Woman's Hour - Army racism, Gardens and the Bloomsbury Group, Fantastically Great Women musical

Episode Date: August 7, 2024

Kerry-Ann Knight, who served in the army for over a decade, has spoken out about the years of racist and sexist abuse she received whilst serving saying that it made her life "a living hell". She joins Nuala to discuss her experience of taking the Ministry of Defence to an employment tribunal where she accepted a substantial settlement, along with an apology. Her experience has led to lawyer Emma Norton - who's an expert in this field - to call for an inquiry in to the experiences of black and minoritised service personnel in the armed forces. A new exhibition, Gardening Bohemia, at the Garden Museum in London explores the relationship between women in the Bloomsbury group and gardening.  Plus a book out earlier this year, Rural Hours, looks at the influence of time spent in the countryside on three women writers associated with the group, including Virginia Woolf.  Curator Claudia Tobin and author Harriet Baker discuss.When illustrator and author Kate Pankhurst started writing the Fantastically Great Women book, she didn’t know she was a distant relative of suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst – or that the book would become an award-winning pop musical. With the show currently on at The Other Palace in London, Nuala talks to Kate about why she wanted to celebrate historic women and their achievements, plus cast member Anelisa Lamola performs live in the studio.Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Dianne McGregor

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2. And of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Nuala McGovern and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. Hello and welcome to Woman's Hour. Well, today, a lawyer for the Centre for Military Justice is calling for an independent inquiry into the treatment of black, Asian and ethnic minority service personnel in the military. We're going to hear her reasons why. And we'll also hear from Kerry-Anne Knight. She is a former servicewoman who recounts the racist and sexist abuse she says she experienced while serving. Also, later this hour, the country lies of women we often associate with the city. Virginia Woolf is one. We're going to hear more about how London's Blooms who changed the world. It is a musical.

You'll hear a performance of one of the songs from one of the stars of the show this hour. And we'll also hear from a distant relative of Emmeline Pankhurst, who wrote the book on which this musical is based. So looking forward to speaking to both of those fantastic women. If you want to get in touch with the programme on anything you hear, the number is 84844 on social media. We're at BBC Women's Hour. Or you can email us through our website. For a voice note, that number is 03700 100 444,

or indeed a WhatsApp message. But let us begin this morning with a very powerful and personal story that you might find upsetting when you hear the details. In the past week, Kerry-Anne Knight, who served in the army for over a decade, has spoken for the first time about the years of racist and sexist abuse she received while serving, saying it made her life a living hell. Her experience has led a lawyer, who is an expert in this field, to call for an inquiry into the experiences of black, Asian and ethnic minority service personnel in the armed forces.

We're going to hear from that lawyer shortly. But first to Kerry-Anne Knight, who in 2019 was the face of a recruitment poster for the military, saying she wanted to encourage more individuals of colour to join. But she says now, following the treatment she received,

she would no longer recommend that. She describes boxes and dirty crockery being piled high on her desk, of a senior colleague asking her to get naked at an army event, and male soldiers shouting racially offensive insults at her. She began secretly recording conversations, and she eventually took her case to an employment tribunal and accepted a substantial settlement from the Ministry of Defence last month, although with no admission of liability, something we will get into. She also received an apology

from the army. I spoke to Kerry-Anne yesterday and I began by asking her why she wanted to join the armed forces. After the army came in and did a presentation on life in the army, this was in college, and I thought, wow, this is the place for me. They spoke about a sense of family, that camaraderie that you build with your peers that lasts for a lifetime, etc. And I really, really wanted that at that stage in my life. And it just sounded like such a dream. And I was extremely excited. And so you decided to sign up. But how long was it, Kerri-Ann, before you realised it definitely was not the dream you

were expecting? It was a nightmarish at times from some of your testimony. It was pretty much instantaneously. As soon as I stepped through the gate, it was clear that I wasn't welcomed and accepted because I was a black woman. I know you had difficulty with one woman who was senior to you. And how did that manifest itself? How did you come to the conclusion that her actions were based on race? Just numerous comments that she'd make. For example, just for my swimming swimming lessons I wanted to put just a couple of braids in my hair in order to protect it and she wouldn't allow it reminded me as she said that I

wasn't I wasn't in the ghetto when I was marching she'd remind me I'm not in the ghetto as well in terms of my buttocks were swaying too much. So I just remembered just really having to try and focus on literally tensing my buttocks as if I was tensing my abs, just to make sure I wasn't appearing to have a walk as if I was in the ghetto. Yeah, so right away I knew if I'd embraced anything to do with my race, it would be seen as or taken as ghetto to her. So I had to act and speak as white as I possibly could in front of her. Kerri-Ann, I've read that you said you served alongside soldiers who claimed to support groups, including the Ku Klux Klan. I've also read that you said boxes and dirty crockery would be piled high on your desk. And you've also given other examples of racism. But did you also encounter sexism? just from the get-go underestimated what you know I was capable of being a female I remember

yet again in my earlier career I do remember they invited me to a a battery event up in what what is that kind of a get-together or a get-together and I was so excited I thought wow okay my team you know this is where they're going to be embracing me I felt as if you know I was then going to be a part of the team because they invited me somewhere however after a short period of time of being there I heard them ringing a bell and they started getting naked and telling me to get naked. Mind you, I was the only black woman of this regiment at the time. And this is after loads of different comments saying, I'm not normally into black women, but you're quite pretty for a black girl.

