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Today

A History of Our World Through 60 Years of Conversations & Controversies

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About this listen

Today is the sound of history being made - live on air.

In an era of fake news, echo chambers and new fault lines in global politics, millions of listeners turn to BBC Radio 4's Today programme each morning to help them make sense of the world around them.

The first ever book from the iconic programme marks six decades of BBC Radio 4's Today programme with 60 world changing stories as they were broadcast. Covering war, rebellion and political transformation, to significant changes in culture, society and the scientific world, the book explores events as they happened and how they changed the world around us.

From the fall of the Berlin Wall and the anti-apartheid movement to 9/11 and the Rise of Islamic State, from the Rushdie affair to the emergence of Brit Art and from space exploration to the tomorrow's world of artificial intelligence and machine learning. Key figures within the book include Harold Wilson, Margaret Thatcher, Stephen Hawking, Tracey Emin and Barack Obama.

Chapters include:

Chapter 1: Rebellion, Revolution and Protest

Chapter 2: Britain's Political Landscape

Chapter 3: War, Conflict and Security

Chapter 4: Art, Culture and Sport

Chapter 5: Social Change

Chapter 6: The Natural World, Science and Technology

Edited by Edward Stourton. Forewords by Nick Robinson & Martha Kearney. With an introduction by Sarah Sands, editor of the Today programme.

Shortlisted for the 2019 FutureBook of the Year award.

©2019 BBC Radio 4
Entertainment & Performing Arts Modern Political Science Politics & Government World War Socialism Entertainment Artificial Intelligence Winston Churchill Middle Ages Africa
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I am a today fan. and I've listened over a number of years. this book is absolutely amazing if you like the Today programme or politics or current affairs or history you will love this book and something there for everyone

amazing book amazing stories

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A series of fascinating mini podcasts of current affairs topics using mainly narrated quotes from Today programme. Stourton is of course outstanding and delivers the usual balance and insight. So this is a history book, relatively shallow, across lots of topics.

However, I was expecting this 20 hours to have a LOT more recorded voices from Today. Instead, Stourton usually tells us what the politicians etc said in the Today interview. What I wanted was mainly outtakes from Today interviews so we could hear the voices of John Timpson, Brian Redhead, John Humphreys. Michel Hussain etc and the voices of their interviewees across the decades. This may have covered a lot less ground but would have been a lot more true to the title imo.

And few bizarre choices with longer interviews eg some unknown vicar views on Concorde - why.

I did enjoy the three introductory essays.

Excellent but big missed opportunity

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I am seventy years old , so sixty years of the today program covered all the big mile stones through history many of which I remembered like they were yesterday. Brilliantly compiled .

Review of my life

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