Woman's Hour - Weddings online. Expert Women Project and Covid. Author Tishani Doshi

Episode Date: May 4, 2020

The breakout of COVID-19 has put many aspects of life on hold – including the Big Day. Emily McMahon and her partner Jack Walsh tell us about their online wedding with friends and family over video call.The Expert Women Project has been recording and reporting the appearance of women authority figures appearing on news programmes for the last five years. Since this project began the number of women experts on these programmes has risen by at least 40%. Emeritus Professor Lis Howell directs the project and the former cabinet minister Baroness Morgan of Cotes, one of its supporters, join Jane to discuss the latest batch of results tracking the appearance of women on flagship news programming during the Covid 19 pandemic. Tishani Doshi is an Indian poet, writer, and dancer. Her latest novel, Small Days and Nights tells the story of Grace who returns to India from the USA to cremate her mother, only to find out she has an unexpected inheritance, a house on the beach and a sister with down’s syndrome. How does it feel to be bereaved and living alone during coronavirus? In today’s Woman’s Hour Corona Diaries, Elaine Chambers from Brighton talks about how being forced to give up social activities has affected the process of grief - and how she’s trying to cope with the emotional exhaustion of daily life. And the programme everyone's talking about the adapation of Sally Rooney's "Normal People" Presenter Jane Garvey Producer Beverley PurcellGuest; Professor Lis Howell Guest; Baroness Morgan of Cote Guest; Tishani Doshi Guest; Elaine Chambers Guest ; Emily McMahon Guest; Jack Walsh Guest; Maria Fleming Guest; Elizabeth Day

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. Hi, this is Jane Garvey and this is the Woman's Hour podcast. It is Monday the 4th of May 2020. Hello, good morning. It's Monday morning. Woman's Hour's back live and you're welcome to take part at BBC Woman's Hour on Twitter. I hope you had a reasonable weekend. I changed a hoover bag and it's a measure of just how dull the weekend was

that I think that's worthy of mention. But maybe your weekend was more interesting than mine. Who knows? Today, we're talking about Zoom weddings. We'll talk to a bride who married on Zoom. And we'll also discuss in some detail normal people, which has been a real talking point. There have been newspaper columns and editorials dedicated to it. It's seemingly the drama show of the moment that everyone is watching. What do you think of it? Has it helped you open up a conversation, perhaps particularly about consent with your children? Let us know about that. And we'll have another coronavirus diary. Today you can hear from Elaine in Brighton,

who was bereaved in 2017 and was about really starting her recovery and things were getting better for her. And now she's found that the lockdown has had quite an impact on her and her quality of life. So we'll talk to Elaine a little bit later. First up this morning, the Expert Women Project has been recording and reporting the appearance of female authority figures on radio and television news programmes for the last five years. Now, in that time, the number of women experts on programmes has gone up by at least 40%. But interestingly, during the early weeks of the lockdown, there was a dramatic fall in the number of women appearing.

Emeritus Professor Liz Howell directs the project, and in a moment you can hear from the former Tory MP and Culture Secretary, Baroness Morgan of Coates, Nicky Morgan, who has supported the aims of the project. Liz Howell, first of all, what exactly is it you're doing? Well, we count the number of women experts or authority figures who appear on five or six flagship news programmes and we do it for five days a month in selected months of the year. This year we decided to do it in February and March and then extended the project into April,

and we found some very interesting figures. For example, in February, there was a pretty respectable ratio of men to women experts. It was 1.9, and that's what we'd expect to see because the ratio of female expertise in society is around about two to one. However, in March, this figure rocketed to 2.7 men to every woman, nearly three men to every woman. And that's the worst figure we've seen for a long, long time. And that was when the coronavirus began to take hold.

It was just pre-lockdown. We were measuring the second week in March, and it was when there was a lot of speculation and concern about what was going to happen. And we found that the group of people who really dominated in this period were male politicians and male politicos. And they sort of surged back at that stage and gave us one of the worst figures we've had for a long time. Then in April, interestingly, women experts came back to the fore because of the NHS and because the editors of the programme decided to go into hospitals and care homes and talk to real people. And women came back. But the big fear is that when we get into May and it's more speculative about the end of lockdown, we will go back to seeing all these men with their opinions, predominantly cabinet ministers and political appointees, and that they will dominate the airwaves again. Why does it matter, though, Liz? Because we need to hear from the experts. We've never

needed expert opinion more. Why does it matter? Because there are a great many women experts out there. And I think that they're possibly being overlooked, not necessarily by the editors who are trying very hard, but by the administration. It's right anyway that we have fairness to women. As I say, the level of expertise in society is about two to one in favour of men, nothing like three to one. Well, how do we define an expert? We define an expert as an authority figure, somebody who, for example, we look at people who are in professions like the law, in academia, and are expert witnesses, expert witness agencies. And they all show a ratio of

about two men to every woman. But in the news programs that we were seeing in March, it was three men to every woman. And that isn't right. Also, there's a lot of evidence that women are performing very well in this crisis. You've got Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand, Angela Merkel in Germany, Tsai Ing-wen in Taiwan, Nettie Fredrickson in Denmark, Anna Marin in Finland, Nicola Sturgeon, they're all doing very well. So there is some evidence that people respond well to women and that perhaps the current administration is shooting itself in the foot by not having more women experts up there.

