Episodes
Episode | Title | First Broadcast | Repeated | Comments |
---|---|---|---|---|
01 | Iona | 20160919 | Poet Kenneth Steven has a special relationship with the small Hebridean island of Iona, set in the Atlantic off the west coast of Scotland. It was the place of learning and worship in the 6th century, when St Columba brought Christianity from Ireland and set up a monastery, and today it still has a spiritual quality for many of its visitors. Kenneth has visited since he was a child and collected stones polished by the sea along its beaches. Today he reflects on Iona's place as a 'meeting of the sea roads, which has had such a profound impact on so many, and has done for longer than we can ever know'.
'..That is why
Poet Kenneth Steven reflects on Scottish island life. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
01 | Iona | 20160919 | 20180813 (R3) | Poet Kenneth Steven has a special relationship with the small Hebridean island of Iona, set in the Atlantic off the west coast of Scotland. It was the place of learning and worship in the 6th century, when St Columba brought Christianity from Ireland and set up a monastery, and today it still has a spiritual quality for many of its visitors. Kenneth has visited since he was a child and collected stones polished by the sea along its beaches. Today he reflects on Iona's place as a 'meeting of the sea roads, which has had such a profound impact on so many, and has done for longer than we can ever know'.
'..That is why
Poet Kenneth Steven reflects on Scottish island life. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
01 | Mingulay | 20200601 | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
01 | Mingulay | 20200601 | 20220606 (R3) | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
02 | Hoy | 20160920 | Poet Kenneth Steven writes on Hoy, the only place of cliffs and mountains in the archipelago of the Orkney islands. Kenneth describes the beauty of the Orkney islands as seen in their greenness and lushness, in contrast to the harsher landscape of the north-east corner of Scotland just to their south. 'These islands seem almost cut out of some richly endowed agricultural shore far to the south and planted in the sea just to the top right of Scotland'. But Hoy is different, the island has a wildness not found elsewhere in the islands.
Kenneth reflects on the relationship between writer George Mackay Brown and the composer Peter Maxwell Davies, who died in 2016. They had met and Peter Maxwell Davies made the decision to live on Hoy in its rugged yet peaceful landscape. 'His falling in love with Hoy was not just a passing whim. He had to win his right to the place in almost fairy-tale like terms. But the peace he had so craved was all about him and his was able to compose; the music that flowed through him could be released at last.'.
Kenneth Steven explores Hoy, the only place of cliffs and mountains in the Orkney islands. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
02 | Jura | 20200602 | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
02 | Jura | 20200602 | 20220607 (R3) | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
03 | Rum | 20160921 | Kenneth Steven looks at Rum, a wild and windswept Hebridean island, and responds to its landscape in poetry. Rum is the largest of a group making up the 'Small Isles', Rum, Muck, Eigg and Canna, lying west of the fishing port of Mallaig in the Scottish Highlands. 'I don't know a Hebridean island more beautiful to approach. Every time I do I think of it again as a treasure island.'
Its remote and rugged beauty attracted an eccentric Victorian industrialist, who bought it and attempted to transform it into his own vision of an island home, complete with a castle. 'The castle itself was built of red sandstone and shaped from the Isle of Arran. Greenhouses were brought for the growing of peaches, grapes and nectarines. There were heated pools for turtles and alligators; an aviary was constructed for birds of paradise and humming birds.'
Poet Kenneth Steven reflects on on Scottish island life. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
03 | Rum | 20160921 | 20180814 (R3) | Kenneth Steven looks at Rum, a wild and windswept Hebridean island, and responds to its landscape in poetry. Rum is the largest of a group making up the 'Small Isles', Rum, Muck, Eigg and Canna, lying west of the fishing port of Mallaig in the Scottish Highlands. 'I don't know a Hebridean island more beautiful to approach. Every time I do I think of it again as a treasure island.'
Its remote and rugged beauty attracted an eccentric Victorian industrialist, who bought it and attempted to transform it into his own vision of an island home, complete with a castle. 'The castle itself was built of red sandstone and shaped from the Isle of Arran. Greenhouses were brought for the growing of peaches, grapes and nectarines. There were heated pools for turtles and alligators; an aviary was constructed for birds of paradise and humming birds.'
Poet Kenneth Steven reflects on on Scottish island life. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
03 | Staffa | 20200603 | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
03 | Staffa | 20200603 | 20220608 (R3) | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
04 | Barra | 20200604 | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
04 | Raasay | 20160922 | Poet Kenneth Steven writes on Raasay, an island close to Skye once home to the great Gaelic bard Sorley MacLean. Kenneth describes the history of this 'fiercely traditional island', with its continuing belief in the sanctity of the Sabbath Day - Sunday. 'This was prevalent until recently all across the Highlands and islands; it has faded with increasing secularisation, but on Raasay (as in other Outer Hebridean islands in particular) it remains firm'.
But his main interest is in the work of Sorley Maclean, Gaelic poet. 'Gaelic was his mother tongue, the language of the heart, and the poetry he wrote was out of the burning fires of the heart. This was no gentle poetry. Sorley Maclean's people were from Raasay and Skye and the memory of their struggle for justice and for land beat within him like a living drum.'.
Kenneth Steven on Raasay, an island close to Skye and once home to poet Sorley MacLean. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
05 | St Kilda | 20160923 | Poet Kenneth Steven writes on the remote islands of St Kilda, where the community is only a distant memory echoed in the sound of seabirds. This is an island far out in the ocean. 'To make the sea crossing to St Kilda a boat is heading into the full fury of the North Atlantic; west of here lies nothing more than Rockall - and then America.'
But by 1930 the British Government wanted an end to the expense of supporting this remote colony, and the community were forced to take the decision to evacuate. Now there are only the empty shells of houses and the endless cries of seabirds.
'In all the cobbles, concrete years to come
Producer Mark Rickards.
Poet Kenneth Steven on the Scottish islands. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
05 | St Kilda | 20160923 | 20180815 (R3) | Poet Kenneth Steven writes on the remote islands of St Kilda, where the community is only a distant memory echoed in the sound of seabirds. This is an island far out in the ocean. 'To make the sea crossing to St Kilda a boat is heading into the full fury of the North Atlantic; west of here lies nothing more than Rockall - and then America.'
But by 1930 the British Government wanted an end to the expense of supporting this remote colony, and the community were forced to take the decision to evacuate. Now there are only the empty shells of houses and the endless cries of seabirds.
'In all the cobbles, concrete years to come
Producer Mark Rickards.
Poet Kenneth Steven on the Scottish islands. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
05 | The Holy Island | 20200605 | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. | |
05 | The Holy Island | 20200605 | 20220610 (R3) | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |
04 | Barra | 20200604 | 20220609 (R3) | Kenneth Steven visits another island and responds to its landscape in poetry and prose. Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond. |