Woman's Hour - Conductor Marin Alsop, actor Diana Quick and a campaign to protect domestic abuse victims

Episode Date: December 7, 2023

Marin Alsop is one of the most famous conductors in the world. Ten years ago, she became the first woman to conduct the Last Night of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall. Now she is giving the European premiere of Too Hot To Handel: The Gospel Messiah!, a reimagining of Handel’s Messiah Marin tells Hayley Hassell why she wanted to rework the piece, and looks back over her illustrious career as a conductor. The actor Diana Quick joins Hayley to discuss her role as Mrs Wentworth in a new series The Famous Five – and describe how the classic adventures have been brought to life with a new, fresh, modern reimagining of Enid Blyton’s iconic stories.The Centre for Women’s Justice is campaigning to prevent unjust criminalisation of victims and survivors of domestic abuse. Hayley is joined by director of the CWJ, Harriet Wistrich, and former director of Southall Black Sisters, Pragna Patel.What can we tell about medieval women’s lives from studying their skeletons? Dr Sarah Inskip from Leicester University has been part of a team excavating Cambridge graveyards for a new research project called After the Plague. She has found evidence that some medieval women did very strenuous work that changed the shape of their upper bodies; others were trading and travelling across Europe, and many would have existed in chronic pain.Producer: Hannah Sander Presenter: Hayley Hassell

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 and welcome to the programme. As the news breaks that singer and businesswoman Taylor Swift has been named Time Magazine Person of the Year, we'll be speaking to our own influential and powerful Women of the Year, starting with the musically talented and innovative conductor, Marion Alsop, one of the most famous conductors in the world. Well, she'll be here with her reinvented version of Handel's Messiah.

We also have Diana Quick coming into the studio. Many of you may know her as Lady Julia Flight from the TV series Brideshead Revisited. Well, now she's bringing some of our childhoods to life in a new adaptation of The Famous Five. So she's coming to tell me all about that and a bit about her own childhood too. And from the 1940s to a time much further back than that. I'm talking about the medieval period of about 1000 AD to be precise. So stay tuned

because I should be able to tell you just what women in that period in Cambridgeshire got up to. And as you'll hear, it's not at all what you might think. But before all that, I want to draw your attention to a campaign that's been launched today by the Campaign for Women's Justice, who are asking for the law to be changed for victims of domestic abuse who are facing criminal prosecution for their actions whilst they were under the influence of their perpetrators. It's something my guest Lou knows all too well about. And she's coming here today to bravely tell me her story in the hope that it will change things in the criminal justice system and mean that other women don't have to go through what she did.

Well, all that's to come. But first, for those of you who aren't diehard Swifties, let me enlighten you about Taylor Swift's accomplishments. Because according to Global Newswire, if Taylor Swift was an economy, she'd be bigger than 50 countries. She's the first songwriter to score seven Grammy nominations, the first living artist to have five albums in the top ten simultaneously, and she's taken ownership of not only her musical publications, but her brand and her image. And so I'd like to ask you,

do you think that qualifies her as Person of the Year? This comes after we've had Vladimir Zelensky, Elon Musk, Joe Biden and Greta Thunberg for the last few years. So is Taylor the right candidate? Or is there someone else we're missing? I'd love to know what you think. As always, you can text the programme. The number is 84844. Text will be charged at your standard message rate. On social media, we're at BBC Woman's Hour

and you can email us through our website too. Or you can send a WhatsApp message or a voice note using the number 03700 100 444. Data charges may apply depending on your provider, so you might want to use Wi-Fi if you can. The terms and conditions can be found on our website. But let me start the programme, because there is one Christmas classic

that many of you will be familiar with, Handel's Messiah. But you've probably never heard it like this before. Well, what a wonderful way to start the programme this morning. That's got me right in the Christmassy mood. Well, that was, of course, a clip from Hallelujah, which features in Too Hot to Handle, the Gospel Messiah, created by the much-acclaimed conductor, Marion Elsop,

one of the most famous conductors in the world. She joins me in the studio this morning. And as well as being responsible for that composition you just heard, she has a list of accolades. So let me just read out a few because Marion is the winner of the prestigious MacArthur Award, the chief conductor of the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, and the first, and also the first woman, to conduct the last night of the proms three times

and was the first woman to take on that task. Her reimagining of Handel's Messiah was first performed in 1993 so it's now celebrating its 30th year and as part of this Too Hot to Handel is this evening making its European debut at the Royal Albert Hall and so Marin welcome to the programme. It's lovely to have you here today and to start with such joyous tunes but let let me start with That Messiah, because it's such a fabulous bit of music. But what inspired you to reimagine it in the first place? Well, it's wonderful to be here. Let me let me say that. And I'm so excited to bring this project to the audiences here. You know, Britain has always felt like my second home, especially London, so I'm really happy. And to be at Royal Albert Hall is wonderful.

So over 30 years ago, boy, you start to feel old, don't you? Well, not you. You're so young. But I was talking to some friends, and they're non-musicians. And they said, well, what do you have on this week? And I said, well, I'm doing the Handel's Messiah. And they said, oh, that's the one where they stand up at the end. I like that part, but it takes too long until that happens. And I had a swing band at that time, and I was sort of fooling around with Bach in some of the Baroque music. And I said, why don't we try to do sort of an update of the Messiah so it feels relevant and draws in new audiences.

