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PROGRAMME INFO |
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Desert Island Discs is one of Radio 4's most popular and enduring programmes. Created by Roy Plomley in 1942, the format is simple: each week a guest is invited by Sue Lawley to choose the eight records they would take with them to a desert island.
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PRESENTER |
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Sue's biography
- Sue's interview
- Quiz about Sue |
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"Lawley's consensual, almost sensual probing, producing an ambiguous bond like that between hostage and hostage-taker, is ... a masterpiece of technique."
The Sunday Times 17 March 1996
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PROGRAMME DETAILS |
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Carl Djerassi
picture courtesy Oxford University Press
Carl Djerassi was born in Vienna to an Austrian mother and Bulgarian father. Both parents were involved in the medical profession and, growing up surrounded by medical paraphernalia, he assumed that he would become a doctor. For the first four years of his schooling in Austria, he attended a girls' school as the boys school was full. He says "women are much more important than men, in my life. I mean, I enjoyed it, I'm not complaining at all!"
He didn't start studying science until his mid-teens and the outbreak of war meant a move to America, where he attended a pre-medical course at college. He soon became interested in organic chemistry and focussed on this subject for his PhD.
Whilst working at a pharmaceutical company he was involved in two important discoveries. The synthesis of cortisone from plant material was, at that time, the most competitive and difficult project amongst chemists. Cortisone was considered a wonder drug with the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, inflammation and eczema.
The other discovery was the creation of a progesterone that could be orally active - aimed at treating menstrual disorders and infertility. It was realised that it could be used as a contraceptive but, as Carl says: "in the 1950s contraception was not high on the priority list. Pharmaceutical companies, with one exception, were not interested in that field. The population explosion, these concepts, that did not come about until ten years later". It wasn't until 1960 that it was approved by the FDA as a contraceptive and became the Pill.
Carl spent the next few years working in research and universities. He has also published five novels, three plays, a book of short stories, an autobiography and a memoir and is still writing. He describes a lot of his work as science in fiction - not science fiction - which explores aspects of scientific behaviour and of scientific facts. As he says "Disguising them in the cloak of fiction, it is possible to illustrate ethical dilemmas that frequently are not raised for reasons of discretion, embarrassment, or fear of retribution".
1. The Leaves Were Sadly Rustling
Performer: Boris Kristov with the French National Radio Orchestra, conductor Georges Tzipine
Composer: Mussorgsky
Publisher: EMI
CD Title: Mussorgsky Songs
Band: CD1T4
Label: EMI
Rec No: CDH 763026/28 2
2. Nuits d'Eté
Performer: Marie Nicole Lemieux, accompanied by Daniel Blumenthal
Composer: Berlioz
Publisher: Cypress
CD Title: Lemieux/Blumenthal Lieder
Band: CDT1-6
Label: CYPRESS
Rec No: CYP 9611
3. Elle e Pura
Performer: Placido Domingo with the Vienna Philharmonic conductor
Herbert Von Karajan
Composer: Verdi
Publisher: DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON
CD Title: Verdi's A Masked Ball
Band: CD2T13
Label: DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON
Rec No: 449 589 & 590-2
4. Helpless
Performer: Neil Young
Composer: Neil Young
Publisher: REPRISE
CD Title: Neil Young Unplugged
Band: CDT8
Label: REPRISE
Rec No: 9362 45310 2
5. Wenn dein Mütterlein tritt zur Tür Herein
Performer: Janet Baker with the Halle Orchestra, conductor Sir John Barbirolli
Composer: Gustav Mahler
Publisher: EMI records
CD Title: Mahler: Lieder
Band: CDT1-5
Label: EMI
Rec No: CDM 566981 2
6. Respondemos
Performer: Victoria De Los Angeles, accompanied by Geoffrey Parsons
Composer: Rodrigo
Publisher: CBS
CD Title: De Los Angeles Songs by Rodrigo/Albeniz/Moreno/Bautista
Band: LPS2T7
Label: CBS
Rec No: 76833
7. Quartet in F Major, Op 59 No 1
Performer: The Takacs Quartet
Composer: Beethoven
Publisher: Decca
CD Title: Beethoven: Middle Quartets
Band: CD1T1
Label: DECCA
Rec No: 470 850-2 & 470 851-2
8. Who is Ibrahim?
Performer: the Steve Reich Ensemble conducted by Paul Hillier
Composer: Steve Reich
Publisher: nonesuch
CD Title: The Cave
Band: CD2T1
Label: Nonesuch
Rec No: 7559-79327-2/A & B
If Carl could only take one of the eight records it would be No 5, the Mahler
His book, in addition to the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare, would be the collected poetry and prose of Wallace Stevens.
His luxury would be a solar powered computer with a secret compartment containing a white powder
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