clarke, who was starting his first job in the
:03:14. > :03:22.business. My Week With Marilyn is based on his memoir of the week he
:03:22. > :03:27.spent with Hollywood's most memorable actress. She and Olivier
:03:27. > :03:32.were talking a dlifrpb language. She decided this wuing man, Colin
:03:32. > :03:37.Clark was someone to trust and befriend, eventhough they had aner
:03:37. > :03:47.rottically charged few days together, she was able to recapture
:03:47. > :03:49.
:03:49. > :03:54.her lost childhood with him. Given this is his first feature film,
:03:54. > :04:04.Curtis has managed to assemble an impressive cast, including Kenneth
:04:04. > :04:05.
:04:05. > :04:10.Branagh, Eddie Redmayne, Dame Judi Devon, and Michelle Williams.
:04:10. > :04:13.knew Michelle Williams was a great actress, but I didn't know what a
:04:14. > :04:18.great dancer and singer she was. It was great to surround her with a
:04:18. > :04:23.great team of people. At the heart of it was Michelle's brilliance. I
:04:23. > :04:26.love seeing her sing the songs from the tripbstripbs and other times in
:04:26. > :04:29.Marylin's life -- The Prince and the Showgirl, and other times in
:04:29. > :04:35.Marylin's life. Does My Week With Marilyn manage to give new insight
:04:35. > :04:40.into the legendary star, or is it just another tribute to a pop icon.
:04:40. > :04:47.# The way that I move # That thermometer proves
:04:47. > :04:51.# That I certainly can Sarah, you have written about
:04:51. > :04:53.Marilyn Monroe, you know her life very well, how well do you think
:04:53. > :04:57.that Michelle Williams manages so capture the essence of the woman
:04:57. > :05:02.and the star? It is a performance that is getting a lot of hype. I
:05:02. > :05:06.have to say I think it deserves it, it is an extraordinarily,
:05:06. > :05:11.technically remarkable performance. She gets not only Marylin's
:05:11. > :05:21.mannerisms, she really gets her voice very well, particularly. She
:05:21. > :05:21.
:05:21. > :05:27.also gets the tremulous that Marylin brought to her performance,
:05:27. > :05:30.she quivered, she was almost like a humming bird. I think the problem
:05:30. > :05:35.for anyone playing Marilyn Monroe, Marilyn Monroe is Marilyn Monroe
:05:35. > :05:40.for a reason, it is like trying to play Cary Grant, there are a
:05:40. > :05:45.handful of people who were transcendant, people use words like
:05:45. > :05:48."all chem me" and "magic to talk about her, there is no word for the
:05:48. > :05:51.presence she has on the screen. Nobody can do that. However good
:05:51. > :05:54.the performance is, and Michelle Williams can't do that. It is not
:05:54. > :06:04.her fault, it can't be done. close do you think Michelle
:06:04. > :06:08.
:06:08. > :06:13.Williams got to the all can he me? You are being -- you are being
:06:13. > :06:19.asked to play an energy. It is in the middle of a pedestrain film, a
:06:19. > :06:22.film made up of a lot of acting, some acting you will like, you will
:06:22. > :06:27.like Branagh's Olivier, because he brings Olivier to us, you won't
:06:27. > :06:32.like Emma Watson, or the lady who plays Vivien Leigh, and within it
:06:32. > :06:42.is the performance of Marylin, for Michelle Williams it will put her
:06:42. > :06:46.on the Oscar list. Her performance is a photocopy of a photocopy of a
:06:46. > :06:51.rumour someone once said about Marilyn Monroe. If you are up on
:06:51. > :06:53.Marilyn Monroe it is disappointing, if not it is a film of good acting.