So I got together with two arranger friends of mine, Gary Anderson and Bob Christensen. They thought I was crazy, but they jumped in and divided up the piece and talked about it. And, you know, this is what we have now, this fantastic gospel rendition. And it is, it kind of sends like shivers up your arms because it's so, it's kind of the song that you recognize. Right. But it's been reinvigorated, like, please forgive my limited musical expertise. But can you talk me through how you've changed the piece?

Because I can hear some jazz in there, some gospel, maybe even some R&B. Oh, yeah, definitely. And, you know, so what we did was I said, look, I want the audience to come and think it's going to be, you know, the traditional Messiah. So we start very boom, boom, you know, very, very properly. And then pretty soon the rhythm section comes in. You know, saxophones and fantastic Hammond B3 organ. And, you know, the idea was to retain the integrity of the piece itself, you know, using it as the DNA, but change the feel, change the harmonic structure.

And so each number is really treated differently. So all we like sheep is now a shuffle, and there are several jazz waltzes. And, you know, it's just an absolute blast to do. And we have two phenomenal soloists, Vanessa Haynes and Zwa Kelly Shambhalala are singing and they're amazing. And they improvise and they do the call and response. So, you know, it's a concert that if you want to stand up and dance and clap, it's welcome. And that's one of the things I love about it, because I can tell even when you're sat here, your body's moving, you're so in love with the music and really alive with it. And I've heard

that your concerts, unlike other classical music concerts, there's audience participation, and it's quite encouraged by you. How that work well i especially in this piece of course um i and i don't turn around during a beethoven symphony and you know encourage audience participation too much but occasionally um but uh you know the idea is that we're getting back actually to the the origins of classical music which which originally was a much more participatory experience for the audience. You know, if they like something, they clap. If they wanted something reprise, they'd yell out. And I'm not saying you should, you know, yell out during the show, but you can if you want.

This is a piece about, I think, inclusion and celebration and unity. And so I want everyone to feel welcome. I love that. And there are three soloists in the piece as well. I want to take this opportunity to play a little bit of Thomas Young, the tenor, singing the Colorado Symphony and the Colorado Symphony Chorus. This is Every Valley. Every valley shall be exalted, shall be exalted, shall be exalted, shall be exalted. Everybody, everybody, everybody shall be exalted, shall be exalted. What a voice.

And I know you premiered that piece 30 years ago in the US. So my question is, why has it taken so long to get to Europe? Do you think we weren't ready for it? Oh, no, not at all. Really, I just didn't focus on it. I think that's, you know, I really needed to put my energy into it. And it's been performed every year across the United States. And so I was talking to Bob, one of the arrangers, Bob Christensen.

And he said, you know, the 30th anniversary is coming up. And I said, oh, my God, it can't be that long. He said, I'd love to see this at Royal Albert Hall and maybe film for PBS and BBC. And so that's exactly what's happening. So I'm, I want to call him, you know, tomorrow after the show and say, listen, your dream, your, you know, your wish is my command. You did that. But of course, it's not just always at the Albert Hall and other places. You've worked recently on the film Maestro, which tells the story of Bernstein and his wife, Felicia. What was your role in the film and what was that like? Oh, I didn't have an official role at all.

I was contacted by Bradley Cooper, who saw my documentary actually on a plane. What was it like working with him? Well, I mean, we just texted, he would send me some photos of, you know, from makeup, and how does this look? Does he know that kind of thing? I think the, the thing about this film, and the thing about Bradley Cooper is that this is a complete immersion for him and a labor of love. You know, he not only wrote the script, he produced the film, he directed it, he stars in it, you know, and he came to this with an incredible passion for the story of Leonard Bernstein. And I'm thrilled because a lot of young people don't even know who Bernstein was anymore. And maybe they know he wrote West Side Story, if they know that much. So I'm hoping this really revives the interest in this great American icon.

And sticking with the UK for a moment, because I don't know whether you saw the news yesterday, but I know you were principal conductor at the Bournemouth Symphony for six years. So you know the classical musical scene pretty well here. And this week, the English National Opera announced that it's moving its headquarters to Manchester, that the company has actually been ordered to leave London or lose its funding. What did you make of that news? And have you found classical music quite London-centric?

