Radio 4s Cultural Exchange: The Sci-Fi & Fantasy Choices
Fascinating arty interviews from arts magazine show Front Row
For the past few week, Radio 4’s arts magazine show, Front Row , has been running a feature where they’ve been asking leading “creative minds” (writers, performers, designers, artists) to name their favourite works or culture or other creative minds that have influenced their lives. It can get unashamedly high brow (you’ll be happy to learn that Brian Sewell chose “Christ contemplated by the Christian Soul” by Diego Velázquez and not On The Buses so all is right with the world) but a fair few interesting SF and fantasy choices have been made.
Below we’ve listed all the relevant instalments with links so you can listen to them. Well worth an aural browse.
Riz Ahmed on Street Fighter II
Gemma Chan on The Princess Bride
James Blake on Stalker
CJ Sansom on William Hartnell as the First Doctor
Paul Franklin on The Thief Of Bagdad (1940)
Sign up to the SFX Newsletter
Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month!
Sarah Hall on Blade Runner
Neil Gaiman on The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke by Richard Dadd
Philip Pullman on the Georges Brassens song “Supplique pour être enterré à la plage de Sète”
Brian Aldiss on The Diary of Maria Bashkirtseff
Mohsin Hamid on Olaf Stapledon
Dave is a TV and film journalist who specializes in the science fiction and fantasy genres. He's written books about film posters and post-apocalypses, alongside writing for SFX Magazine for many years.