:06:53. > :06:58.The clash between Marilyn Monroe and Lawrence Olivier, who you have
:06:58. > :07:04.worked with in the past? I did, and Kenneth Branagh is fantastic. He
:07:04. > :07:09.gets the normality of the man, along with the, the fact is, that
:07:09. > :07:14.period of time, Olivier wanted to do what Monroe could do, and Monroe
:07:14. > :07:17.wanted to do what Olivier could do, she wanted to be a great actress,
:07:17. > :07:21.and he a movie star. He didn't know how to deal with her, she was just
:07:21. > :07:26.was on the screen, and he acted. I think possibly Michelle Williams
:07:26. > :07:30.does work from the outside in. And like Marilyn Monroe did, I think
:07:31. > :07:34.that Kenneth Branagh worked from the outside, like Olivier did,
:07:34. > :07:38.there is these wonderful moments when he says it's like teaching
:07:38. > :07:45.Urdu to a badger, and he goes completically, it is so familiar
:07:45. > :07:52.that, I gets it right. -- completely, it is so familiar, he
:07:52. > :07:58.gets it right. The world of these two huge egos, and then comes the
:07:58. > :08:00.character of Colin Clark, in a sense an outsider? He was the
:08:00. > :08:10.weaker part, Kenneth Branagh is brilliant. Michelle Williams, like
:08:10. > :08:15.you say, it reminded me of Will Smith playing muham med Ali, it is
:08:15. > :08:18.such an incendiary character. In the novel's so campy, making
:08:18. > :08:22.comments, he has interesting thoughts, but the guy who is Clark
:08:22. > :08:26.in the film is bland guy. Firstly, you don't understand why Marilyn
:08:26. > :08:30.Monroe would invest her faith in him, and secondly, this sexual
:08:30. > :08:35.thing, which is this erotically- charged relationship. In the book
:08:35. > :08:38.you realise he has an experience of gay sex in the diary. You think why
:08:38. > :08:43.don't you sleep with Marilyn Monroe if you have the chance. It raises
:08:43. > :08:47.two points, if we believe Colin Clark, it is based on two books he
:08:47. > :08:57.wrote, one published in 1995 and 2000, years after everybody
:08:57. > :09:02.involved was dead. My own sense is this is boardering on apocrophy, it
:09:02. > :09:06.is embellished. There are lots of diaries of Marylin, I have read
:09:06. > :09:10.hundreds of them. It is probably very embroidered. The second point,
:09:10. > :09:15.the film is very, very polite to both of the principals, even in
:09:15. > :09:20.Colin Clark's books, he has a bitchy side, he allows both of them
:09:20. > :09:24.were monstrous, which this film don't. It want them both to be
:09:24. > :09:28.really nice people. It has a Sunday night television quality, the way
:09:28. > :09:32.it is shot, everything is order, the darkness about Monroe doesn't
:09:32. > :09:37.come through. And Olivier. Colin Clark is played almost like, it is
:09:37. > :09:41.a very gentle, very, it is vaguely charming. It is a biopicture, it
:09:41. > :09:45.isn't the whole of Marilyn Monroe's life, it takes a week. And we learn
:09:45. > :09:53.more about her from that week? of course, he, the Eddie Redmayne,
:09:53. > :09:57.and he's very good a cross between Mia Farrow and Andy Murray, he just
:09:57. > :10:01.looms and is adorable. The film is interesting, and you mentioned this
:10:01. > :10:06.with Olivier and Monroe, it does capture a moment where celebrity
:10:06. > :10:10.changes and actors are passed on and stars are becoming, the film is
:10:10. > :10:16.a passing of the torch. Olivier knows his time is gone, and the
:10:16. > :10:20.acting he does is on the way out and the acting Monroe does is there.
:10:20. > :10:25.He goes to the Royal Court and sucks out all the new Osbourne
:10:25. > :10:31.stuff. It is It is a turning point for Olivier it is the stage and a
:10:31. > :10:34.new wave of theatre. Ultimately the take on both of them is fairly
:10:34. > :10:40.superficial, the more you know about Marylin, there is more
:10:40. > :10:42.interesting things, even in the filming of The Prince and the
:10:42. > :10:47.Showgirl, Olivier said terrible things about her from the beginning,
:10:47. > :10:50.before all of that, he was rude to her before. Many of the things in
:10:50. > :10:55.the film could have been told 40 years a there doesn't seem to be
:10:55. > :11:00.any use of our hindsight. It is not a new take. It was about the part
:11:00. > :11:03.of in his downfall. It was very important to Colin Clark, it wasn't
:11:03. > :11:08.important historically, and I don't suppose Marilyn remembered it at
:11:08. > :11:15.all, it was a couple of weeks. claims she called him just before
:11:15. > :11:25.she died. Using this as a small kernal, it was tamely written. It
:11:25. > :11:27.could have been an episode of Downton Abbey. Same casting. Green
:11:28. > :11:35.light casting. Marilyn Monroe did pay the ultimate price for fame
:11:35. > :11:40.with her famous and untimely death from an overdose. To what limits
:11:40. > :11:48.will people go to cling to fame and power. That is a question supposed
:11:48. > :11:53.by Charlie Brooker's new drama, The National Anthem. Script writer,
:11:53. > :11:58.comlumist and author Charlie Brooker, is renowned for his
:11:58. > :12:03.commentry on contemporary culture. With 400,000 followers on Twitter,
:12:03. > :12:10.it is no surprise the social media revolution has inspired his latest
:12:10. > :12:18.TV series. Black Mirror is his take on the Twilight Zone, the American
:12:18. > :12:23.1950s sci-fi drama, which reflected fears about nuclear war and the
:12:23. > :12:27.McCarthy era. So, what are the contemporary British issues which
:12:27. > :12:32.Brooker wants to explore? I was thinking about the relationship
:12:32. > :12:37.between rolling news and things like Twitter, you get these waves
:12:37. > :12:40.of opinion and information, rolling in at you. It is sort of too much
:12:40. > :12:45.to take. Often many days you wake up and think the news has gone
:12:45. > :12:48.surreal today. It feels like nobody is really in charge. The first of
:12:48. > :12:53.three films, The National Anthem covers the hours following the
:12:53. > :12:56.kidnap of a member of the Royal Family. Please don't kill me.
