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What’s the key to bringing home Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British woman who has been held hostage in Iran for almost six years? And how closely linked is Nazanin’s release to a tank deal debt more than 40 years old? In episode 1 of Nazanin, former Today programme editor, Ceri Thomas, explores the origins of the debt, the apparent corruption which surrounded the deal which created it, and its long, difficult legacy. It’s a story which begins in the freewheeling 1970s when the need to ‘grease the wheels’ of big arms deals seemed barely controversial, and when the Shah of Iran and a notorious middleman known around Whitehall as ‘Mr 1%’ were able to pocket millions in commissions paid by the UK. And it leads back to the fate of more than one hostage today. Presenter: Ceri Thomas Producer: Matt Russell Original music: Tom Kinsella A Tortoise Media production for BBC Radio 4

The Irish cultural industries have in recent decades managed to turn James Joyce into a valuable tourist commodity - 'a cash machine', 'the nearest thing we've got to a literary leprechaun.' Joyce would surely have disapproved. "When the soul of man is born in this country," he wrote, "there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight. You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets." That is precisely what he did, leaving Ireland behind and living more than half his life across Continental Europe. As Anthony Burgess put it, "Out there in Europe the modernistic movement was stirring," and by placing himself in the cultural cross-currents of cities like Trieste, Rome, Zurich, Paris & Pola, where he experienced the early rumblings of Dada, Psychoanalysis, Futurism et al, Joyce became a part of an endlessly plural social and linguistic explosion, far removed from the monolithic oppressiveness of Ireland. Backed up by interviewees including Colm Tóibín, John McCourt and Liv Monaghan and illustrated by rich archive recordings, Andrew Hussey argues it was the deliberate rupture of leaving home - taking up "the only arms I know - silence, exile and cunning" - that allowed Joyce to develop the necessary breadth of vision and literary skill to write his greatest works. The Dublin of Ulysses itself becomes, according to Tóibín, 'a Cosmopolis... another great port city like Trieste." For Hussey, who has himself lived and worked as a writer in Paris for many years, Joyce was not only a great pathfinder, he also offers an inspiring trans-national vision of Europe and the world just at a time when borders are tightening and the darker shades of nationalism are once again looming large. Produced by Geoff Bird

‘He was interested in why I was so attached to this penguin’ Bex is at university when she starts feeling anxious and overwhelmed. As Bex deteriorates, doctors are in a race against time to diagnose her. And that’s where the penguin comes in. In Room 5, Helena Merriman interviews people who - like her - were changed by a diagnosis. Written, presented and produced by Helena Merriman Composer: Jeremy Warmsley Sound Design: Eloise Whitmore Production Co-ordinator: Janet Staples Editor: Emma Rippon Commissioning Editor: Richard Knight #Room5 With special thanks to Rachel Roberts, principal viola with the LSO End song: Miffed by Tom Rosenthal If you have a story you’d like to share you can email: room5@bbc.co.uk