Just to pick you up on that, they're doing well in terms of how they've dealt with the coronavirus or indeed in how the public perceives the way they're giving out the important messages? Well, both. And the two things are obviously inextricably linked. I mean, linked, for example, Nicola Sturgeon's approval rating on YouGov for March in Scotland is 54%. That's really high. So it's not as if women weren't doing well. They're doing very well elsewhere. So what's wrong here? Nicky Morgan, sorry, Baroness Morgan. Good morning to you. How are you? Good morning. Very well, thank you. Do you think this stuff matters?

I do think it matters. I think that having the female perspective on something obviously as critical as the virus is very important. But I equally, I think the point that you made, Jane, which is that at this current moment, we want to hear from the right people in the right jobs. And it just so happened that this time the chief medical officer obviously is Chris Whitty, the chief scientific officer is Patrick Balance. You know, if it had been nine months ago, we had a female chief medical officer in Dame Sally Davis, and we would have been hearing a lot more from her, for example. And it also happens that the relevant cabinet ministers at this time are male. Well, the Home Secretary is a woman. We are living in quite unprecedented times. I never thought there'd be any kind of lockdown and this level of restriction placed on my social life in my lifetime in this country. We never hear from the female Home Secretary. Incredible.

Well, we have heard from her. She's done interviews. She's done a couple of the press conferences. But nothing like you might expect. Well, I think at the end of the day, Downing Street will always think about who is the right person to front up the press conferences, depending on the announcements of the day. And at the end of the day, I think what most people want to hear from is the Prime Minister.

But of course, he hasn't been in position because of his health. He's back now, which I think everyone is very relieved to see. And of course, we had an example last week where we did have a female minister talking about domestic abuse or trying to on a national news programme being shouted down by a male presenter. That's not encouraging. You're talking there about the encounter between Helen Waitley and Piers Morgan. No, Victoria Atkins, who is the minister who is about to take the domestic abuse bill through Parliament.

And instead, you know, obviously she's a minister. She's there to answer for the government. But she didn't get asked about domestic abuse at all, which is something we know sadly has increased as a result of the lockdown. And some people were watching that programme, wanted to hear more. Instead, what they heard was a male presenter trying to trying to shout her down. That's not encouraging. But the overall point of Liz's work is right, which is actually you have to be deliberate about getting female voices out there on any issue, including the current crisis. Yeah, I've got to speak up for Piers Morgan and journalism generally. If somebody like Victoria Atkins makes an appearance

on a national television show or radio show, you know that you're going to be asked about a topical news line of the day. Not necessarily all you're going to be asked about is what you thought you were going to be coming on to speak about. I mean, in the real world, that's what happens. Absolutely. And she did answer those questions, but clearly not in the way that he wanted. And normally what happens in any programme, as you say, is you'll expect to be asked about a topical issue of the day. And I've been there and had to answer questions not in my department. But then you are also asked about what you have been booked to talk about, particularly when it's an issue which we also know is deeply, sadly topical in this current lockdown crisis.

Do you think that, Nicky Morgan, that women are simply less likely to self-identify as experts? Have we still got that as an issue? Well, I do think that there's an issue. And of course, the BBC did run an expert women programme, which I think has now slightly fallen by the wayside. I don't think that's what Tony Hall would say, but carry on. Yeah. But I do think you're right in many ways, which is that, and I think editors will find this, which is when they ask women to go on, women often want to be much surer of the ground they're talking about. Whereas often, I remember talking to a senior editor about this, often it is men who will actually go on and say, well, I'm not an expert on this, but I will talk about it. And I think that's what Liz is getting at when she talks about at the time when the news is more speculative, then actually often it is male voices that will come to the fore or people who will want to give their opinion. But if women are not involved in decision making about how we ease the lockdown or indeed about any other aspect of the current situation, then Nikki, we are all going to lose out,

aren't we, potentially? Well, I think it's right. You have to have women's voices around the table. And we do. Obviously, we have people like Therese Coffey, who is DWP secretary. We've obviously got Priti as Home Secretary. We've got the Deputy Chief Medical Officer in Jenny Harries. We've got the Chief Nurse in Ruth May. The latter two, as well as Priti, have also spoken at the press conferences. So there are female voices. But it is obviously the case that at this current moment in time, the politicians we're hearing most from, the health secretary, the prime minister, the chancellor, the community secretary, the business secretary, those positions are held by men. Nicky, thank you very much. Quick word from you, Liz.