:12:56. > :13:02.Prime Minister is responsible for securing the Princess's release,
:13:02. > :13:05.but the hostage-takers make a rather unorthodox randsom demand.
:13:05. > :13:11.The PM, Michael Callow, played by Rory Kinnear, is forced to question
:13:11. > :13:16.how far he will go for Queen and country. Saving the Princess's
:13:16. > :13:23.bacon would prove his loyalty, but also cause widespread revulsion.
:13:23. > :13:26.The sensational news story spreads rapidly around the country. Forcing
:13:26. > :13:30.traditional media to defy Number Ten's attempts to keep it secret.
:13:30. > :13:35.Technology is a thread running through all three Black Mirror
:13:35. > :13:39.films, and Brooker isam belief lent about our current obsession with it.
:13:40. > :13:44.The first thing I do when I wake up is grab a smart phone and start
:13:44. > :13:48.checking Twitter and e-mail and things like that. Everyone can feel
:13:48. > :13:55.their brain is being rewired in some way. I'm for technology, I'm
:13:55. > :13:58.worried about what it is doing to us, it is a destrubgt jif and de--
:13:58. > :14:02.destrubgtive relationship. It is described as a twisted parable for
:14:02. > :14:07.the Twitter age. What does it say about how the media shape the news
:14:07. > :14:17.and how we consume it. What now, what is the play book. This is
:14:17. > :14:19.
:14:19. > :14:23.virgin territory, there is no play book.
:14:23. > :14:27.This could be done slapstick and purely for laughs, it isn't like
:14:27. > :14:31.that? It is fantastic. I thought it was an amazing piece of sat tie, it
:14:31. > :14:35.is black and bleak, and it is very -- satire, it is black and bleak
:14:35. > :14:39.and very worrying, it is impecably cast, every actor in it is
:14:39. > :14:44.completely right and good. The timing is so good, the director has
:14:44. > :14:49.done such a good job. It looks amazing, it is quite shocking. It
:14:49. > :14:55.is what satire should be. There is a fantastic twist at the end. Not a
:14:55. > :15:00.twist, it is not fantastic, it is good. Rory Kinnear, is such a
:15:00. > :15:09.talented actor. He plays the Prime Minister, his wife is well cast. It
:15:09. > :15:12.is very funny. You laugh in spite of yourself. Were you as
:15:12. > :15:16.captivated? No, I feel like you are decribing a different film from the
:15:16. > :15:21.one I saw. I agree it is very dark, I didn't think it was remotely
:15:21. > :15:29.funny. I didn't laugh for a second. You didn't laugh at the first sight
:15:29. > :15:34.of the person? No I didn't. The thing for me is a satire, it is
:15:34. > :15:40.called a twisted parable, it needs to be funny, it needs to be like
:15:41. > :15:45.The Thick Of It, it begs comparisons there, or needed to be
:15:45. > :15:49.more twisted. The quote there where he says it is virgin territory and
:15:49. > :15:53.there is no play book, I thought I have seen this a lot of times
:15:53. > :15:56.before. They have pushed it, I don't want to ruin it. But they
:15:56. > :16:01.have just gone further than most people are willing to go. That is
:16:01. > :16:04.not actually to me making it fun or more meaningful. The twist at the
:16:04. > :16:07.end, you say, it is a twist at the beginning, you are avoiding the
:16:07. > :16:11.twist at the beginning because you are not going there at all, you are
:16:11. > :16:16.holding off that to deliver that to the fresh audience. It is a very
:16:16. > :16:21.difficult one. It is not something you want to discuss but you don't
:16:21. > :16:27.want to spoil the splot. It is as if David Cameron is having to have
:16:27. > :16:37.sex with a pig to save Kate Middleton what ultimately turns out
:16:37. > :16:37.
:16:37. > :16:42.to be bleepbleep. It is the blackmail threat. It is a plot to
:16:42. > :16:47.engage with this kind of thing. Possibly the programme that will
:16:47. > :16:51.save Channel 4 next year on the 30th anniversary, at last some
:16:51. > :16:55.intelligent life, a response to where we are, and what is happening
:16:55. > :17:00.to it, from someone aware of it. Charlie Brooker is very good on
:17:00. > :17:06.this world. Even he can make one of the funnyiest lives in it, "it is
:17:06. > :17:10.trending on Twitter", or "it is someone she knows from Downton
:17:10. > :17:16.Abbey", it is something happening lately. It is reality itself
:17:16. > :17:21.changing, and an attempt to respond to that. How the traditional media
:17:21. > :17:30.has been caught out by the Internet, the news spreads. You were mention
:17:30. > :17:36.about The Thick Of It, I was thinking about Day Today and Brass
:17:36. > :17:39.End, news was God, they are talking about the mainstream media held to
:17:39. > :17:42.randsom by Twitter and all that, now everyone is chasing after
:17:42. > :17:46.things. In that sense, the other thing interesting about it, I think
:17:46. > :17:50.it is basically a one-line programme run to an hour. But it is
:17:50. > :17:55.a comedy that has been directed as a political thriller, in that sense,
:17:55. > :18:03.because the acting is so overthe top, and hamy, if you want to put
:18:03. > :18:07.it -- over the top, and hamy and over the top. What that girl does
:18:07. > :18:10.at the beginning is one of the hardest things an act stress can do.