Do you fancy SHOG? I don't really want to go into the stuff that they used to say. And they wanted me to get naked in this bar full of men and these were my seniors at the time and I said to them absolutely not and I was making my way out and you know um a couple of them tried to stand in front of the door and I physically had to barge past them in order to make my way out because I was not going to stand there and get naked in front of my battery seniors peers I just thought it was extremely wild. It sounds incredibly traumatic Kerri-Ann. I mean, these are stories that you're just pulling out as I ask you one question. Did you think at some of those points, I've got to leave? I was encouraged by others who were in different units of the army. It's not the same everywhere you go, etc.

You've just been put in the wrong regiment. I then tried to transfer out, but even that was a painstakingly arduous process. And it took me years to do so. This is a topic we've covered before on the programme with women in the military that have joined us to give their testimony. And the armed forces continue to say that they've made big commitments to change. For example, the launch of the My Complaint app that was in October to make it easier for personnel to complain if they feel they've experienced unacceptable behaviour.

They say they've ensured that complaints of bullying, harassment or discrimination are now dealt with by someone outside of an individual's chain of command. And that there's also a 24-hour helpline available for all staff in need of support. I mean, was the culture changing when you were there? Do you have faith in what you hear is happening now? It's lip service, Nuala. It really is. Unless they start living by and acting on what they're preaching, it genuinely is just a tick box exercise and nothing will change nothing will change no not not in this so nothing will change currently as the as the way the army set up after being through the recent process of following through the thorough process of the service complaint and to the point where I ended up in an employment tribunal with the army,

it just shows that there's not going to be, say, any imminent change to the lived experience that women are facing in the army and especially BAME and what I mean by that is then Black Asian Minority Ethnic Groups. There won't be any imminent change. If I look back, you were once the poster girl for the army and I put that in quotation marks, but you were the face of it to encourage other young women to join the forces in advertisements.

Why did you do that, particularly as you had had such a hard time? When your chain of command ask you to take part in a campaign, one, you don't say no to your chain of command. You follow their orders, you follow what they're saying. But then I was looking at it also from the perspective of, OK, if my face can encourage other BAME individuals, even though I was smiling in photos and being put in into a situation where the army would appear to be inclusive you know and empowering women of colour etc that was not the case but I wanted to encourage more BAME individuals to join, because I genuinely believed at the time,

if you've got more BAME individuals coming into the army, then things will have to change. And I will not then be the only black woman in that regiment, in that unit, because it's an isolating place to be. So to try and change it from within. Yeah. But I'm wondering now, that was back in 2019, would you recommend the army now to a person who is black, Asian, minority, ethnic? No, I would not encourage women, any woman of colour and males to join the army

because you will be given miniscule tasks. It doesn't matter what level of qualification or experience you had before joining the army. You're not seen for your abilities. you're not seen for your abilities. You're not seen for your strength. You are put in a category and you're not treated as equal. And in the long run, it will have a detrimental effect on one's well-being.

You went to court when you had brought this up with the complaint that you made of the treatment that you went through. Yeah. I even raised a service complaint or taken my case to employment tribunal. And still, for eight days, I felt attacked on that stand. Yeah, it just felt as if I was being, there was an attempt to humiliate me again or bully me you know I felt as if I was just in the army again facing all of these bullies and their discriminated ways and horrible treatment towards me that's just how I found the the court process but um I endured it and you know, even though the barrister, the defence barrister, was so intelligent to the point where he was trying to twist the clearest examples of racism as in, you know, the lynching aspect,

the towering and feathering. Let's talk about that for a moment because our listeners may not be aware. You've mentioned two things there, lynching and towering and feathering. Where did that come up, if it's okay to ask? This is after I had submitted a formal complaint to my chain of command because being the only female of the company

and the only female of colour throughout the college the amount of misogynistic remarks my treatment based on my colour just it was unbearable so I made a complaint to my chain of command highlighting this. And it's after I made that complaint, they'd gathered together in the office I worked in and they were talking about lynching me, coming together and lynching me was the context of that. And even what I believe was a senior member making the remarks of, we should just tar and feather her like they used to do in the old days.