Well, I think, I mean, this is a huge topic really to discuss because, you know, it's cyclical, of course, and the arts are often relegated to, you know, the backseat when people feel financial pressures. But I really believe that we need to put the arts front and center. You know, there's nothing more valuable to a young person than to be able to express themselves through theater, through music, through, you know, through graphic visual arts. It's critical to fostering imagination and to creating a sense of self, especially for young people. So, you know, to me, it's sad news. I mean, of course, I think art should be everywhere, not just in London, but it's a bit of a beacon of the sign of the times. And you've been quite pivotal in that growing of the next generation, I suppose, because you made history this year as both the first American and first woman

to guest conduct the last three nights of the proms, And you were the first woman to do it in 1993. And I know that bringing along the next generation is massively important to you because you do a lot of teaching, you have a mentoring scheme for young female conductors. So how important is it to support female conductors now? Well, I think it's hugely important. As a result of the social movements, you know, Black Lives Matter, Me Too, we're seeing a lot more opportunities for underrepresented people on the podiums. But I think now is the moment to be really vigilant about pushing the doors open, you know, really wide, because we still don't see any women in the top tiers of the classical music field in terms of conducting. So it's important to create, through this fellowship

I have, we have a huge community now of women that support each other and help each other. And the great thing is I hear from almost every one of them, this fellowship I felt entirely alone now I feel I have resources and people so it's so important and have you seen it change and improve because I know you were once told when you were younger girls don't conduct well you certainly showed that person they were wrong but is that something you've come across in your career and has it changed to this point you know I think it has I think it has changed I think young women today don't have to suffer that same kind of prejudice or don't have those same challenges. But I would say that it really, it still remains a hurdle. And I worry that it's a little bit trendy right now to have women on the podium rather than intentional. Which brings me to another point, because I don't know whether you've seen the film Tar, which was starring Cate Blanchett. And it put female conductors on center stage.

And Blanchett was nominated for Best Actress at the Oscars last year because of that. But the character she played gave a pretty negative depiction of female conductors. She was a bully, a bit of a sexual predator. How did you respond to that film based on the fact that what you're trying to do here? Well, you know, this is a little bit of a hot topic because I have spoken out about the film. I think Cate Blanchett is marvellous, of course.

But I think that the script was written for a man. And so they just put that on a woman. And it's quite premature to assume that a woman who is in a top position will behave as abusively as her male counterparts. And I'm not saying all men behave that way by any means. But I think... But we've not heard that any women do and that must have made you quite angry yeah I mean I was and I I spoke out about it because I I feel a responsibility to all the women that are looking toward me um so you know I'm it's nothing it's nothing personal toward um Kate's acting whatsoever um but I did feel that the script and I didn't feel that the film made a whole lot of sense either.

I can see that. Well, thank you so much for coming on Woman's Hour, Marian Alsop. And there are still tickets available for Too Hot to Handle the Gospel Messiah at the Royal Albert Hall tonight.

Or if you can't make that, there is going to be a recording of the concert, which will be on BBC Radio 3 at 7.30 on Tuesday, the 12th of December. Thank you very much, Marion. It's my pleasure.

Thank you. And speaking of the music industry and influential women in it, we have been talking about Taylor Swift and how she has been said to be the woman of the year, the person of the year in the Time magazine.

Lots of you have been talking about this. Sarah has written to say, as the mother of three teenage girls 13, 17 and 18, I think Taylor Swift is a wonderful role model for their generation. She's honest about mistakes she's made, does not purport to be perfect and refuses

to allow others to unfairly control the narrative around her. Taylor shows young people that you can be in control of yourself and your business. I can't think of a better recipient of the Time Award. And someone else has written in though who says, why Taylor and not Dolly? Given Dolly was born 43 years earlier, I believe that's Dolly Parton, her achievements are so much more remarkable. We'll keep those coming in. It's good to talk

about all influential women here on Woman's Hour. Now I move on to my next topic because at least 60% of women in prisons are victims of domestic abuse, say the Centre for Women's Justice. They are calling for changes in law, policy and practice to prevent unjust criminalisation of victims or survivors of domestic abuse and other forms of violence against women and girls who are accused of offending. They want to ensure that victims are identified at the earliest possible stage and ensure that their experience of abuse is taken into account throughout the criminal justice system. Well, I'm joined now in the studio by the Director of the Centre for Women's Justice, Harriet Wishrich, Harriet Wishrich, sorry, and campaigner and former director of Southall Black Sisters, Pragna Patel. And also by Lou, who was convicted of a crime that arose in the context of an abusive relationship 12 years ago.

Welcome to you all. Thank you for coming on. Thank you. Harriet, I'm going to start with you because it's a change you've been working on for many years now. Tell me what it is you're pushing for and why. Well, we're pushing for and why. Well, we're pushing for change right across the criminal justice system. We think, first of all, that women shouldn't be... that there aren't defences available for women

who face criminal charges. But we also want to look at the way that police respond in the first place because often, in fact, rather extraordinary facts, if there are counter-allegations made at the scene of a domestic abuse, police are more likely to arrest the woman than the man, three times more likely, according to research. We want to see a change in the approach of prosecutors so that they can properly take into account a history of domestic abuse.

We want to see changes in the court system, and we want to see a reversal of the reduction of the specialist domestic abuse courts. And we want to see changes in policy. We're really pushing for new statutory defences because there are no defences that work for women. And far too many women are being criminalised when they are actually victims of abuse. And the system needs to actually work to tackle the perpetrators,

not the victims, which is what it's doing far too often. Of course, and it sounds justified what you want to do. But how are these women being criminalised in the first place if they are, as you say, victims? Because there is a lack of understanding around domestic abuse and the dynamics of domestic abuse. So that police, for example, are not identifying who actually is the victim. They're taking the perpetrator as his word at the scene of the crime. And that there's just really a fundamental lack of understanding right through the system. But also, if we had effective defences, it would influence at the beginning.