:18:11. > :18:16.Unlike a lot of political satires like this, where the Prime Minister
:18:16. > :18:20.would be a two-dimensional stoodge, we are sympathetic for him and the
:18:20. > :18:24.might. At the end, the resolution with his wife is very unpredictable.
:18:24. > :18:28.The whole thing is. It is beautifully acted. There are people
:18:28. > :18:34.doing things in this that they are not doing in the Shakespeare.
:18:34. > :18:38.view it as a drama. But that to me is what kills the joke. On the
:18:38. > :18:43.contrary, they play it straight, that is funny. It would be if the
:18:43. > :18:47.lines were funny. The problem is. It is trending on twiter, that is a
:18:47. > :18:52.brilliant thing. I think that Charlie Brooker is an incredible
:18:52. > :18:55.writer and I was looking forward to it. What struck me about it n the
:18:55. > :18:59.week of the Leveson Inquiry, was the public attitude towards what
:18:59. > :19:03.was happening and how gripped they were. And how complicit they are in
:19:03. > :19:07.this, which is something we have seen. 140 characters changes a
:19:07. > :19:10.Government. But also I think part of that is this is the relationship
:19:10. > :19:14.that Black Mirror deals with in way that My Week With Marilyn doesn't.
:19:14. > :19:17.It is a two-way relationship, the public can respond to things, and
:19:17. > :19:21.have a view, and what is interesting in fact in Black Mirror
:19:21. > :19:27.is the Prime Minister is constantly being told about on-line polling.
:19:27. > :19:31.His decision making is having to be done based on on-line polling. That
:19:31. > :19:35.is a more reactive world than my week. Definitely tackling a world
:19:35. > :19:38.where the control seems to be in the hands of ordinary people, but
:19:38. > :19:42.in fact they have been given the illusion of control but it is all
:19:42. > :19:46.taken away from them. What is interesting with Black Mirror, is
:19:46. > :19:49.although the narrative is that Twitter, it is trending on there,
:19:49. > :19:55.the blackmailer wants the event to be broadcast on TV. There is still
:19:55. > :20:01.a sense that actually TV does matter. That tension between the
:20:01. > :20:04.mainstream media and the Internet world hasn't been resolved. It is
:20:04. > :20:07.that tension between media and celebrity and what people will do
:20:07. > :20:14.for power. That goes back to what we were saying about Marylin too?
:20:14. > :20:17.One of the things, one of the strix that film misses about celebrity
:20:17. > :20:20.and Marylin's relationship to celebrity, is fame was the great
:20:20. > :20:24.achievement of her life and the proof of her value. When we talk
:20:24. > :20:28.about the way the crowd can control these sorts of discourses, it is an
:20:28. > :20:36.illusion. In part, because so many are chasing fame themselves. Talk
:20:36. > :20:40.to young people today and so many say their goal is to be famous.
:20:40. > :20:45.irony of all irony is the Leveson Inquiry is said to be hijacked by
:20:45. > :20:48.celebrity. The father of one of the 7/7 victims won't appear in front
:20:48. > :20:52.of it because he fears that. Charlie Brooker says in his
:20:52. > :20:55.interview, to respond to a piece of satire or a response to it when the
:20:55. > :21:00.thing itself is becoming more and more surreal. I was watching the
:21:00. > :21:07.DVD in Black Mirror and behind was the Iveson, the two things were
:21:07. > :21:12.merging together, to give a hint. Never has Hugh Grant been more Hugh
:21:12. > :21:16.Grant-like. And Hugh Grant for Prime Minister, was on Twitter.
:21:16. > :21:19.has already played that. To have something that is engaging with
:21:19. > :21:22.dislocation and dissolving of reality is very refreshing. It is
:21:22. > :21:26.very difficult to do. And everyone is very scared of it. It seems to
:21:27. > :21:32.be spoiling the party. You will all get a chance to see Black Mirror if
:21:32. > :21:37.you want on Channel 4 on the 4th of December. Fame beyond the grave was
:21:37. > :21:42.guaranteed in Ancient Egypt by the most elaborate funeral arrangements
:21:42. > :21:47.in his treatment most of it is on show on the first ever public
:21:47. > :21:50.museum, the Ashmolean in Oxford. It was rebuilt some years ago, a
:21:50. > :21:56.series of Egyptian galleries will be open to the public, showcaseing
:21:56. > :22:01.one of the finest archaeological exhibitions in the world.
:22:01. > :22:04.Amassed over 300 years, the Ashmolean collection of Nile Valley
:22:04. > :22:10.art facts reflects the long standing British passion for
:22:10. > :22:13.Egyptling to. Now six new galleries showcase mummies, coffins, shrines
:22:14. > :22:19.and statues, many of which have been hidden away in store for years.