That was shocking to me because throughout my time in the army, I'm used to being called black, B-I-T-C-H. However, such deep level of racism and no one that asked these individuals, explain what you mean by, you know, Tarvin and Featherin. They all laughed as if they understood exactly what this person meant. Whereas me, I had to do, say, a deeper research because I knew it had a racial undertone, but I didn't actually know how deep. Yeah. actually know how deep um yeah and and more horrific when you get into the historical detail about it exactly so when i raised this then to the higher chain of command that these are the things that's been said after i raised my complaint my treatment is worse and I felt dismissed. And then they went on to attack my

mental health on paper, my credibility as an instructor and went on to describe me as an an aggressive black woman. And that's when I really realised that there's systemic racism in the army and it's from the top down. So it doesn't matter who you complain to. Nothing's going to be resolved. That's just genuinely how I felt at the time and still feel until this day. Horrific. You reached a settlement with the Ministry of Defence.

Not the first offer, my understanding is. Can you talk us through that? On day seven, they came to me, well, not to me directly, through my legal team and submitted a substantial amount of money. So that was the offer. That was the offer on the table for me to settle out of court. And I said to my legal team, absolutely not. I'm not here for money. I'm here to vindicate myself. And I'm also here to try and make or push for real, tangible change to the lives of service personnel in the army. So I said no, I declined the offer. And on day eight, they came back with an even more substantial amount of money and an apology. So with the apology, I did feel a sense of being vindicated. And I thought, OK okay this process has gone on long enough the toll it was taking on my young family on me and so yes I agreed to

to settle with them however there are recent comments in in the media about them not accepting any liability. It just, for me, undermines their credibility of them claiming to be an inclusive employer. It just shows that they're not able to and will not accept that these are experiences of BAME individuals. We did have a statement from Al Carnes, who's the Minister for Veterans and People, who said this should never have happened. We sincerely apologise for the treatment that Kerry-Anne experienced during her time in the Army. No one in the military should go through what Kerry-Anne experienced and the response to Kerry-Anne's complaints should have been better and quicker. The army

has recognised the need for culture reform and to drive forward robust policies which tackle bullying, harassment and discrimination. And they go on to say, when the Secretary of State was appointed a month ago, he said in his first speech to staff in the Ministry of Defence that we will have an armed forces and civil service drawing on all talents. We will have a culture that values all. We'll have zero tolerance for any abuse in the military or the civil service. This is the approach of this government and we will step up efforts to bring about these changes.

What do you think when you hear that? It all sounds beautiful. It really does. But until there's been some real accountability, until the army stops protecting individuals who are extremists, who are racist, who are sexist, who are bullies, who do not treat individuals with the respect just a normal human being would expect. There won't be any change until the individuals themselves got being protected by the army nothing, nothing will leverage him

So you have left or you are leaving perhaps is a better part of the verb to use the army behind obviously you're still speaking to me about it but do you feel okay in yourself do you feel at peace

what's next for you? What next for me is to start living. I now feel a sense of freedom. I'm no longer in a working environment where I knew I wasn't accepted where I was working tirelessly to be accepted. I'm just excited about life. Now this chapter is nearly behind me. That's Kerry-Anne Knight that I spoke to. And I understand that many of you will find the language that is racist at times that Kerry-Anann was describing can be very

upsetting. I do want to read a message that came in who was just as I was listening to Kerry, so was this listener. She says, listening I could weep. I've been a female civil servant in the Ministry of Defence for many years. Nothing has changed. She's right, it's lip service and

better apologies, not a culture change. I've witnessed all of this and more over the years. Something has to change, but I doubt it will. Well done to her. I'm so proud she had the courage to call this out. She's a better woman than all of us. Well, let us continue to speak about this, because following my interview with Kerry-Anne, I spoke to Emma Norton. She's Kerry-Anne's solicitor. She's also director of the Centre for Military Justice,

a charity that provides legal support to people in the armed forces. And as I mentioned at the beginning of the programme, Emma is calling for an inquiry into the experiences of black, Asian and ethnic minority personnel in the army. I began by asking Emma Norton for her reaction to Kerry-Anne's story. Kerry-Anne initially contacted me when she was still in the army and one of the things that was really shocking to me was after she was telling me about some of the things that she'd been going through was that she didn't seem to understand, which is common for lots and lots of service women and men who are suffering discrimination, they don't understand that they do actually have legal rights. They can actually take the army to an employment tribunal. So that was obviously our priority was to get her case, her claim issued

and underway as quickly as we possibly could. But by that point, she was already fairly heavily embroiled in the army's internal service complaints process. That's their internal workplace grievance scheme that she'd been trying to manage herself for the best part of a year by that point. In fact, I think it was more than a year. And she was just completely isolated. And not only had she been experiencing this appalling racism and sexism, she'd had to deal with this complaint by herself. She was now being very heavily victimised for having had the audacity to make the complaint in the first place. So when she first contacted us, she was a very, she's a very, very strong, brilliant woman, but she was also a little bit broken.