It would influence police if they were aware of that, it would influence prosecutors in particular, because they would see that actually, if there's evidence that somebody has been in a coercive and controlling relationship and been basically pressurised into committing an offence, then they might not charge. And we also think that they need to apply the public interest test much more effectively so that when a prosecutor makes a decision, they consider first whether there's evidence that somebody has committed a crime. Well, often, you know, in these cases, women may have technically committed a crime,

but they've done it under coercion. So we want the prosecutors to recognise that those sorts of women should not be being prosecuted, they should not be being sent to prison at all. And it has wider implications, not only for those women, but often for children as well. But is not the worry that you know some people might be listening who are concerned that lawyers might use this to their advantage to perhaps get lighter sentences for people who have committed a crime or that men could take the blame for a joint criminal offence. So could this law or this change in law that you want not be misused? Well, there's always a risk that laws can be misused in certain cases.

And in fact, what's happening at the moment is laws are being grossly misused because they're sending the wrong people to prison. They're convicting the wrong people. So that's why there has to be something that goes alongside changes in the law. And that is a kind of fundamental recalibration of the whole criminal justice system and an understanding at every level. So it's not just training, but we're also looking at accountability and leadership so that you're not just training police officers, prosecutors, those in the courts and judges to really understand what's going on and what lies beneath these offences. But you're also asking for leaders to step in and lead to ensure that's happening.

And we're looking at accountability. So where things go wrong, those people are held to account because otherwise they'll carry on getting away with it. So it's at every single level. Which is, of course, what has happened for Lou. Lou, I'd love to bring you into the programme now because, first of all, thank you for coming to tell me about your story. I know it's not easy to talk about, but I know you've joined this campaign because you feel that you've been punished by the system that was supposed to be there to help and protect you. Can you just tell me what happened to you and why you feel that the system failed you?

Yeah, yeah. Thank you for having me on. Well, I suffered over a decade of emotional, financial and physical abuse, which I finally managed to break free from and then stay free, which in itself is really difficult um and my my prosecutors were the local authority uh they're just another enforcement body like the police in certain circumstances um and yeah they they came along and uh obviously not only did they not help which would be bad enough um but then they went on to prosecute me and drag me through the courts, which was even more traumatising again, especially when I was sort of trying to recover. I was sort of trying to recover now and it's a few years on.

It's not an overnight thing you recover from. And they knew full well how violent my partner was because whenever they visited any of his premises, they weren't allowed to attend without police. So they were fully aware of all of that. And yet you were still arrested. What was the outcome? Yeah, well, it went to court. I had to plead guilty.

Really, I hadn't done anything wrong. But my choice was to have a potential two-week trial, sharing the witness box with my abuser and travelling a 50-mile round trip every day as well. And the judge had already indicated that a custodial sentence would be likely so can i just go back a few steps what was the crime you were convicted of and what was it that had actually happened yeah it was um it was to do with welfare of animals um and the animals weren't mine. They weren't on any land of mine. I didn't do daily care for them. They knew full well it wasn't anything to do with me. The whole point of them prosecuting me was to ban me from keeping animals on my former partner's behalf.

But because you were in partnership with your former partner, you were therefore convicted alongside him. And it was a joint trial as well, which must have put you in a very difficult position. Yeah, he went on to plead not guilty. But I decided to plead guilty because I didn't want to spend a fortnight sharing the dock with him. I was told by my lawyer before that somebody had made me the court and I'd been in a separate room. But none of that happened. There was nobody there at all. I was just on my own, which was pretty frightening. So you were convicted and charged with cruelty to animals.

And the outcome was a suspended sentence, I believe. Yeah, I got probation. I got a fine. I was on tag. I got a suspended sentence and I had a life ban on keeping animals except for all my own animals which I had horses at the time and that was that was the issue horses and I was still allowed to keep my own and then all replacements so it was purely divisive by the local authority the whole idea was that they didn't want me to keep any horses or animals on behalf of my former partner who I wasn't with anyway. And can I just be clear so the crime was against cruelty to animals and you pleaded guilty because you didn't want to be in the dock with him at

that time. Did you raise the abusive relationship with the police or anybody in the court along the way were they aware that you were being controlled by him at this point yes they were and was that information shared yes it was i i did a statement um and my my solicitor told me that the prosecution may want to speak to me about it and discuss it but they they didn't. Nobody did. The only person who spoke up for me was the court probation staff, the lady from court probation. more supportive than my own legal team and then subsequently probation afterwards they they were again extremely supportive really helpful but of course it's too late so you've already got the conviction yeah Lou I'm so sorry to hear that um we have got a statement from the Ministry of Justice who say the government is changing the law so that fewer offenders go to prison for short periods and it is already the case that being a victim of abuse or coercive

control can be a mitigating factor when someone is sentenced. But of course Lou's story is unfortunately not the only one. Pragner, is her story familiar to you? Totally familiar. I think the real problem we have here is that there is an institutional response that is really woe sort of wider criminal justice system responses, such as the Casey Review, which talked about institutional racism, institutional misogyny, institutional corruption. Sadly, that is where the problem lies. And until we fix that, what we're really seeing is a routine criminalization of women, not only those who might commit offenses because they've been coerced into committing those offenses, but also women who just report domestic abuse. My experience is showing that women are routinely being criminalized for reporting domestic abuse. Police officers don't understand coercive control, don't understand the dynamics or don't want to investigate because it takes time. It's time consuming. And domestic abuse calls are,