:22:19. > :22:25.The result is a journey tracing 3,000 years of culture in Egypt and
:22:26. > :22:32.Nubia, now Sudan. Featuring some remarkable pieces. This is the
:22:32. > :22:39.shrine of the king who ruled in the 25th dinnasty. Excavated in Sudan.
:22:39. > :22:46.It was sound by the first professor of Egyptology, who packed the
:22:46. > :22:51.shrine away into 150 creates and transported it back to dk cats and
:22:51. > :22:58.transported it back to -- crates and transported it back to the
:22:58. > :23:03.university. This is one of the most iconic piece, the Princess fresco,
:23:03. > :23:09.excavated in the 1890, and an intimate portrayal of the Royal
:23:09. > :23:15.Family, lounging at a palace, including two of the six daughters
:23:15. > :23:22.of the king and his Queen Nefertiti. Behind me were r two huge statues
:23:22. > :23:25.of the fertility God, they were excavated in 183, we have
:23:25. > :23:30.reconstructed them at their original heat.
:23:30. > :23:33.Display cases protect items carefully restored. Modern medical
:23:33. > :23:37.technology has revealed more about some objects in the collection than
:23:37. > :23:45.had ever been known before. Complimenting the ancient exhibits
:23:45. > :23:55.is a new installation, by the artist, Angela Palmer, based on CT
:23:55. > :23:55.
:23:55. > :24:00.scans of a two-year-old boy mummy, died at the end of the Egyptian
:24:00. > :24:07.century. There is contemporary art to allow the public to peer below
:24:08. > :24:13.the bandages. The new galleries show case one of the greatest arbg
:24:13. > :24:19.facts of the period outside of Egypt. How does it help our
:24:19. > :24:24.understanding of this ancient civilisation.
:24:24. > :24:31.You enter these new galleries through what was once the shop,
:24:31. > :24:34.into what was probably the most unusual part of the exhibition, the
:24:34. > :24:42.predynastic work, we are not familiar with that? I loved this
:24:42. > :24:46.exhibition. When you see Egypt you see the blockbuster, the pyramids.
:24:46. > :24:50.They were doing the narrative story, the beginning, the connections
:24:50. > :24:54.between 3,000 years of history, the thing I most loved about it was it
:24:54. > :24:59.was telling you the human story, underneath the civilisation. You
:24:59. > :25:04.keep talking about things like, Egyptian civilisation, pyramids,
:25:04. > :25:07.kings. What was really important the small items about the human
:25:07. > :25:11.stories, the clump of human hair, things that people were buried with.
:25:11. > :25:16.Suddenly you are not talking about civilisations, or thousands of
:25:16. > :25:20.people, it is individuals. I found it incredibly powerful. The things
:25:20. > :25:26.they buried with was their every day life, everything they would
:25:26. > :25:29.need for the next life. wonderful boat carved with 14
:25:29. > :25:34.different characters doing different things to take them to
:25:34. > :25:37.the rest world. Jewellery, various things, it was just gorgeous. A
:25:37. > :25:44.lovely exhibition. There was a particular piece of jul jewellery I
:25:44. > :25:51.love, a naked woman holding a little bowl. With a ceramic spoon.
:25:51. > :25:55.A spoon for make-up. Exploring back to the predynastic period, pieces
:25:55. > :25:59.of art that looks abstract. Completely contemporary. I find
:25:59. > :26:02.when you go to these exhibitions, as much as you are looking into the
:26:02. > :26:06.past you are looking into the future. An extraordinary sense of
:26:06. > :26:10.how they were making works of art, how they were decribing their
:26:10. > :26:14.feelings, how they were preerpbg for death. Is so un-- preparing for
:26:14. > :26:21.death. It is so modern. It is an extraordinary amount of information
:26:21. > :26:25.to fill in what are inextra ordinary gaps in knowledge. Because
:26:26. > :26:29.the gallery is filled with intimate moments and takes you through the 6
:26:29. > :26:35.though words in such an intelligent way, you don't feel overwhelmed and
:26:35. > :26:45.you piece together the information. Little laund royalists and sick
:26:45. > :26:48.
:26:48. > :26:53.notes written on -- loyal sick notes written on -- little sick
:26:53. > :26:58.notes written on there. And the idea of knowledge, you could take
:26:58. > :27:02.three or four hours to digest T the first room is a bit deceptive, it
:27:02. > :27:07.is empty, and there are two big statues, it gets more and more
:27:07. > :27:12.intense, and the displays get more filled. You could spend hours. It
:27:12. > :27:16.is wonderful, one of the things I loved about it, we haven't
:27:16. > :27:23.mentioned it. They have done architectural renovations to create
:27:23. > :27:27.parallel spaces, so you can see, as Egypt is evolving, Nubia, or Sudan
:27:27. > :27:31.is evolving simultaneously. They used space to move through time so,
:27:31. > :27:34.you can look across the room and see this is the Sudan at the same
:27:34. > :27:38.time, this is what they are doing. You start to get the sense of the
:27:38. > :27:48.cultural interchange between them. There is a wonderful piece that
:27:48. > :27:48.