So it's been a really, really difficult, difficult journey for her. How unusual is KerriAnne's experience? Well, one of the things I worry about is, going back to my earlier point, that service personnel often don't think that they have the right to bring an employment tribunal claim. They're not told that they do. And they're always encouraged to keep things in-house, as it's put, to use that internal workplace grievance scheme. You don't need to go to an employment tribunal and they're not told about it. So one of my concerns is that people, these kinds of problems are hidden and they are more widespread than we would like to think. We did a case just a few months back of a black gentleman called Dwight Pyle Gray. He described exactly the same kind of experience, which is a long history of

unacceptable behaviours over a really long period of time that he and others have put up with, put up with. And then something happens that means, you know, it's the straw that breaks the camel's back. They bring a claim or they make a complaint and then they really start reaping the whirlwind, which is all of these consequential victimising behaviours from those around them for, as I say, having the audacity to complain about racism. So my fear is that it is more widespread than we would like to think amongst black and minoritised service personnel. And certainly women experience these kinds of behaviours in hugely disproportionate numbers. You mentioned the internal process. I was

mentioning some of the introductions that the armed forces made. They say including greater support for victims and taking the complaint process outside of that individual's chain of command. I should say they were introduced after Kerry-Anne's experiences. She called it lip service. How do you see them? Yeah, that stuff is smoke and mirrors. It's always, for a very, very long time, it's been possible to take your complaint outside of the chain of command. The point is, it's got to be taken away from the army. Because, you know, Kerry- And to where? To an internal, what we need to build is some sort of independent scheme whereby people who are properly trained, who know what they're doing, who understand about discrimination and who have no connection to the single services, are having oversight and control of these kinds of sensitive, complex cases, because it remains the case that it is still the army that is investigating the army.

It's the Navy that's investigating the Navy. So would that be under the Ministry of Defence though? I think it needs to go outside of defence. But at the moment, we are still inside the single services. So even taking it outside of the single services would be an improvement. I would like to see it to go further. Sarah Atherton in the Atherton inquiry, which was the investigation into the treatment of women in the armed forces a couple of years ago that you've reported a lot about. That was one of her recommendations. You need to take responsibility for the handling of these complaints away from the single services themselves.

And the then Secretary of State for Defence, Ben Wallace, rejected that. And so we will see with the new government and with the new minister what changes may come about, as that is what you are asking for at the moment. I'd be curious for their response. What about the outcome of Kerry-Anne Knight's case? Ministry of Defence settling with her outside of court, but not accepting liability. The army did give an apology, however.

What does that mean legally? Well, I think it's important that people can apologise and not accept liability because otherwise all cases would go to trial and it would be, you know, a waste of enormous time and resources. So I think it's important that people can do that, that parties can do that. But in this case, what had happened was that she had brought claims of racial harassment, sexual harassment, direct discrimination and victimization. And in their internal service complaints process, because Kerri-Ann had recorded these comments, they had to accept some of those things had happened. It's important to note that in all of the cases where she hadn't recorded it, they preferred the views of the white men over the black woman.

So it was a despicable process, actually, and it was deeply traumatizing for her to go through. But that is where we got to. So they came into the tribunal with this huge problem, right? They've accepted racial and sexual harassment in their internal complaints process. So that was what they sat behind in terms of the apology. She made a number of claims. There were many, many claims in her case, and I am confident that we would have made them out. But in order to avoid this case going on for another, I can't remember, I think it was scheduled for another two weeks, they approached us about settlement after a week. Having put her through the most appalling

cross-examination, at one, they were asking a black woman to explain why shouting the word watermelon at her when she comes into a room is connected to her race. And I say that is unworthy of the British Army. They should not have put those points to her. It's quite right and proper that you subject witnesses to really intense cross-examination, but that was too far.

And there were other points which I also think went too far far and we've written to the MOD about that as well. And for me to be clear as well with our audience that the Ministry of Defence settled with her outside of court it was the army that gave her an apology again drawing that distinction between the two entities in this particular case. I understand that you were in touch with the Ministry of Defence and looking to set up an inquiry into this. What are you looking for? So I mentioned before the Atherton inquiry. So that was the inquiry held by the Defence Committee,

which is the committee of MPs in the House of Commons that scrutinise all aspects of defence work. They held an inquiry in 2021 into the experiences of women in the armed forces, and it was incredibly powerful. And it produced a number of recommendations, it's important to say the most fundamental of which were not acted on by the former Secretary of State for Defence. But nonetheless, it was really important in shining a light on what happens inside these very closed institutions to minorities. And we are saying, Kerri-Ann is saying, other soldiers who we're supporting are saying, there needs to be a similar process for black and minoritised service personnel. Because the kinds of experiences that they are describing, I think, are sadly not unusual. And until there is a light shone on this, until the army is going to