You say you've spoken to editors. Have any of them actually promised to make a much more concerted attempt to even things out as we go through the crisis? I would say they all have. They're very keen to make sure that women are fairly represented in this crisis. And they do try very hard to do so. You can read a lot more about these figures on the website we've just launched, which is the Expert Women Project. And in terms of quotes from editors there, They are trying, but it's very difficult when the administration isn't helping.

And in terms of the best programmes with regard to letting women have a say, apart from this one, who would you go for? Channel 5 News is very good and people don't think much about Sky because a lot of people think, you know, they go to the BBC or the ITV, but the Sky Breakfast programme is doing extremely well.

News at Ten has just improved massively, BBC News at Ten, and ITV has done a really good job. They are trying. They really are trying. We should sometimes perhaps think about clapping for broadcasters. I don't think that will ever happen, but they are doing a really good job. Good luck with trying to get that one off the ground. Thank you very much indeed for talking to us. That was Emeritus Professor Liz Howell before that. Baroness Morgan of Coates, that's the former Tory MP, Nicky Morgan. Do you think it matters? Do you care who delivers the important messages of the moment? Is there a real problem because we have, relatively speaking, fewer women involved in decision making and making pronouncements in the UK right now? Thank you. She inherits a house on a beach, but much more importantly, she discovers she has a sister with Down syndrome, somebody she knew nothing about.

For me, a big part of it is about caregiving, actually, and what it means to nurture, that sense of what it means to be a mother figure, that sense of how certain places allow or disallow the function of feeling like you're part of something or a sense of belonging. There is quite a bit of your own personal story or personal experience in this book, isn't there? In particular, the fact that your central character, Grace, has to care, and she does it somewhat reluctantly, for a sister she didn't know she had,

who has Down syndrome. And you have a brother who has Downs, don't you? Yes, I think I've wanted to write about the experience of growing up with a sibling who has Down syndrome or anyone who is differently abled, I suppose. But I wanted to write in fiction, I guess, a different story than the one I've had in real life but while keeping true to some of the things that I've been thinking about about the difficulties of caregiving so I really didn't want to sentimentalize the whole idea of it but I wanted to allow for a truthful exploration of the joys that it can allow, but also the difficulties, the day to day, which I feel we have difficulty even in our own lives. And, you know, when you have to look after someone

else, what does that mean? Do you think it's right to describe it as brave to do what you've done in this book and to actually acknowledge how very, very tough it can be to give care in these circumstances? Yeah, I think we were talking about place. So my novel is set in South India and Tamil Nadu. Grace, my protagonist, is a woman who's essentially living alone in a very isolated rural coastal beach. And I think the sense of what are our support systems if our family lets us down?

What is the support system that the country offers you? How are you managing to do this in your life? And those things are very hard for people at the best of times. So when you put in to, you know, layer it in with gender, with class, with caste and all of those things, it becomes a very complicated issue. And I wanted to explore all of that in the book in some way. Popular culture, if it talks about caring at all, tends to over sentimentalize it, doesn't it? You don't do that. And you actually acknowledge that, frankly, Grace finds aspects of caring for her sister profoundly irritating. And in fact, when she can,

she leaves her and goes off and does other things. Yeah, there's this sense of how will you live your life? What will you put at the center of it? And Grace is someone I see as somebody who really wants to do the right thing. So it is a moral book in that sense. It has a moral question at the center of it. You find out that you have a sibling you didn't know about. What will you do? Will you change your life or will you go on as if nothing's happened? So she decides to change her life, but she doesn't actually have the ability to successfully do this thing that she wants to do. You know, so she fails. She needs to go into the city. She needs some other enjoyment. She needs to have people to talk to. And so she sort of abandons her sister. And I think this sense of, do you know, what this whole area of what is good, what is bad, what are intentions, those are important things. And they're not clear black or white issues ever. No, but as a reader, I found myself judging her, even though I have no right to, because if I'm honest, I know I couldn't care for a sibling like Lucy in the book. So why

would I be so hard on a fictional character who also couldn't do it? But our brains work in a strange way, don't they? You know, we expect certain things of women, especially when we're talking about the role of nurturing. And we expect women to be the primary nurturers, whether it's in a family or in any situation. And so I think that our judgment comes from the fact that we are societally programmed to expect certain things from women. And the other thing is that we want our women to be likable, you know. And so a part of me wanted to create this character with this frisson, with the sense of the reader also saying,