:27:48. > :27:55.they had, I loved this, it was a script, they haven't desieveered it
:27:55. > :28:00.yet, they said there -- desieveered this yet, they said there were
:28:00. > :28:06.scolars working on it as you saw T The fact you see how the -- the
:28:06. > :28:14.fact you saw how the Egyptians influenced the rest of the world. A
:28:14. > :28:19.roam boy mummified. And a Roman woman painted on her, she is
:28:19. > :28:24.mummified but this Roman thing on it. She has the criss-cross
:28:24. > :28:29.bandaging with the goldam mulets. The fact that it was in the Roman
:28:29. > :28:35.empire and it carried on. For the first time in that exhibition I got
:28:35. > :28:38.that sense there is Egypt in us now in England. A lot of that is
:28:38. > :28:45.traditional museum curating they have done, I liked they had the
:28:45. > :28:50.guts not to reinvent everything. Not modernising it, they don't do
:28:50. > :28:58.tweets! There are modern touches, the interactive computer to see the
:28:58. > :29:01.CSI, CD video of the thing. Angela Palmer, it plaiks you feel at the
:29:01. > :29:06.end of the exhibition how shocking and sudden and beautiful things
:29:06. > :29:13.were at that time. The colours are still preserved, buetloofl
:29:13. > :29:19.terracottas and blues. -- beautiful terracottas and blues. How did they
:29:19. > :29:27.deal with the idea these are human remains? They do it really well and
:29:27. > :29:31.intelligently. One of the women the mummies they have, had an
:29:31. > :29:34.inscription that was meant to be read out as a memorial. They are
:29:34. > :29:38.encouraging visitors to read it out. That is the ritual she wanted
:29:39. > :29:42.people to be participating in. She wanted to be preserved, they have
:29:42. > :29:46.put her in state-of-the-art preservation, she is lasting longer
:29:46. > :29:53.than she expected. The fact they are portraits, you can see the
:29:53. > :29:57.faces of the woman and man, not just the bound things. I thought
:29:57. > :30:02.they were really people, for the first time I thought. It is a
:30:02. > :30:07.constant theme that has gone on ever since that death is the team
:30:07. > :30:10.of life. You recreate your life in the next life. Something in Egypt
:30:10. > :30:15.that they really went to town in terms of preparing for the
:30:15. > :30:19.afterlife. In terms of just the amount of servants and these mini-
:30:19. > :30:25.bakeries. They create the immortality, we are still looking
:30:25. > :30:33.at those things. They were right. The immortality exists. It is like
:30:33. > :30:39.Marilyn Monroe. Was she a mummy. She had one but wasn't very nice to
:30:39. > :30:43.her. Like Marylin, Kerouac is another of those single words that
:30:43. > :30:47.carry a whole host of associations, Jack Kerouac also died in the 1960s,
:30:47. > :30:52.his profile, too, like Marilyn Monroe, has never faded. Next year
:30:52. > :31:00.we will see a film version of his best known work, On The Road. And
:31:00. > :31:06.this week, Kerouac's long lost first novel is finally published.
:31:06. > :31:15.Jack Kerouac's 1957 novel, On The Road, has axe fired cult stages as
:31:15. > :31:21.its pages incaps late the literary movement that Kerouac dubbed The
:31:21. > :31:25.Beatles. People ask why I -- Beat Generation. People ask why I
:31:25. > :31:31.wrote these books, I wrote what was true and what I saw. Before he took
:31:31. > :31:35.to the road he took to the sea. In 1942 having dropped out of Colombia
:31:35. > :31:38.University, Kerouac completed his first tour in the United States
:31:38. > :31:43.Merchant Marine, the trip fed his love for adventure, and inspired
:31:43. > :31:48.him to keep a journal, detailing the daily routine of life at sea,
:31:48. > :31:52.and the characters of his fellow shipmates. These journal entries
:31:52. > :31:58.forpbl the basis of his first novel. The Sea Is My Brother hasn't been
:31:58. > :32:02.published in its entirety until now. The only reference to his existence
:32:02. > :32:08.lay in Kerouac's private letters. It centres on two men, both of whom
:32:08. > :32:11.share characteristics with the author. One leaves his teaching job
:32:12. > :32:15.at Colombia, following his new friend, the ruthless drifter,
:32:15. > :32:20.Wesley Martin, a man who Kerouac said loved the sea with a strange
:32:20. > :32:24.lonely love. The sea is his brother, and sentences he goes down. He felt
:32:24. > :32:30.the thrill of anticipation as he sat there dosing, in a few days,
:32:30. > :32:34.back on a ship, the sleeply thrum of the propeller chuorning in the
:32:34. > :32:39.water below, the soothing rise and fall of the ship. The sea
:32:39. > :32:43.stretching around the horizon, the rich, clean sound of the bow
:32:43. > :32:47.spliting water, and the long hours lounging on deck in the sun,
:32:47. > :32:51.watching the deck of clouds, ravished by the full, moist breeze.