explain how it's going to tackle this pernicious virus of racism, it is going to continue. So we've written to the Secretary of State for Defence, and we've asked him to do what he can, because obviously the Defence Committee is not owned and operated by him. But if he could express a view that he thinks this would be a helpful process, that would obviously be very encouraging. And as soon as the new Defence Committee is appointed, of course, the Parliament isn't sitting at the moment, so it's not been appointed yet. We will be writing to the chair asking them to hold such an inquiry. Emma Norton, thank you very much. I will just say for our listeners as well that may not be aware of the watermelon stereotype that it's an anti-black racist trope

originating in the southern United States but allegedly used as Emma and also Kerry-Anne was saying within her time in the military. Thank you, Emma. Thank you. Emma Norton there and before her, Kerry-Anne Knight and I do of course understand that you may find some of the details you have heard over the past 30 minutes or so distressing. I do also want to say we've contacted the Ministry of Defence this morning to respond to the comments that were made by Emma Norton.

And I will bring you the Ministry of Defence's response once we receive it. 84844 if you'd like to get it. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake.

No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now. In touch. Now the Bloomsbury Group, a bohemian collective of writers, philosophers and painters,

they got together in the early 20th century and they had this huge influence on British culture and also society. Members of the group, let me see, they include the writer Virginia Woolf, the economist John Maynard Keynes, the painter Vanessa Bell, among others, and primarily known for their art and literature, but also maybe progressive attitudes towards feminism, relationships, sexuality. Called the Bloomsbury Group because yes of that area in London where they lived and met. But there's a new exhibition on Gardening

Bohemia at the Gardening Museum in London and it looks at how four women in the group were also influenced by green spaces. It looks at the gardens of Virginia Woolf, Vita Sackville-West, Vanessa Bell and Lady Otterline Morrell. I'm joined in studio by the curator, Claudia Tobin. Welcome. Hello, lovely to be here. And also on the line with us is Dr Harriet Baker, who's written a book, Rural Hours, about the time that some of the

Bloomsbury women spent in the countryside. Welcome. Hello, thank you for having me. Let me begin with you, Claudia. You've chosen four women and the gardens and green spaces that surrounded them for the exhibition. Was it mainly the women in the Bloomsbury group that, I don't know, had more of a connection to the greenery around them? Yes. Yeah, well, I wouldn't want to suggest that the men in their lives weren't involved in their gardens. And to a greater or lesser extent, they were. I mean, Leonard Wolfe, Virginia Woolf's husband was famously green fingered. But I think I was really struck by the ways in which these women were attuned to their gardens, and use them as a kind of fuel

to their creative lives, whether that was through words or images. And I think, you know, the gardens are kind of a threshold space, isn't it, between public and private. And I think, you know, it allows a kind of informality and freedom of expression to take place, which perhaps even for the Bloomington group wasn't so acceptable indoors. And that sort of sense of, I think, freedom of expression really plays out in the different gardens and perhaps particularly at Garsington, Otterley Murrell's home in Oxfordshire. And I think I called it the gardening museum, it's the garden museum, the exhibitionist gardening,

forgive me, which I didn't know existed. I'm going to plead my ignorance here, but now I am very into it. It's just so beautiful. But what people can see is some of uh the accoutrements some of the artifacts that they used while gardening some of their tools although i imagine it was a range of gardeners that was given in the hand absolutely yeah there certainly were um and to a lesser or greater extent given the different scales of the gardens but yeah i've hoped to brought together a kind of really rich range of objects across different media. As you mentioned, we've got wonderful tools, Vita Saxville-West tools with her initials engraved, beautiful paintings by Vanessa Bell, photographs, photograph albums of Ottilie Murrells and some wonderful

textiles, some of her beautiful textiles that she collected with floral inspirations, floral motifs, including her wonderful boots, colourful beats with floral designs. Let's talk about Lady Morel for a moment. Because I was kind of describing this as a place that people were able to experiment as well as finding sanctuary. But she was quite a flamboyant woman. How was that reflected? Yeah, absolutely.

She was. I mean, she described Garsington as a sort of theatre. I love that. Yeah, it gives you a sense of the kind of performance element there. And she created a garden that was sort of sensuous, lots of sensory stimulation, lavender under the window so that the scent could kind of flow into the house and secret walkways created from yew trees, lots of bathing, naked bathing going on in the pond.

But her herself, yeah, she was really flamboyant. I think one of her modes of expression was certainly through dress. And she wore sort of huge hats, veiled hats. She had piles of beautiful auburn hair and would often wear kind of really unconventional sort of combinations of clothes, often these beautiful textiles. And I mentioned the wonderful boots. But I think that was definitely a mode of expression for her amongst her artist friends.