you know, are widespread. They are increasing all the time. So we're seeing on the one hand, more and more women being encouraged to report domestic abuse. And then we're seeing a criminal justice system that is being punitive to them when they report domestic abuse. And we're not only seeing vulnerable women in conditions of coercive control like Lou, but we're also seeing black minority women who are also likely to face double disadvantage in the criminal justice system. Well, in fact, your campaign points out that black Asian minoritized and migrant women can receive particularly unfair treatment, but they're twice as likely as white women to be arrested over this. Absolutely. Black and minority women are overrepresented at every stage

of the criminal justice system. This is not something that campaigners like myself are saying or Centre for Women's Justice, actually the Ministry of Justice itself recognises this. The College of Policing and the police as a body have also recognised domestic abuse as a risk factor, you know, and yet women are being criminalized. They don't want to explore and investigate the underlying reasons for, you know, sort of the underlying relationships of coercive control. It is easier to just accept the word of perpetrators. And that's what's happening. Counter allegations are usually made by perpetrators when women report domestic abuse and perpetrators voices are heard and privileged over those of vulnerable disadvantaged women and the more richer you are the fact that you're male the fact that

you own property the fact that you speak, the fact that you come across rational, those are what I would call privilege factors, which enable your voice to be heard over the voice of vulnerable women. So the more vulnerable you are, the less likely you are to speak English, understand the system, can't navigate your way. And knowledge of that puts you off telling someone in the first place. Well, knowledge of that means that you're more likely to be detained or arrested. And knowledge of that puts you off telling someone in the first place. Well, knowledge of that means that you're more likely to be detained or arrested. And knowledge of that means that, yes, you're going to be deterred from going to the police in the first place, which is the reality, particularly for migrant women, because they fear data sharing between police and enforcement of immigration enforcement. We have, the Ministry of Justice have spoken to us about this. They say we remain committed

to addressing racial disparities within the criminal justice system and action taken so far includes providing more bespoke support for ethnic minority women and measures to increase judicial diversity. But I just want to come back to you,

Harriet, for just one last question quickly. I mean, what do you want to see happen here because the MOJ have said that they're doing they have made changes in recent years what more needs to be done? Could I just say first of all that we have a film that we've just produced which is the sort of key to this item on the programme it's called Stop Criminalising Survivors and it is on the Centre for Women's Justice website and in in that film, we identify a whole series of different steps that need to be taken. But as I've set out, it really is at every single stage of the criminal justice system that we have to address this. And we're asking the government to consider new defences,

which will in turn influence the way prosecution decisions are taken and will influence the practice of policing. But we also need a massive transformation, really, to ensure that police are accountable and everyone in the criminal justice system is accountable so that they are not only just failing to you know failing to protect women but they're actually punishing the women they should be protecting and that has to change it's just scandalous thank you thank you harriet thank you pregnant and thank you lou and thank you very much

for coming on the program today um you can text women's hour of course on 844 sorry 84844 text will be charged at your standard message rate and you can check with your network provider for extra costs. And on social media, we're at BBC Women's Hour, or you can email us through your website. I would love to hear your opinions on this topic. Thank you very much for joining me. Now, let's move on to our next topic, because what can we see or find out about medieval women's lives from studying their skeletons. Well, it seems that some did very strenuous work that changed the shape of their upper bodies. This is unbelievable. And others were trading and travelling across Europe, and many would have existed in chronic pain.

That's all according to Dr. Sarah Inskip from Leicester University, who has been part of a team excavating Cambridge graveyards for a new research project called After the Plague. Well she joins me now. Hello Dr Sarah Inskip thank you for coming on the programme. Good morning Hayley it's a pleasure to be here thank you for having me. No thank you. First of all can you tell me more about this project because what time period are the skeletons from and what have you found? Yeah so the After the Plague project which is recently finished actually it's taken place from 2016 up until Covid actually and the whole aim of the After the Plague project was to look at the impact of the Black Death on the lives

particularly the health of people from medieval Cambridge. And we were doing this from the perspective of archaeological skeletons. And the skeletons themselves date from around 1000 right through to sort of 1500. And what we wanted to do really is to use lots of kinds of different techniques. So using genetics, analysis of proteins, looking at the bones, looking at disease and also geochemistry, a bit of isotopy to understand more about the lives of individuals that were buried in the hospital there, that were from the from the friary, from the rural surrounding rural community and in the town itself. And what you found has been quite shattering, hasn't it? Because I know you've given some of these women names, so we can talk about specific ones like Christina. Tell me, no, Christiana, sorry.