I'm not entirely sure whether I really even completely like this character. I have reservations. And I thought that was important because as a woman myself, I've always been desperate to be liked and desperate to please. And it's sort of you need to go through life a bit to arrive at a place where you think I don't need those things anymore. And you go into a different interrogation, I suppose, of what it means to live in the world. You are now actually teaching in Abu Dhabi, which I'm sure has its own challenges. Certainly the place itself has its own challenges. Certainly the place

itself has its own challenges. But you have spent most of your life in India, haven't you? Your mother is from Wales. Yes, my mother's from North Wales, but she's been in India for more than 50 years now. And I've spent most of my life in Madras, now Chennai, but I've lived in other countries and other places for work or for study or for travel. So I always return back and circle back to the city of Madras. It's sort of my nucleus and my centre. We should say that Grace has been living outside India, hasn't she? She's been in America and she slightly, reluctantly creates a kind of community of women around her. Tell me a little bit about that and the importance of that. For a long time, I worked with the title of the book being A House Without Men. And I hadn't realized in a way what I was trying to get at

was this sense of community and the sense of women particularly who provide these support systems. And so for Grace, she comes back, her mother dies, she inherits a house by the sea and she finds out about her sister. So she decides to go and live there. And then the village headman says, you know, you can't live there alone. You're a woman all alone. So here's this other woman who doesn't have anything or any family and she will help you and be your caretaker there. And so between these three women, there is a kind of life. And to ask the question of what it means to be a woman living alone in India is something I think about a lot. And what are the dangers implicit in that? And what are

the things that you're taking on? Because there are many, many messages that are always being told to us as women in India that, you know, if you choose to live alone, something might happen to you. And so you're always encouraged to stay within the family system so that you will be protected. And so by choosing to go out of that is an act of rebellion. But it is also, in some senses, could be seen as inviting danger or harm. And Grace still decides to do this. Yes, you also do make clear that, in part, women are perpetuating the patriarchy, they are going along with it. It's inevitable in a patriarchal country where you've had generations of this, there is a sense that women have been brought up, conditioned in a

particular way, and they go through their experiences and still they pass it on. They perpetuate it to a younger generation of women. And it's very hard to break that cycle. And I think particularly when you cross that with caste, which is another kind of very rigid structure, it becomes very difficult to break free of that, you know. And so a certain amount of wealth, privilege, travel, education means that you might jump that barrier somehow, but you don't get to jump it with everybody being on board with you or everybody understanding. And so, for example, Grace in the book decides that she wants to pay the women who come and weed in the garden the same amount as the men. And she's told by her caretaker, who's a woman, no, you can't do that because it will create a kind of chaos. And that's something that's interesting. Why would a woman not want to offer that equality of pay, for instance?

And how do we then move that into a society that can accept that? What will it take? That's really interesting. Tishani Doshi, the award-winning Indian poet and writer, and if you'd like to investigate that book, it's called Small Days and Nights I enjoyed that, it took me somewhere unexpected I think it's fair to say

so the name of the writer, Tishani Doshi. Now we are going to talk about Normal People, both the novel and the TV adaptation a little bit later in the programme today but now it's time for your favourite moment of the week Baby of the Day. In fact we've got a baby every single day this week on Woman's Hour.

Baby's laughing. This is Edward. He is six months old and his tummy is being tickled by his mum, Hannah, who wrote to us this is a poor substitute for his grandad's usual boisterous tickling, which Edward has been missing for the past few weeks because of the lockdown. Here we go.

HE MUMBLES HE MUMBLES past few weeks because of the lockdown. Here we go. That's Edward laughing and it needs no further explanation. Thanks to Hannah for that very much and I hope he's reunited with his granddad very soon. Now would you fancy getting married on Zoom? Well, it wasn't quite what Emily McMahon had in mind. She was due to marry Jack Walsh on April the 12th. It didn't happen in the way you'd planned, Emily. Good morning to you. Good morning. I'm really sorry about this because you've been planning the wedding for how long? For 18 months. Right. And that takes huge effort. Any rows, any raised voices as you were doing the planning? A few. But to be honest, I tended to take control of it and do most of it myself, which works for us. So, yeah. And then all this happened. So when did you realize you wouldn't be able to go ahead with everything?

So it was three weeks to go where we had obviously started taking more and more note of the situation. And within a few days, we'd had conversations with our venue. And also it looked like not only that would be cancelled, but also Jack was due to go on his tag, which was quickly cancelled. And also our honeymoon in a matter of a few days so it's quite a stressful week as you can imagine i know i can i mean it is bitterly disappointing for you and for jack and for everybody else i'm sure so on the day on april the 12th you must have woken up and felt well i don't know a bit gloomy yes absolutely i think uh as most brides will know that have been in a similar

situation you have 18 months like we said of building up to the day of of your dreams with all the planning and the excitement and I think also you get quite connected to the date as well so uh wake up early thinking you know we're going to make the most of it it was a beautiful day um my jack made me some breakfast which is very nice had a bit of a cry over my coffee and then composed myself and just thought you know what i'm gonna have a great day i'd arranged to speak with my family throughout the day um treated myself to put some makeup on which is a rare occurrence during lockdown yeah and um and i just thought that that was going to be our day. Jack floated the idea about having a bit of a date day in the garden,