Well, let's turn to Harriet, who's written the book Rural Hours. You focused on Virginia Woolf, this towering figure in British literature and also feminism. But, you know, lots of people think of her as a city dweller, as a city woman. Tell us a little bit about her time in the countryside or how you think it influenced her. Yes, I think that's certainly true of Woolf, that people associate her with Bloomsbury and they associate her writing with novels like Mrs. Dalloway that are essentially urban novels but actually throughout her life she spent a lot

of time in the country particularly Sussex and from about 1912 the year that she married Leonard Wolfe she took the lease on a house called Asham which no longer exists but it was in the South Downs just across the valley from Monk's house, her house in Rodmill and from that point she really began to build a very very deep relationship with Sussex and from the period of 1912 she was actually very unwell and so in my book I pick up her story in 1917 when she has published her first novel The The Voyage Out, which was published in 1915. But she's been unwell and she hasn't even written her diary for a few years. But in 1917, she's at Asham, she's in the South Downs and she's convalescing

and she begins to write in her diary for the first time. And really, we can see this country life beginning to take shape. She goes for long walks on the Downs and when she gets back to the house in her diary she tallies the number of butterflies that she saw and the number of mushrooms and blackberries that she picked. Obviously it's wartime, there's rationing and so these things brought back into the kitchen had a real effect on the wolf's larder and their meals and really she begins to build that relationship with Sussex that fed itself into her writing. So if we take a short story from that period, Kew Gardens, which was written from 1919 and published for the first time in 1921,

Kew Gardens is obviously about a London park and it's about people walking amongst the flower beds. But as much as it's a city story, it's also a deeply country story because as much as it's about the people walking, it's also about the country story, because as much as it's about the people walking, it's also about the insects moving between the flower stalks and the light falling into the flowerbed. It's a very impressionistic story, which shows her relationship with Vanessa Bell and Vanessa Bell's paintings at that period. But the fact that Kew Gardens was written mostly at Asham, I think is a really exciting and kind of unacknowledged point about her work, that she was spending time in the country, she was nurturing this kind of convalescent quality

of attention. And then that fed itself into her writing. You know, there's a term you use there, which I think should be the name of a book, Harriet, The Wolf's Larger, which I think is wonderful. But let me turn back to you, Claudia, because Harriet was mentioning Vanessa Bell there, the sister of Virginia Woolf. She was another woman that drew inspiration for creativity. But her house and garden even became somewhat of a focus during World War One. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And in a very literal sense, you know, she was bringing in, she was using the garden as a resource for her work

and alongside Duncan Grant, her lover, collaborator, another painter, you know, bringing in flowers into the home to paint and vegetables too. But yeah, the context of the First World War

is really important. I think for Vanessa Bell and Charleston and also for Otoline Murrell at Garsington. And, you know, Duncan Grant was a conscientious objector, as were many in the Bloomsbury group, and they were enabled to do agricultural work as war work to avoid conscription.

So that's the case for Duncan Grant. And very much, I think, an important part of the sense of refuge at Garsington too, because Otoline hosted many conscientious objectors there and pacifists. She was a staunch pacifist. Her husband was a liberal MP. And, you know, it really went against the grain of the times to kind of make that public knowledge and to sort of house and host these different pacifists in their home. We mentioned Vita Sackville-West briefly. Was she, I mean, the garden lives on, right?

We've seen her send people, you know, gardeners, gardeners, that's a place that they'll go and visit. Was she the most serious gardener, would you say? Well, I think, yeah, she's the best known as a gardener, as a practical gardener. We've got lovely photographs in the exhibition of her kind of, you know, kneeling in the soil, hands in the soil. And she was, she wrote, you know, with practical advice in her newspaper columns about gardening, about planting. But, you know, in different ways,

I mean, Virginia Woolf too, I mean, you know, not as definitely not known as the best gardener of the group. And I wouldn't argue that, but she writes too about relishing sort of waking up in the morning stiff and scratched I think she says sort of after having been in the in the out in the flower beds with Leonard her husband and having chocolate earth under her fingernails and that I just love that beautiful description very physical as well back to you Haritha we've mentioned like these women that are very famous already But you have also taken a look at perhaps some that weren't as well known or maybe not on the tip of the tongue of people.

Who should somebody know about? Who would you like to point out to our listeners? Oh, well, I think Sylvia Townsend Warner was a great discovery for me and thrilling to write about for the book. And it's interesting that Claudia picks up on Woolf's phrase, the dirt beneath her fingernails, because that was almost the approach

to writing these women's biography that I wanted to take. And for someone like Sylvia Townsend Warner, she was a great gardener. And I want to show her in the book with dirt beneath her fingernails. So instead of looking at all the main novels and the main life events that a conventional biographer might look at, I want to find her in the garden. I look at her recipe books, her gardening notebooks, her lists. She wrote a wonderful table in a notebook where she tallied the progress of her plants year after year. And I read that as an emotional document, as an autobiographical document, that here was Warner. She had left London. She'd moved to the country, to rural Dorset, for the first time in 1930. She'd fallen in love with a woman for the first time, which was unexpected for her.