:32:51. > :32:55.A simple life, a serious life. To make the sea your own, to watch
:32:55. > :33:01.over it, to brood your very soul into it, to accept it and love it
:33:01. > :33:05.as though only it mattered and existed. The book also contains an
:33:05. > :33:09.assortment of other early writings from the same period, as well as
:33:09. > :33:15.letters, sketches and photographs. Is The Sea Is My Brother a valuable
:33:15. > :33:19.record of an author's early efforts, are was is juvenile book,
:33:19. > :33:23.previously unpublished, for a good reason.
:33:23. > :33:29.Did they book deserve to be unearthed? Absolutely, anything
:33:29. > :33:33.that gives a clue of how a great mind was forming. Jack Kerouac has
:33:33. > :33:37.become more a personality, a great American personality. Anything that
:33:37. > :33:40.can remind us he was a great American writer as well is very
:33:40. > :33:45.important. As a brand he gets underestimated as an American
:33:45. > :33:51.writer. I love him as an American writer, I love seeing this happen,
:33:51. > :33:55.in the 1940s you see a young boy, influenced and wants to be a great
:33:55. > :34:00.novelist by all the great writers, but also at the same time, at that
:34:00. > :34:04.moment by Charley Parker and Leicester Young, it is merging
:34:04. > :34:09.together and you are seeing it ferment and bubble. The sentences
:34:09. > :34:13.gets longer during the 1920s and 1930, you see a forming of the mind
:34:13. > :34:18.that remind you that above all EMS he was a great American writer not
:34:18. > :34:22.just a -- else he was a great American writer. What did you
:34:22. > :34:26.think? It is embryonic. The problem is, he wants to be a great writer,
:34:26. > :34:31.but like so many aspiring young writers, he has absolutely nothing
:34:31. > :34:36.to say. Here there is nothing to say here. It is derivative at best.
:34:36. > :34:42.It is a sketch, really. It wasn't published for ran. Kerouac himself,
:34:42. > :34:49.before he died, referred to this novel as a croc. I think we can
:34:49. > :34:55.trust the man's assessment here. At best at flimcy. There is some
:34:55. > :34:59.really bad writing. He does that thing that bad writing 101, won't
:34:59. > :35:09.use the word "said", you runs through other words, he greeted
:35:09. > :35:14.
:35:14. > :35:19.hello, she yawned and then says something, she mild hello. 'S only
:35:19. > :35:25.20 years ol. It is not complete this book, it -- he's only 20 years
:35:25. > :35:29.old. It is not complete this week, it is like an early demo for a band.
:35:29. > :35:33.I never got into Kerouac, I preferred Steinbeck in terms of
:35:33. > :35:38.road movies and novels. I want to say that what is interesting about
:35:38. > :35:43.it is just the fact that he does have this tension between being an
:35:43. > :35:50.intellectual and the physical world. He has that and follows it through.
:35:50. > :35:55.Everheart is an academic builty about being an axe dij. In the
:35:55. > :36:05.sense of -- academic, in a sense of seeing that grow is interesting.
:36:05. > :36:07.
:36:07. > :36:11.had to staple this book to me I found isth almost unreadable. It is
:36:11. > :36:16.so hard to read, so endlessly macho. And cold beers, and people who
:36:16. > :36:22.punch each other in the stomach as a form of greeting, and kick each
:36:22. > :36:27.other up the pants. So American, and misolg sojist.
:36:27. > :36:30.I thought the ambition, the care, the idealism, the belief in
:36:30. > :36:33.something, a lot of things that have gone missing, I saw all of
:36:33. > :36:38.that. Especially with the novel in itself ending with the ship sailing
:36:38. > :36:42.off and it ends there. When the ship is sailing off and what is
:36:42. > :36:48.happening is it is taking high culture with it, he's handing that
:36:48. > :36:54.over to popular culture. That is giving it a lot of credit. I only
:36:54. > :36:58.went to see say for a year. You are delivering a lot of intelligence.
:36:58. > :37:03.It did change popular culture, you see what happened in that period
:37:03. > :37:06.end earth Dylan and The Beatles. It makes it an interesting book. It
:37:06. > :37:11.makes it a book worth publishing. The journal is interesting, the
:37:11. > :37:15.Journal of the Egoist, he's a having that conversation about what
:37:15. > :37:20.kind of write he wants to be. He wants to go an eccentric artist and
:37:20. > :37:23.he wants to do those things. There is something endearing about T
:37:23. > :37:28.is an important manifesto. I don't agree, any creative writing teacher
:37:28. > :37:33.has read this over and again. The fact he went on 15 years later on a
:37:33. > :37:36.drug drag to write one good book. The rest of what he wrote is not
:37:36. > :37:42.good. It does feel like when you are a teenager at school and you
:37:42. > :37:45.want to use the word "picturesque" as often as you can. There is
:37:45. > :37:50.poignancy there. We know what happens, he does and doesn't become.
