Radio programmes, podcasts and interviews featuring Lesley Downer
Building Utopias – The Failure of the Future
BBC Radio 4
First broadcast on 16 January 2024
Happy to be included in Johny Pitts’ series The Failure of the Future on BBC Radio 4 – including my memories of the Tsutsumi Seibu empire, which I wrote about in my book The Brothers.
#20 History Hack: Reimagining Old Japan
Author and Historian Lesley Downer joins us to share her love of Japanese history and culture. From geishas, to Dutch merchants, to enforced assimilation with the west, we find out how a love of all things Japanese impacts her writing and why Whats’app is keeping people going.
English National Opera Pre-performance Talks 2019/20 – Madam Butterfly
Join in on a lively 45 minute talk about the season’s productions, whether you’re new to operas or an opera expert.
Wednesday 11 March, 2020
Ruth Knight (Staff Director)
Lesley Downer (Writer and Journalist)
Mark Down (Blind Summit Artistic Director)
English National Opera Pre-performance Talks 2019/20 – The Mikado
Join in on a lively 45 minute talk about the season’s productions, whether you’re new to operas or an opera expert.
Saturday 16 November, 2019
Christopher Cook (Host)
Elaine Tyler-Hall (Revival Director)
Mark Biggins (ENO Chorus Master)
Lesley Downer (Writer, Journalist and Broadcaster)
Commodore Perry’s Expedition to Japan, 1853
Travels Through Time Podcast #14
History Today
Travels Through Time is presented by bestselling historian, Peter Moore.
In this episode, writer and historian Lesley Downer takes us back to the moment when Perry’s fleet of ships sailed into Edo Bay (present day Tokyo), the tour of the ship taken by Kayama Eizaemon, Police Magistrate of Uraga, and Perry’s arrival on shore. Downer describes the collision of two contrasting worlds: the confusion, the power play and the consequences.
Kimono – Moving Pictures
BBC Radio 4
First broadcast on 23 March 2019
Each thirty-minute episode of Moving Pictures is devoted to a single artwork – and you’re invited to look as well as listen, by following a link to a high-resolution image made by Google Arts & Culture.
Was this vibrant robe worn by a Japanese courtesan? Cathy FitzGerald speaks to Lesley Downer to find out.
- Interviewees: Anna Jackson, Andrew Gerstle, Paul Griffith and Lesley Downer.
- Producer and Presenter: Cathy FitzGerald
- A White Stiletto production for BBC Radio 4
- Kimono © The Victoria & Albert Museum, London.