And she was really tallying her own progress year after year, putting down roots, holding on and finding a new kind of creative expansion and happiness. And also, I should mention her book, Lolly Willows, seen as an early feminist novel about a woman who moves to the countryside to take up witchcraft which sounds like a very good summer read I think or maybe something that somebody would like to do. I want to thank both of you very much for telling us about Gardening Bohemia, the Bloomsbury

Women Outdoors opened at the Garden Museum in London in May it's continuing until the 29th of September and also Harriet Baker who joined us, her book is Rural Hours it was published in April and out now. Just fascinating to get a little glimpse into the green world of those famous women.

Now, is there a topic or is there perhaps an issue that you'd like to hear in Women's Hour? Now is your chance to make it happen because we have Listener Week coming up. If you're a new listener, this is the week where all the items are chosen by you. We're putting you at the centre of Women's Hour. Last year, we discussed living funerals, communal living, all the way through to big noses.

My relationship with my nose has changed and I now am really grateful that I look like me. And I think that's been really important for me. And I also think, you know, ethnicity does play a part. Like it comes from my ancestors and generations and just because of where we live in the west we have a white beauty standard and so I've been trained to not see my big nose as attractive and it's taken me a long time I'm now in my early 30s like it's only now that I'm really confident with my nose and I actually got a nose piercing a couple of years ago which draws more attention to my nose and I always thought I could never do that. Wonderful item. That was Radhika Sangani, who started the hashtag side profile selfie campaign. Maybe there's another body part that you want to focus on.

Whatever it is, let us know. You can text us in the usual way, 84844 on social media at BBC Woman's Hour, or you can email us through our website. Now, where can you see Rosa Parks, Marie Curie, Emmeline Pankhurst, Jane Austen, Amelia Earhart, and Frida Kahlo, all in the one room?

Well, I saw them all yesterday, along with lots of young girls and their mums, and it was at the Other Palace Theatre in London. They all magically appeared during the award-winning musical Fantastically Great Women Who Changed the World. It is a pop-fuelled extravaganza. It's loads of fun. I'm joined in studio

now by some of the show's cast. We're going to be chatting to Annalisa Lamola in a minute. I've also got Kate Pankhurst on the line, illustrator and author of the original book, which the musical is based on. Kate, you are a relative of the suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst. Distant relative I hear. Kate, you are a relative of the suffragette, Emmeline Pankhurst, distant relative I hear.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah, quite a distant is the right word. So Emmeline Pankhurst is my great, great grandfather's brother's son's wife. So you have to kind of count it back on your fingers. But yeah, it's kind of a connection that I became a bit more aware of as I got further into my career. And, you know, having a name like Pankhurst that's followed me all my life. I think her story is one of the only amazing women from history that I knew about as a young person, because I feel like you know things have changed now children learn about these women in school but I certainly didn't when I was younger and I think yeah knowing about her story when I was younger has definitely planted a few seeds and it did lead to the the spark that led to me making the fantastically great women books.

Yes the book that then came to the musical. I'm wondering, because I know you worked with the producer as well, how do you pick which women to illustrate? Particularly with the show, you've got a set amount of time, one hour and 20 minutes to be specific. So I think it's the same with a book. So you've got like a limited number of pages. So as you're kind of

doing your research and trying to come up with a list of um a lot a list of women you know you stumble across such interesting stories about women that you've not heard of before and I think making the initial book to begin with I thought there was only going to be kind of one or two books so that was like a difficult process to be like oh no we've got to leave her out um but then there's been subsequent books I've been able to put those women in but the way that I did it was to try um to kind of give readers a taste of women who had different skills were from different places in the world um so there's like sports women in there scientists Marie Curie artists Bruda Carlo that you mentioned.

And yes, I try to be as broad ranging as possible and give like a little bit of lots of different areas of life. Well, that's how we whittled the list down. Well, let me turn to Annalisa, who's in front of me here. Welcome to Woman's Hour. I loved the whirlwind tour that we had through history and some of these fantastically great women. You play some iconic figures. Amelia Earhart is how we're first introduced to you, but you're also the British nurse,

Mary Seacole, Rosa Parks. We'll go into that a little bit further as well. He was the civil rights activist in the United States. Out of those, have you got a favourite?

