Are we hard-wired to feel other people’s pain? And if so, is it necessarily a good thing? Andrew Scull has reviewed three new books on empathy and joins us to tell us more; Charles Dickens's love of all things theatrical – in life as in art – is no secret. Robert Douglas-Fairhurst considers fifty years' worth of Dickens adaptations for the stage (and film)
Books
The Empathy Instinct by Peter Bazalgette
Against Empathy: The case for rational compassion by Paul Bloom
The Invention of Humanity: Equality and cultural difference in world history by Siep Stuurman
Dickensian Dramas: Plays from Charles Dickens (Volume One, edited by Jacky Bratton; Volume Two, edited by Jim Davis
The Ebb and Flow of Power
Liberté, Égalité and Fraternité
Mementoes and Mayhem
Free-thinking Dinners in the Age of Revolutions
The Shape Of Things To Come
The Birds and the Bees, and Books Made of Cheese
Lives, Interrupted
Life Lessons and Making Sporting History
Early Days And Their Long Shadows
Boundaries Real and Imagined
Visions of Violence
Rock Star, Freak, Agitator
Say What You’re Going To Say
Faint Praise
Birds of a Feather
A Story With Strings Attached
Writers at the Gates of Dawn
Derevaun Seraun! Derevaun Seraun!
Clarity, Honesty, Fluff
Carnival of Darkness
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Modern West
Just Dumb Enough Podcast
Voices of Misery Podcast
House of Whimsical Terror
Stuff You Should Know
Timcast IRL