Tell me more about her. Yeah, so we had a number of interesting women that we gave names and we wanted to pick ones that were typical of what was happening and some that were more unusual and Christiana is one of these and she's sort of a success story really. So she was a young woman that was buried in the hospital of St John and that took in poor people or poor scholars and from her genetics we could see that she was sort of blonde, blue eyed. She was quite tall. And we didn't find any sort of evidence for a difficult childhood or chronic disease or anything like that. But what was interesting is that her bone chemistry told us that she was likely to be from outside the Cambridge area and very likely not to be from England as well. Wow so I suppose that kind of messes with our preconceived ideas

that traders were men that people who came from other continents were mostly men because here's a woman doing that. Yeah so what we looked at was looked at her bone chemistry and what we base this on is sort of everything that you eat and you drink takes on sort of signatures of the, will make your bone take on signatures of their surrounding environment. And her signatures were far more consistent with coming with, it's either west of England or Scotland or perhaps Norway. And yeah, given the trade that was taking place in the North Sea area and Cambridge position, it was likely that she was probably coming from Norway and possibly the big trades at this time are sort of in fur and in lumber. So it's possible that she came over

perhaps for, there's a big fair at Cambridge Stourage Fair, which was famous in Europe, and to trade here and what's important about her is it shows that potentially young women were were trading and and were moving around a few historians have discussed this but they're not you know that there there's not that much evidence about it because their their sort of stories and narratives are lost but it also suggests that perhaps she had control of her own capital as well which is quite quite important and we know sort of at this in this time for example guilds you know are the prerogative of men and women generally were not allowed in into guilds um so yeah she's it's

really interesting to reconstruct her and see that you know perhaps you know women are I mean they're coming to Cambridge and they're coming to trade um and I love this and let's talk about Marjorie she's another interesting character what kind of life did she have so um Marjorie was a mature woman and and she was found in the normal parish of All Saints um in the in in the town of Cambridge itself. But unlike the local women that we found in the hospital who had kind of a lot of evidence for illness and disease, as you might expect, she was actually reasonably tall. She looked like she had quite an unremarkable childhood. But she had, from her bones, we can see it's likely she had a very physically demanding life because she had a very, very robust upper body. And she was one of a couple of women that had this.

In fact, some of the strongest bones in our sample, irregardless of whether they were male or female. So she she had some rib fractures and she had some herniated discs as well, which may suggest and link to the fact that she's doing a lot of physically strenuous life. And from this period, I mean, there is an overwhelming, not overwhelming, but people assume that women are just doing these kind of domestic things around the house. But actually, medieval women would have done a lot of things like seasonal work. And even though she was living in the town, she perhaps is going out and working in the fields and working alongside men as and when it was demanded. So there's a lot of variation in what women could be doing.

And they could be doing, you know, quite physically demanding work and could be very strong individuals too. And how can you tell that? Because quite a few of the women highlighted in this project, you've said, did very strenuous work. How can you tell? I'm fascinated by how you can find this out. Yeah, so your bones are a very active tissue. People don't think about their skeletons and bones. They just sort of are in our bodies and do their job. They're constantly changing throughout our childhood and throughout our adult life. Yeah, because you mentioned the food you eat affects what the bones look like as well. It's unbelievable.

Yeah, absolutely. And so if you're doing a lot of physical activity, you have a lot of muscle, you need a lot of bone to support that muscle. So what we can do through using CT scans is look at the distribution and the shape of the bone. And this can tell us about the forces that are going onto the bone. We can also look at muscle attachments as well. So in a, I guess, simple way that she had very thick bones, which suggested, you know, that there's a lot of activity going on and shape was in a particular sort of shape, which should suggest loading in some kinds and particular sorts of ways.

So there's so many more women that you've explored that we could talk about all day. But what can we conclude about all the women of this era from this new research? I mean, do our existing narratives about them stand up anymore? I think, well, the beautiful thing about archaeology is it kind of complements history. It's not acting to sort of replace it, but it brings new evidence that can be used with history to sort of address our narratives. And of course, women are disproportionately absent from the historical records. There's a few of their writings and what they were doing was not really of interest to people that were writing and what our research has really shown is that there were lots of different life courses and outcomes for women and some of these women had agency and control over what they were doing so in particular we find a very old woman buried in the chapter house in the friary, which is a very male dominated space. And we also, there was a girl in there as well. So that was really interesting

for us too. But for me, it's important to come up with these narratives and tell not only the realities of life for women, which was difficult. We did have individuals that, you know, probably lost their lives in childbirth or around the end of childbirth. And women seemed disproportionately affected by tuberculosis. But we do have these success stories as well. So it's not all doom and gloom for these women in this period.

And there's a lot of colour out there which is missing. And that's what archaeology adds. It's fascinating. Dr. Sarah Inskip, thank you very much. And you can see more on the After the Plague website hosted by Cambridge University. And if you enjoyed that, in our upcoming Boxing Day programme, we're going to be speaking to more women who dig for the truth

in their working and personal lives. And we want to hear from you. When have you had to dig for the truth? their working and personal lives. And we want to hear from you. When have you had to dig for the truth and what did you discover? Maybe you found a long-lost relative, solved a local mystery, exposed a family secret or even dug up something special in your back garden. Please get in touch. You can text the programme, the number's 84844. Text will be charged at your standard message rate.