Am I allowed to ask that? No. They're all my babies. I love it. I think probably Rosa Parks for me because the resonance for me is you know being a young black girl from South Africa um and hearing about Rosa like you know for me it's not only an honor but like it's one of the the best parts of the show for me because I feel like the show is so busy and amazing and you meet all these amazing

women but then you get to Rosa and she kind of like ties it all together at the end for Jade's journey and like just reminding young children about how you know even the smallest things that you can do in life are also the greatest things that could just change stuff. And so Jade is a school girl who kind of gets lost in the museum and meets all these fabulous women. But it is also about a young girl trying to find her voice. I thought the age that she is portrayed is wonderful. It's 11, which is such a transformative age, I think, particularly for a young girl.

What's it like to be in the show? It's incredibly hard, but incredibly fun. How do you do it? The energy is incredible. It is non-stop. Full-color explosion in a pop-fueled frenzy. I think it's the biggest challenge for my career so far in the sense that I've done different shows

where you do a different accent, but it's not every day that you end up with six or seven accents in one show. And costumes. And costumes and worlds as well, because we also, as we're bringing all these characters alive, we have to be a little bit more truthful to making sure that their world is represented in a way that's respectful and real.

You talk about the real because you don't pull any punches with some of the really discriminatory things that these women went through or the difficulties that it can be to be a young girl or young woman or an older woman still today and trying to portray that to the audience. I was kind of looking at the little girls around me and I was wondering how are they taking that in? I think it's, you know, I mean, I don't know how they go away and feel about it, but I would hope that they are not scared. I would hope that they are not seeing that and thinking, oh my goodness, it's still hard for me and I can't do anything. I would hope that the reality that we're giving them is showing them that like, actually, happening however you do have a voice you can

make a change you know what I mean yeah and there's still work to be done and I kept going back to that about how an 11 year old girl can find her voice but as I mentioned I was surrounded by young girls and their mothers but I did wonder I was like maybe who really needs to be seeing this show is young boys absolutely and their. Absolutely. I think so. Because I think, you know, I was saying this to my mum the other day, and I was saying that, like, you know, in order for us to bring change to a lot of things, we have to teach everybody in the same space. So I think, for me, it is more important for boys to hear it than for women, because I feel like we're living that reality, whereas they don't understand

what perspective we're coming from. And I just think the more we can teach young children about the perspective, especially young boys, of women. What about that, Kate? I mean, obviously, it was immediately attractive to girls and mums looking at the audience, which was packed out. Is there a way to change that mindset of who should be going yeah yeah i think you know i personally feel really fortunate that um i've been able to take my eight-year-old son to see this so he's kind of grown up with the show and been to see it a number of times with me i guess he's in a particular position yeah yeah and i think um the kind of stories are the way into these things, aren't they? It's kind of finding a way in to talking about this to a younger audience. And yeah, it would be lovely to put the message out there.

But of course, women and girls are going to find so much in this, so much positivity in this. But yeah, it's so important, isn't it, for boys and male audience to kind of see this and read the book. It's because it says fantastically great women. It's not just for the girls, is it? And I'm just throwing that out to the audience now. Annalisa, you're going to be performing for us in just a moment. What are you going to be singing? I will be singing Rosa's Lullaby.

This is as in Rosa Parks. This is the woman who refused to give up her seat for a white man and really was a catalyst for the huge civil rights movement in really part of black history and American history at this point. And as she says in the play, she was not the first woman to do it nor the last woman to do it. But I thought that was really quite moving as well. I just got a message in.

Will the musical be touring? I'd love to be able to see it with my family. It sounds brilliant, says Lizzie. Do we know? Do you know what? Start a campaign guys. Get the hashtags going. No, in fact, let's get it into the West End. Oh, okay. How about that? Kate, you're clapping. I can

see on my video screen. Yeah, yeah, that was beautiful. I think I now know to pack tissues when I go and see the show because that bit kind of just gets me every time. It is gorgeous. And then to kind of glance around the theatre after that song finishes and just kind of see lots of people wiping their tears away, giving each other a hug. And lots of laughs as well. And I should say, I've also found out about some women that I didn't know about before. Gertrude Ederle, for example, who won a gold medal at the Olympics 100 years ago.

And also I've heard about her, but more details, Saka Jawiya, who was this amazing, intrepid explorer. I want to thank both of you so much for joining us. We had Annalisa Lamola and also Kate Pankhurst. Anita will be with you tomorrow. Thanks for listening. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time.

In 1962, President John F. Kennedy articulated his vision for why we, or rather America, would choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon. In the Kennedy archive, you hear Cold War competition front and centre. You'll be sure we are behind.

But this rubs up against the ethical dimension of space endeavor, which says that when we take these giant steps, they should always be for the benefit of all humankind. We shall make up and move ahead. Who gets to go and how it impacts the rest of us and space itself are vital questions to answer in a looming new era of space travel. So come with me, Matthew Side, to explore the moral dilemmas that sit at the heart of space exploration

and why they should matter to you. Sideways, a new frontier. Listen now on BBC Sounds. that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this?

From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in. Available now.