so I put on a nice dress and then was told to go upstairs quite swiftly and not come down until I was called. You must have got suspicious around this point. Well, yes, but Jack does these things quite often where he likes to surprise me, so I thought, well, what's he doing now? But I thought maybe he would just put a nice lunch on with some champagne and and certainly didn't think what was to come next really what did happen Jack so hello morning Jane um so I obviously said and go upstairs and don't come down until you're kind of summoned um and I I summoned you do know which program

you're on don't you jack but anyway yeah sorry probably not the best i'm kidding um so so whilst that was happening that gave me a kind of short window to get my my laptop and zoom set up on two balancing on two chairs precariously yes um and i i'd set up the garden with um our big pallet kind of sign that we were going to use on the day anyway for kind of the guests. Quite conveniently, the path in our garden leads up to our doorway. So that was a bit of an aisle up to the altar sort of thing. And I had some music playing. So I went upstairs, blindfolded Emily with a tie and brought her down in her kind of gown, which she was going to use for the evening like the wedding dress right and and then kind of put her at the end of the garden went and stood by the

zoom altar and said take your blindfold off and she saw me our dog in his bow tie um the laptop ready to go and as she kind of walked up the aisle to some music um she could see that we had quite a few guests on the zoom pool ready to i've got to. I've got to say, Jack, you're setting a high bar here. Emily, there'll be other men seething around Britain as they realise they could have done this and they didn't have Jack's planning ability. And sensitivity, I should say, as well. So we'll forgive him from the word summoned now, I think.

We'll let that one go. So what did you make of it all, Emily? Oh, it was just wonderful I like I said I I'd I suppose thought the day was just going to be so gloomy and miserable as soon as I walked up it took me a little while to figure out what was going on and then I saw some faces on the screen and and lots of fascinators in the hats and uh and heard my dad's voice but everybody had made made so much effort. And then, like you say, Jack did such a wonderful job. And it was so touching that everybody had tuned in to, yes, what couldn't be the wedding day.

But it was actually so much more special in some ways as well. It'll be the ultimate 2020 experience. And you can bore future generations with your wedding day over many, many years to come. I really, i wish you the very best and i'm so glad that it went well for you and a honeymoon in lockdown how is that going well we you know we venture from the lounge to the garden like most people so um it's not too bad we're doing quite well we're still fake married so that's good i think

we might put like i don't know We might get a beach scene on YouTube and get our shorts and sunglasses and sit on the sofa and see what we do. Yeah, do that. But even in these times, do apply sun cream. We're all about health and safety at the BBC. Well, look, I hope you had more. I mean, I said at the beginning of the programme

that my big excitement over the weekend was changing a Hoover bag. And so I trust yours was better than mine, your weekend. Thank you very much indeed for talking to us and congratulations. Thank you. I'm sure when everything's back to normal, you'll do it all again.

But it was good to talk to you both this morning. Thank you. Thank you. Take care. That's Emily and Jack and our very best wishes to them. So, Normal People then. There's been so much stuff written about the TV adaptation of Normal People. There was a lot said as well, we should say, about the book by Sally Rooney, Normal People, that came out a couple of years ago now. Here's a good tweet from Claire who just said, Normal People made me want to be young again and not be young again. And it's the first time I've preferred a TV adaptation to the book, but both are wonderful.

Claire, I totally get what you mean about the young thing. I really get that. Let's talk to Maria Fleming, who's the general manager of the Dublin Theatre Festival. And she's got two teenage daughters, aged 16 and 13. And Elizabeth Day, the writer, journalist and podcaster. How to Fail is her podcast. Elizabeth's able to join us as well. Good morning to you both.

Hello. Hello, hello. Right, now, great. Let's get the view from Ireland first of all, Maria, from you. When you knew that the BBC was doing Normal People, what were you thinking about what it might be like? Well, similar to other people, having read the book, I had huge fear. We've all had that disappointment of that television programme or that film that didn't quite live up to the images we'd created in our heads. And also you'd have to be living in a cave in Ireland not to know that this was coming

up. It is everywhere on radio, television, print media. So I was anticipating but slightly nervous but I have to say it didn't disappoint. I'm so excited by the series. Let's be really positive because there's so much to celebrate here. What's the really

what are the real positives about both the book and the TV show Maria? Well I have to say first of all huge props to the actress Daisy for her Irish accent. That's a huge positive.