On social media, we're at BBC Woman's Hour and you can email us through our website as well. Or you can WhatsApp message or voice note us using the number 03700 100 444 and all the terms and conditions can be found on our website. Now, our final guest, Diana Quick, is well known for her performance as Lady Julia Flight in the TV

series Brideshead Revisited receiving both Emmy and BAFTA nominations. She's portrayed Queen Elizabeth II and appeared in film and television and both classical and musical theatre ranging from Troilus and Cressida to the Three Penny Opera. Her latest role though is as Mrs Wentworth in a new television series of The Famous Five, in which the classic adventures have been brought to life with a new, fresh, modern reimagining of Enid Blyton's iconic stories. Well, Diana joins me now live in the studio. Welcome, Diana. Now, I'll begin with talking about The Famous Five because I've watched the first episode. In fact, I watched it with my kids and they absolutely loved it.

Their exact words were, it's very dramatic, mummy. And I think it is. It doesn't hold back, does it? They were shrieking with fear at some point and excitement to other. But tell me about the films. What did you make of the reimaginings of such classic tales? Well, when it was proposed to me, I was a bit dubious because nobody really is reading

those Famous Five stories at present. But actually, they have come up with a very fresh approach. And the four children who play or four young people who play the human parts of the Famous Five are fabulous, as is

the dog, who's the fifth member. And visually, it's very good, I thought. Didn't you enjoy that? It was very cinematic, wasn't it? It's very cinematic. And the locations as well. You must be on islands and cliffs and sea. Where is it you are?

Well, sadly, I didn't get to do any of the island stuff. You're in the posh house, aren't you? The big, draughty posh houses in Herefordshire. Of course, you play Mrs Wentworth, the mother of the evil Wentworth. That's right. So what sort of character is she and how was it playing her? Well, she's a very controlling

mother who holds the purse strings, but adores her son who's daft and obsessed with getting hold of this treasure, which he's heard about, which he thinks is the key to a crusader secret.

And George, who's the eldest of the famous five, happens to live somewhere where there's an island which had been colonized by the crusaders and where there is supposed to be a curse on the island. I think the episode's called The Curse of Cairn Island. So George finds herself in the position of having to defend the secrets of the island and my son and his henchmen are determined to go and find the treasure such as it is,

not for the sake of the treasure but because they think it will give them the key to ultimate power. And I indulge my son, although I keep a very close hold on the money, but also my soft side is that I love making very, very rich teas and cakes. Yeah, there are a lot of quite exciting cakes in this. You're always sat by some very tall, wonderful cakes. They're amazing. Did food have a lot to play? Because when we do think of Enid Blyton,

we think of ginger beer and picnics and things like that. Food is quite pivotal, isn't it? It really is. And sadly, we didn't have time in the end to film it, but there was to have been a scene where the children make me a prisoner

because I take them tea in a library where my son has said they must be locked up so they can't get into mischief. And the idea was that George starts a bum fight and then I join in. So we should have all got covered in cream. Oh, my kids would have loved that.

I'd have loved that. I know. In fact, one of the comments my kids did make is when the children, who we all know, there's Julian, Dick, George and Anne, they go out sailing and playing all day without their parents. then in fact they actually catch a train to london without even telling their mum and dad where they're going and they said to me they tend to say to me are they not going to ask their mum and dad to go to london and it's a stark contrast to

now isn't it because i suppose we grew up with these stories but can you identify with their sense of freedom and adventure or is it very different to how we live and how our childhood is now? I think it's so different now but certainly when I was growing up in the 50s we got turned out in the morning and told to come back if you got hungry and we were just let out to play and I lived where there was quite a big heathland and we'd just disappear and if we got hungry we came out. You wouldn't dream of doing that with children now. And in fact when my own daughter was growing up I used to lurk in the hedgerow

and pretend that she was free to explore by herself but always keeping an eye. And it's a sad reflection of how we live now that children have to be supervised most of the time. And another big difference I think is the interesting gender roles there. I mean, George is described as a tomboy in the books and in this, but I think nowadays that's more accepted. Do you think those gender roles have changed?

I think they are changing, and thankfully young women are starting to feel that they can do anything that anybody can do do and they're not defined by their gender. Although I have to say, when I was young, I wasn't very conscious of being a girl. Well, it's something you made your mark on, actually, because on leaving school, you went to Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, where you became the first female president of the Oxford University Dramatic Society. So tell me about that role. Were you accepted? Was it something you were conscious of? And did that sort of propel you through your early career?

I wasn't conscious that it was a big deal. I mean, I was immersed in making plays, either performing them or producing them or designing them or producing them, promoting them. And I got nominated by the previous president and went, oh, okay, all right. And then I got elected and was doing it and suddenly got a lot of media attention, which I was absolutely unused to. And I hadn't understood what a significant thing at that point it was because, of course, Oxford was an absolute

bastion of male privilege. But women were were in a minority there were only five women's colleges then and you had to go through a lot of hoops to get a place there at that time you still do of course but women have access to the entire collegiate structure now but the year that I happened to be made president of the drama society there was also a young woman who became president of the Union, which is the debating and political society. So the two of us received a lot of attention. And in the end, I found myself saying to the press, well, if you want to interview me, you'll have to give some money to the Owls

so that we can do some more plays. Good idea. But I listened to Marianne earlier, who was your guest, and I was a bit sad to hear that it's still an area where women have to fight to get a foothold. And I think, you know, we're doing quite well in removing glass ceilings, but it's still significant if a woman makes it. Even in the acting world now? Acting is slightly different, I think. Although, yeah, to an extent, I don't want to come on and moan about it. But, you know, you are still defined by playing a woman's role. And it's unusual for women to be the protagonist, certainly at my age and stage. You usually find yourself cast in relation to somebody else as somebody's lover or wife or mother. Is that something you'd like to see changed? I'd love to see it changed, yes.