:37:50. > :37:54.Why do you think the Kerouac phenomenon has survived y is it
:37:55. > :38:02.people want to publish this, and not just the first novel but his
:38:02. > :38:09.letters, his friends, his poetry. His awful peoples. He became a
:38:09. > :38:15.brand -- The poems? He became a brand name, who became famous,
:38:15. > :38:19.beginning as a 20-year-old talking about famous authors. People who
:38:19. > :38:22.like Kerouac don't read the novels but like the idea of him. I thought
:38:22. > :38:26.it strange to condemn the aspiration happening in a 20-year-
:38:26. > :38:31.old, willing it to lap, and then was part of such an important
:38:31. > :38:39.movement to say it should be obliterated. I said it is not good,
:38:39. > :38:44.I didn't say obliterated. I just said it is not good. But in
:38:44. > :38:49.what sense? Part of the guy that became the brand name that creates
:38:49. > :38:55.curiosity, this is who he was as a 20-year-old. You are never going to
:38:55. > :39:02.agree on that one. If a stranger accosts you in the street with a
:39:02. > :39:07.copy of a book, Maureen would be upset if it was Kerouac. It was The
:39:07. > :39:11.Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie, not a literary mugging but an act of
:39:11. > :39:14.generosity, something similar is happening this year, this is how to
:39:14. > :39:17.prepare yourself. This March saw the launch of World Book Night, a
:39:17. > :39:21.new event across Britain and Ireland, which aimed to celebrate
:39:21. > :39:28.the pleasure of reading. A million special low-printed books were
:39:28. > :39:31.given out to members of the public, to pass on to friends, family, or
:39:31. > :39:37.complete strangers. World Book Night was the brain child of
:39:37. > :39:47.publisher Jamie Bing. One million books, a hell of a lot of books,
:39:47. > :39:55.
:39:55. > :39:59.It was the biggest book give away ever, people responded
:39:59. > :40:02.enthusiastically? Reading is the most important thing in my life. I
:40:02. > :40:07.can't think of anything more important to me. It has shaped my
:40:07. > :40:12.outlook on life, it has opened up a lot of safes, tradition, cultures.
:40:12. > :40:16.Most of what I know is through reading. The World Book Night
:40:16. > :40:24.committee recently announced the list of 25 books to be given away
:40:25. > :40:31.at next year's event, which will take part on Shakespeare's birthday,
:40:31. > :40:36.April 23rd. Classics like Pride and Prejudice, to Steven King's
:40:36. > :40:39.psychological misery, and contemporary best sellers, like The
:40:39. > :40:44.Road. You have until the end of December
:40:44. > :40:47.to register. Visit the World Book Night for more details.
:40:47. > :40:51.1234 That website address, along with more details of everything we
:40:51. > :40:58.have discussed tonight are on the web side. Next week Kirsty will be
:40:58. > :41:05.here with a book special, featuring new titles from Alice Marilyn
:41:05. > :41:12.Monroe, and others. Stay tuned for later for Jools and his guests.
:41:12. > :41:18.Thanks to my guests, Maureen, Paul, Sarah and Salfraz. We leave you
:41:18. > :41:25.tonight with the television debut of Glasgow-based music, Peter Kelly,
:41:25. > :41:29.who goes by the name of Beer Jacket. From his new album, the White
:41:29. > :41:33.Feather Trail, this is him. # Marry young
:41:33. > :41:36.# For the need to be alone fl # Sort of swung
:41:36. > :41:41.# And fear of ringing telephones # Into a wall
:41:41. > :41:49.# Who has learned to crow # The winner is the last of all
:41:50. > :41:53.# Carried like soap # To the one welcoming cave
:41:53. > :42:02.# Words stick in your throat # To a fold
:42:02. > :42:08.# The winter is a first of all # Tired like courage
:42:08. > :42:18.# We're losing to an undead past # Tired is courage
:42:18. > :42:23.
:42:23. > :42:26.# By the act # Choosing the booze don't path
:42:26. > :42:30.# No need for glory # Put to song
:42:30. > :42:34.# But undone # Brownen like glass
:42:34. > :42:39.# Into the sun # Into the cold
:42:39. > :42:42.# And shadow meeting with the world # The window is the mover's pole
:42:42. > :42:49.# Tired like courage # To the mast
:42:50. > :42:55.# But losing to an undead past Tide discouraged
:42:55. > :42:58.# By the act -- tired discouraged # By the act
:42:58. > :43:03.# Choosing the booze # Don't act
:43:03. > :43:13.# Wake your heart up # It's dying to trying
:43:13. > :43:19.
:43:19. > :43:24.# Hey wake your heart up # It's dying to start trying
:43:24. > :43:30.# Tired like courage # To the mast
:43:30. > :43:37.# But losing to an undead past # Tired discouraged
:43:37. > :43:45.# By the act # Choosing the bruise don't pass
:43:46. > :43:51.# Hey wake your heart up # It's dying to start to try