She really nails this. But both the book and the television series just beautifully capture relationships, all types of relationships, intimate relationships, friendship, family relationships, mother-daughter relationships. And the big thing for me when I was both reading it and watching it is just watching that the beautiful flawed communication and miscommunication we all have with our friends

and family and intimate partnership and I did have that thing I'm a woman of a certain age I'm 50 now but I did have that thing of looking back at that age and you know the nostalgia for that period of time moving from secondary school into university and the amount of growth that happens in that time for you you're kind of forced into this growing up period which is both confusing and exciting and wonderful all at the same time and full of huge highs and lows. And it made me nostalgic for that time. And I loved watching it played out again. Right. Elizabeth, what did you like about it? I just watched it for the sex, Jane.

No, I'm joking. I knew you would lower the tone. Anyway, carry on. I loved the fact, and I came to it as a sceptic because I am an author, as you mentioned, and I get very bitter when things are incredibly successful. So Normal People, the book I really liked, but I didn't understand how they could possibly make it into a 12 part series because nothing much happens.

And yet that is the charm of it is that nothing happens. And within that, everything happens. And it really spoke to me of kind of alienation, these two people who love each other, and they can only ever be their real selves with each other. And yet they can't communicate. And I think there's something about that, because we're all in lockdown that we really relate to that kind of yearning for human contact and understanding. So I love that. I totally agree with Maria, the acting is exquisite, the the direction is exceptional the music is wonderful yeah and the script is so understated and and I don't think we get that many understated scripts in tv nowadays and it was just a real breath of fresh air and Sally Rooney has co-written the script hasn't she obviously the novelist she has she

co-wrote it with Alice Birch and I just think it's really interesting because I think a lot of TV commissioners are labouring under the slight misapprehension that we're all desperate for incredibly complex, psychopathic characters with messy personal lives. And actually, there was something really beautiful about watching literally normal people. Consent. Consent is obviously an issue that we've discussed on this programme. And the scene in which Marianne loses her virginity to Conall is brilliantly done. I think, Maria, you've got a view on that, haven't you? Yes. So I have, as you said, a 16-year-old daughter. And we talked after the first episode, the first two episodes, we talked about that beautiful scene where Marianne loses her virginity.

And it was like a lesson in consent. Conall checks in with her before they start. Then when he finds out it's her first time, says, you know, you can stop at any time and you can say at any time and we can stop. And as I was talking to the 16-year-old about it, about the consent, my 13-year-old rolled her eyes, having not seen it and said,

oh no, they're going to use this to teach us, aren't they, in school? I said, they probably are and I hope they do. It was just so beautiful and similar to what Elizabeth says, I love the way they do that thing where they show rather than tell. There's a lot of scenes where there's no dialogue and where very little happens. But we learn so much just by a look or a touch or a still moment from a character. And that's as well in the issue of consent. We can see them checking in with each other.

It's so beautiful. But if I were to express a misgiving, it would be that there's the dark side to Marianne's family and she has very... I don't want to give it away to too many people who perhaps haven't watched or read, but she has very low expectations, let's put it that way, of what a relationship might offer.

Are you in any way concerned about that? Because she alludes, well, you tell me, Maria, about the scene in which very early on... Yes, so there's an early on scene that people, if they've watched, again, I won't give away too much, but there's a scene early on where they go to a disused building where young people go to hook up, and Marianne says to Conall,

I would lie on the ground here and you could do whatever you wanted to me. And you feel that, like you say, that she has learned that that's her worth and that she has to please other people. And you really hope for a progression in the character for ourselves watching it, but also for other people. We want to see her, you know, get ownership of her body and move past that. But we do see towards the end of the series,

another scene where she's saying, you know, you can do whatever you want to me. And is it a flaw? I hate to be critical at all of the because I'm so positive about the book and the series but for myself I wanted Marianne to have a little more ownership by the end than I saw but that like I mean I'm really having to scramble to find a flaw here you know because it's so wonderful yeah no I absolutely take that thank you so much for that um any thoughts on that Elizabeth yeah it's such interesting one. I don't perceive it as a flaw because I think what Marianne is doing is trying to assert a weird kind of dysfunctional power.

The only power she has got is by submitting herself sexually, which I know sounds very counterintuitive. And actually, it's only with Conall that she feels able to be her truest, most vulnerable self. And that's where you get that sensuality that comes exactly as Maria was saying from consent. I just think there's something so integrally beautiful about the fact that Conall is so respectful of her and that adds to the beauty of their love rather than detracting from it. So for me, it kind of works. And I love the fact that you've got, well, I mean, who can generalise, but I'm about to,

a relatively straightforward male character taking on a prickly, difficult, challenging female. How good is that? It's amazing. And it's such a subversion of the norm. And I really love the fact as well that it deals with male depression. And Connell, the actor who plays Connell, is just so phenomenal.

There are these scenes with a therapist later on in the series that are amongst the most moving I've ever seen. Don't pretend you don't remember his name, Elizabeth. Actually, I had a massive break because I'm so embarrassed now because clearly I've been obsessively Instagramming him. It's Paul Mescal. Thank you very much. Elizabeth, thanks so much. Maria, thanks to you as well. And I can see lots of tweets coming in about Normal People. I think everyone seems to be watching it and most of you overwhelmingly adore it. Absolutely love it. It's available in its entirety on the BBC iPlayer.