And actually I'm working on something at the moment which is a Wilkie Collins story who was a Victorian novelist and a contemporary of Dickens where our heroine attends the funeral of her much-loved husband at the beginning of the story to find that in his will he said that he wants her to inherit his business and all the other directors of the company are full of shock and horror but she does take over the running of the company and then a lot of stuff happens after that.

Well, that sounds great. We will await to see that. And you did a play in lockdown, I remember, about mother and daughter. Yes. Midnight Your Time. Tell me about that because you, as you say, play a lot of mothers. But you also got to see, it was quite a different look on motherhood, very different to The Famous Five, for instance.

Oh, completely different, yes. It was written by Adam Brace, the late lamented. Sadly, he died earlier this year. And he wrote it for me. And it's about a mother whose daughter has gone off to be a volunteer in Palestine, and her mother's beside herself with worry that something awful is going to happen to her child.

So she's just learned to make Zoom calls, and they've made a deal that she will phone every night, at midnight, where her daughter is, in order to speak, but she never gets to speak to her. So she leaves a series of messages and gradually over time she reveals the chaos of her own life and her anxiety about her daughter. So we had done this as a stage play.

And then during lockdown, Mike, the director, who was now running the Donmar warehouse, proposed that we should try and film it as a fundraiser for the Donmar. And of course, with it being over Zoom, it kind of lent itself to it. You could have that interactive element to it. Exactly. So that was great. And it's quite a steep learning curve for me because I'd never had to record myself before.

And a massive part, one-woman show, huge. Which brings me back to the industry, really, because I know that your daughter now Mary Nighy she was on Woman's Hour earlier this year talking about a film she's directed Alice Darling and how is it seeing your daughter in the same industry and

do you think she still has to push to be heard and do you worry for her? Well you always worry for your child. I think she's really good at her job so so I don't worry about that. But she does come home with stories about sort of mindless remarks that are made on film sets. Film sets are still very male-dominated.

There are women who are appearing as producers, writers, technicians, camera operators, that sort of thing, But they're still in the minority. Is it not disappointing to you that you still hear that she gets pushed back? You've been in this industry a long time. It was there when you started and it's still there now. Yes, I mean, I think talent will out. And I'm very happy that she's doing well now. And I hope she will continue to thrive, as will a lot of her peers.

I know a lot of young women who have sort of come up in her cohort as writers and producers and directors. And I'm very proud of all of them. And I think it will get better. But isn't it sad that we're still having to make a fuss about it, being a woman doing these things, rather than just a very competent person. You do have a new film coming out next year, Forever Now, and the concept is a very interesting conundrum,

one that I've been, since I heard about it, thinking, what would I do? Explain a bit to the listeners about the concept and I'd like to know what would you do in that situation yourself? Okay, well, the situation is that she is a writer who's been married for a long time to the same husband, and she's the main breadwinner,

but her career is slightly on the way now. And at her last book launch, an old flame turns up who's a scientist and says, guess what? The elixir I've been working on all my life is now viable. Would you like to try it and go back to being 25? Yes, please. No, I'm not sure. Go on. She actually says no initially.

And then she thinks about it and thinks it would be great if she could go back and take her husband back and they could have the child which she chose not to have when she was a young woman. So she proposes it to her husband and he says, no, no, you go back if you want, but I'm happy as I am. And the reason he's doing that is because he has just been diagnosed with cancer

and he hasn't yet told her. And he fears that the stem cell, whatever it is, that the elixir is going to make him... But just before we go, go on. So anyway, when asked if I would do it, I thought I would only go back if I could take all the experiences that I've had in my now quite long life back to being 25 because I wouldn't forego those for anything.

I think you're right. Well, Diana Quick, thank you so much for coming on the programme. Great pleasure. The new version of The Famous Five is on BBC One between Christmas and the New Year, or you can catch episode one on BBC iPlayer from this Saturday. And thank you for all your comments as ever on Woman's Hour today. Just one here about Taylor Swift. The real measure of her success is in the way she challenged and opposed the music industry, which is almost totally

controlled by men. This has been responsible for decades, deeply affecting careers. This is what she should be held up for and what she can achieve. Thank you very much. That's all from me and the Woman's Hour team today. Thank you to all my guests and contributors. And of course, thank you for listening. Well, thanks for listening. There's plenty more from Woman's Hour on BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Kirsty Wark and this is The Reunion. Reflecting on a shared news event, a cultural moment, or just the experience of all being there at the same time and the same place. I just started doing that voice to Armando. When he was stressed.

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