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Scientist, novelist, poet, philosopher, feminist, it's 400 years since the birth of Margaret Cavendish. An extraordinary character in many ways - she lived in a tumultuous time, when ideas around science, religion and the very nature of existence were being challenged and changed. And she had a view on them all. Margaret Cavendish’s writings are vast and broad and yet detailed and thoughtful. However for most of the last 400 years she has languished in obscurity before being rediscovered in the last 40 years and elevated to the status of feminist icon. She was in her time very much the only, and often outspoken, female voice in circles dominated by men – and by and large they hated her for it.Nandini Das looks at the life, work and influence of Margaret Cavendish with:Dr Emma Wilkins who has followed the rise in interest in the work and life of Margaret Cavendish in recent times, and has a particular focus on her science.Professor Anne Thell, Vice President of the International Margaret Cavendish Society who is leading work on interpreting and presenting Margaret Cavendish’s writing for wider audiences.Francesca Peacock, whose new biography of Margaret Cavendish ‘Pure Wit’ sets her in a modern feminist context.And Emeritus Professor of Physics Athene Donald, who includes Margaret Cavendish in her book on women in science ‘ Not just for the boys’ arguing that the treatment of Margaret Cavendish by the 17th century scientific establishment illustrates negative attitudes and issues which have still to be addressed for women in science today.In the Free Thinking programme archive you can find a collection of episodes exploring women in the world including programmes about Aphra Behn, Chaucer's the Wife of Bath, Julian of Norwich and Margery Kempe, Gwendolyn Brooks and Phillis Wheatley.Producer: Julian Siddle

Sixty years after the death of C. S. Lewis's, his best known work, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, is still for many a childhood favourite and it's also the subject of a new literary study. Christianity was central to all of Lewis's his novels, his academic writing and generalist non-fiction. It is also his Christianity that divides his admirers and detractors. This tension lies at the heart of a new film which stages a clash between two ways of thinking, the psychoanalytic and the religious. Freud’s Last Session imagines an encounter between Lewis and Freud exploring the clash between their views of human nature and faith. Chris Harding and guests examine how we're still wrestling with the belief and the imagination of C.S. Lewis today.Meg Thomson is the producer of Freud’s Last Session, starring Anthony Hopkins as Freud and Matthew Goode as LewisJem Bloomfield is an assistant professor at the University of Nottingham and the the author of a new, literary exploration of Paths in the Snow: A Literary Journey through The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.Ruth Jackson is co-host of the C.S. Lewis podcast and a producer at Premier Unbelievable Christian Radio.Justin Brierley is a writer and broadcaster, his latest book is The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God.Producer: Ruth Watts

7th Prince of the West Indies was the title that Frank Walter gave himself. An artist who created over 5,000 paintings, 1,000 drawings, 600 sculptures, 2,000 photographs, 468 hours of recordings, and a 50,000-page archive, tried to become Prime Minister and was the first Black man to manage a sugar plantation in Antigua - a show about him at the Garden Museum in London has been curated by Professor Barbara Paca. She talks to Jade Munslow Ong, plus New Generation Thinker Jim Scown, who's been researching Alexander Humboldt and Camilla Allen who's looked at tree planting and landscape design, and Jago Cooper, Director of the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich discusses their new approach to exhibitions about climate change.Producer in Salford: Olive ClancyFrank Walter: Artist, Gardener, Radical runs at the Garden Museum in London until 25 Feb 2024 At the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich The Stuff of Life | The Life of Stuff which runs until Jan 14th 2024 is part of a season: Planet for our Future: How do we adapt to a Transforming World? Sediment Spirit: The Activation of Art in the Anthropocene runs until March 31st 2024 The Politics of Street Trees edited By Jan Woudstra and Camilla Allen is out now On the Free Thinking programme website you can find a collection of episodes exploring Green Thinking, all available as the Arts & Ideas podcast.