And of course, the book well worth reading as well by Sally Rooney. It's available in its entirety on the BBC iPlayer and of course the book well worth reading as well by Sally Rooney. It's called Normal People. So another coronavirus diary. Today we are joined by Elaine from Brighton. Elaine, good morning to you. Good morning. Now I know your husband Neil died in 2017 and you basically, what do you tell me, you were beginning to rebuild your life and then this happened. Yes, I think hopefully people can identify this if they've lost a loved one or a partner, in my case my lovely husband Neil. And I knew that the world would never come to me, that when I was trying to rebuild my life that I needed to get out there again and live again not just exist and so that took some a lot of energy and now this feeling of being sort of

the lockdown again means that I can't get out there I can't see my friends face to face as I was and like the one your guest has said just now that struck a chord with me that yearning for human contact again when I you know through no fault of my own or anyone else's and through no choice I am completely alone in my house and the loneliness can sometimes be overwhelming. You were telling me about this I'm not in the interest of transparency I need to say I talked to you a little bit earlier this morning and you were just explaining an incident where you were walking through the streets just just tell us about that. I went for my everybody's familiar with this we'll you know get out for our hour exercise or walk I go out for a walk because I

live in Brighton as you said and I go by the seafront and one particular day a couple were coming towards me arm in arm talking look very much in love and I was walking towards them now the pavement was quite narrow and we had to keep two meters between us they weren't aware I was even there I was the one who had to step out into the road to avoid them and in that moment I just felt very invisible and and just so lonely um and I just thought I need to say something tell someone um and because I just felt I wasn't even noticed at all and when you live alone and you you have lost a loved one um it just incidents like that become more important than to anyone else. You might just think, oh, I'll just get out of the way.

It does sort of, you know, it does just get to your heart. And, you know, that's one of the sort of key things that made me want to write in and say something and say I need to be heard, I need to get my point across. I think you will strike a chord with a great many people listening. What does help, Elaine? What helps is, well, just a little bit of background. I think that moment between sleeping and waking is a sort of moment of bliss where you're not quite sure what's going on and you're just coming around.

So when you eventually do get to sleep and then you wake. And it's that feeling. Then suddenly reality kicks in and you think, yes, this is real. This is really happening. And that happened years ago when my husband first died, when that waking feeling of, oh goodness he's not there I am alone in the bed and then as I say the reality does kick in and then you have to find a way somehow day after day of getting out of bed thinking okay now what do I do and getting to

the next step the next rung of the ladder to just get you up and out and doing things. So this again is what I do. I get into a sort of process each day. So I think, right, okay, first thing, get up, get out of bed. And then at the end of the bed now, what I've got is a pair of shorts and a vest and I put them on and I do my yoga online. I do YouTube yoga. I just pick one I want to do. And that gets me to the next rung of the ladder. So I have sort of coping devices which help me get to the next step. And that's what I find helps me. And on this sort of general level as well, I still do, because I started doing ballet class a while ago, beginners,

adult beginners obviously, and I do that on zoom a couple of times a week which is wonderful um and so i keep up exercise um i try and eat healthily so i do all these things um and do my absolute best it just doesn't take away um as i say this feeling of loneliness um every day day and missing my husband. Of course. And your friends and people you do talk to, are they willing to hear you out on this subject? Yes, I'd say yes. I mean, it's taken me a while to, I suppose, come out and actually say to some people quite recently how exactly how I feel.

And it's been lovely that I've got some very supportive responses. I mean, my family and my friends have always been there for me. But sometimes I just feel I don't want to make other people miserable. I don't want to put that point across when there's all this going on as well for everyone else. And you just feel, well, I don't want to make things worse by sort of talking about neil and saying how how obsession lonely i feel um he was the love of my life and say all these things so it's only recently i've been honest and said this is actually how i feel um and it's it's it's been lovely to get responses back and people saying well i'm glad you can say that to us because what friends would we be if you weren't able to say that?

And my family, as I say, have always been there for me, so I talk to them too. That was Elaine in Brighton, and needless to say, so many people just wanted to express their support for her. And so many of you, unfortunately, can only too well recognise what Elaine was talking about. This is from Carol. I listened very carefully to that. It could have been me talking.

About two weeks ago, if asked, I was OK. Then my answer was no. And their faces. Exactly. A double bereavement, says Carol. Yeah, Carol, I understand you're referring when you say double bereavement to a tweet I read out at the beginning of the at the end. I apologise of the radio programme when someone else just said that losing somebody before lockdown is now this. It is effectively a double bereavement because you are deprived of the support you so desperately need. Another listener says, for me, the worst thing has already happened. My husband died after having cancer for nine years. We were virtually self

isolated in his last year. So living through this is not as bad. However, I have the dual emotions of thankful he isn't here. If he was, all would be well. Yeah, I know what you mean. I haven't been through a similar experience, but I know what you're getting out there. Thank you for having Elaine on, who talked about grief and loneliness. My husband died at the beginning of March, and it's been so hard to cope with losing him and this isolation. That waking moment is really odd. He's not there, and the day repeats itself, and somehow you try to make sense of it. It's curious. My husband always said I wore a cloak of invisibility due to my shyness, but now it feels less of a phrase more of a reality it really helped hearing elaine so thank her from me elaine i really hope you get to hear the podcast as well we'll contact you to make sure that you do because i really want you to understand that so many people are grateful to you because i know you're having a rough time from bridget please

elaine this will not last forever she's got to keep on and on and on talking about her lovely husband, Neil. Her friends will listen for as long as she needs it. And if they don't listen, they're not friends. One day she'll wake up and realise that Neil isn't her first thought. It will happen. Will she rejoice? Well, no. She'll feel guilty that she's letting the love of her life down, afraid of forgetting. But believe me, Elaine, time really does heal.

Although between here and there will be pretty ghastly. You sound strong and determinedly analytical. That will get you through. You haven't become alcoholic or given up. You'll make it. Believe it or not, you're doing fine. Every blessing and good luck, says Bridget. Yeah, I mean, without sounding

very sort of pompous here, but of course, no one becomes an alcoholic through choice. You just are or you're not. But I take your point, Bridget, and thank you. From Ruth, I really recognise the sentiments that Elaine is expressing this morning. When my husband died, I too began to feel it inappropriate to burden my friends and with my feelings of loss and loneliness after the first couple of weeks. Partial salvation for me came in the shape of a counsellor I visited for a few months who listened and never judged. She was a bit of a lifesaver. I recommend Elaine thinking about doing something similar. All best to her and anybody else currently in that

unlovely place. Anonymous says I can really relate to what Elaine is saying too. Sorry you're finding it difficult. I'm a single woman. I'm always expected to get out of the way of couples and parents with children and now runners who are exhaling deeply and have no intention of moving. Quite frankly in normal times, it is irritating, but it's exacerbated now with COVID-19. Elaine, very best wishes to you. Yes, I mean, I can definitely relate. I go out on my official, I try to do my 10,000 steps a day,

that kind of thing, in the park. And there is something, I'm sorry to say this because I know running is important, but there is something about the assertive jogger heading in your direction. And I'm afraid to say that the other day in the park, I jabbed my finger at one particular jogger and asked them to move out of the way rather than me. Yes, I finally hit the buffers. But it was just, to be fair, it happened to be a man. It could just as easily have been a woman. Normal people is something that I think is engrossing lots of us. I hope young men are watching it, too, by the way.

And it's not just women of all ages who are enjoying it. I don't actually know. I mean, let me know, by the way. Let the programme know if your teenage sons are watching it and enjoying it or sons later in life or indeed your partners. Let us know what's happening. this is from phoebe i've read both of sally rooney's books i enjoyed them but i was as skeptical as whether they're as radical as have been described by some i was wary of the tv adaptation but it is wonderful and paul mescal's acting is some of the best i have ever seen. From Jane, I love the book. Sally Rooney's style and perfect insight was astounding,

but I love the series more. Casting, acting, direction and cinematography have created a heart-achingly beautiful rewriting. I'm 64. Rarely have I been transported back to the young love minefield so viscerally. And here's another anonymous contribution. I didn't understand why it affected me so much. I realised that I had lived these experiences many times in my younger days.

And now I'm over 50. I'd filed them somewhere deep in my memory box. It was the miscommunications and the what-ifs that I understood, and now I am yearning for a replay. Yes, I totally get that. There's so much I'd like to do again. Actually, Claire, whose tweet I read out on the programme, Claire actually did do a really good tweet, which was, it made me, this is normal people,

it both made me want to be young again and not be young again and so I read that out during the course of the programme but Claire's got back in touch because I've just looked at my screen again and Claire says I had my tweet read out on Woman's Hour today so having achieved something already I can now relax and just fart about on social media

no Claire, no you have peaked, that is. No, you have peaked. That is probably true. Well, you've peaked for today. But why not concentrate now on reaching a whole new peak tomorrow or at a time of your choosing? We love to hear from you, whether it's criticism, praise or just, as you have done today brilliantly, providing support for a contributor, in this case, Elaine, who was really brave to come on because, as we've said on the programme before, owning loneliness is one of the hardest things you'll ever do. It's really hard to say.

So thanks to her for being willing to do that. And to the rest of you who reached out, thank you too, because right now that really matters. Women's Hour podcast and programme back tomorrow. Thanks for taking part. 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 World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby.

It's a long story, settle in. Available now.