Woman's Hour - Women and their relationships with light

Episode Date: April 6, 2026

Easter Monday in the Christian calendar means Christ is risen and symbolises a shift from darkness and death to life, hope and light. We’re also in the middle of Passover which signifies spiritual illumination, freedom, and the transition from darkness to light. So in this special edition of Woman's Hour, Nikki Bedi focuses on women and light. How does light inspire and motivate us, and how can we harness it and use it to our advantage? Nikki speaks to GP Dr Radha Modgil about the impact of light on our health and wellbeing.We hear from Paule Constable, an award-winning lighting designer with Olivier and Tony awards for best lighting design for her work spanning theatre, opera, dance and pop music. She is joined in the conversation with Nikki by Ruth Kelly Wasket, a lighting director at engineering consultancy Hoare Lee where she advises architects and engineers on lighting choices in public buildings.In May last year, we dedicated a whole programme to women and farming. When thinking about the impact of light on our lives, who better to ask than early rising farmers? We catch up with Sinead Fenton, an edible flower and herb farmer in East Sussex, and dairy farmer Lorna Burdge.We discuss light's influence on how our ancestors behaved and what they believed with Carolyne Larrington, Emerita Professor of medieval European literature, University of Oxford and Dr Jennifer Wexler, curator of history for English Heritage. How can you recreate light in other art forms? Cecilia McDowall, who is one of the UK’s leading composers of sacred and secular choral music, tells Nikki about writing music inspired by light and the changes in the seasons.Presenter: Nikki Bedi Producer: Corinna Jones

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. For years, I've sounded like a broken record. I do not want kids. I do not ever want to have kids. I don't want to have a kid. Don't want to have a kid. Don't want to have a kid. I'm in my 40s now. The door is almost closed. And suddenly, I'm not so sure. The story has always been, no.

I'm just wondering to what degree it's just a story. Definitely just a story. From CBC's personally, this is Creation Myth, available now wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, I'm Nikki Bady and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4, just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast, has been removed for this podcast. Hello, and welcome to this Easter Monday, Woman's Hour. Yes, spring has sprung. The clocks have gone forward, so more daylight, you're, during our waking hours. The blossom is blooming, the birds are singing,

the snowdrops and daffodils are out, and if you live in the countryside, you'll probably be seeing lambs in the fields. Easter Monday in the Christian calendar means Christ is risen and symbolises a shift from darkness and death to life, hope and light. And we're in the middle of Passover,

which signifies spiritual illumination, freedom and the transition from darkness to light. So we thought we'd focus on women and light on this edition of Women's Hour. How does light inspire and motivate us? And how can we harness it and use it to our advantage? We're not live today, so don't text in or email. All our guests, though, work in light through various prisms. From lighting designers to historians, a doctor, a composer, Cecilia McDowell,

whose music you've just had a taste of. We also have farmers and we'll be hearing about their relationships with light. GP, Dr. Rada Modgill is here with us in the studio to talk about why we feel so differently when there's more light. There's a sense of relief that the mornings and evenings are a little bit lighter. Maybe we have a spring in our step as well as it being in the air. But what is the reason for that? Is it psychological?

Is it based in science? Dr. Ruther, why do we feel so different? What is the scientific reason for that? So we talk a lot about exercise and diet when we talk about health, but we don't talk much about light, but light is just as essential as those two things for our health and well-being. For many different reasons, but it's all chemically based, all hormonely based. So when we get that natural daylight and it hits the back of our eyes,

we have things called photoreceptors. They pick up that natural light. They then signal to our brain that actually should release something called serotonin. So that's a neurotransmitter, a chemical, which boosts our mood. It helps us feel better. It's the same thing we get when we exercise. We also get a reset of our circadian rhythm. So we have an internal clock, a master clock, if you like,

called the supra-chiasmatic nucleus, which is in our brain. And when we get natural daylight, when the daylight hours increase, that resets our body clock. And that body clock basically impacts when we go to sleep, how much melatonin, a sleep hormone is released and when it's released, and how alert we are. And also, when it's spring, we feel like we want to get outside more, we want to exercise more,

which boosts our dopamine and serotonin and we want to connect socially with people. But is it the boost in the serotonin that makes us want to get up and do things earlier? Does it work both way around? It's probably a bit of both, actually. It's that psychological association, I think, of, like you said, spring comes, all of us, myself included. I think I always have a moment every year where I'm outside, the sun is on my face and I just think, oh, thank goodness. A bit like you said, you know, we've got through winter and autumn, thank goodness.

We've done really well. We've survived that. and now hopefully the months ahead will be easier for us. And does it, apart from what it does in terms of chemicals in the brain, does it have an impact physically on our bodies? And what changes within us physically? So that part in our brain is called the hypothalamic and pituitary axis. And that axis, all that kind of pathway in our brain,

which responds to light, actually produces a lot of the hormones and chemicals which regulates how fast our body works, our hormone levels, in all kinds of ways. So that HPA axis, we call it, is absolutely vital to every single other working bits within our system and our body entirely. So physically and mentally, it's absolutely crucial. We asked you ahead of today's programme to share any morning rituals you might have that tie into your relationship with light. And I have a WhatsApp message here that says, I'm an Ashtanga yoga teacher and I teach 6.15 a.m. to 8.15 a.m. Sunrises in our studio during the practice time. and I love seeing the arrival of the day

supporting the well-being and spiritual practice of others. There's a beautiful community in such a positive, uplifting way to start the day. So rather I'm wondering whether that sunrise yoga and sense of well-being is something to do with the body's circadian rhythms. It's absolutely about when we first wake up in the morning we get an increasing cortisol. We normally think that's a bad thing. But we need that first thing in the morning to get up

to raise our blood pressure so that we can actually function during the day. So the natural daylight actually helps that course level to boost and to rise up. And interestingly, from up that person a message in about, the most important time we can get natural daylight is in the first hour of waking. It's the most effective time to get it. Assuming you wake up in the morning. Yes, that's true. Hopefully we do.

Although, yeah, some night shift workers don't. And I've done night shifts and felt the impact of that chronically on my health as well as everyone else. But it's that first hour of waking that is so important to get that natural daylight. and actually to get outside and to benefit from that. Well, if you are doing yoga, if you're a yogi or a yogini, one of the most important starts to yoga practice is Suria Namaskar, which in Sanskrit means salute the sun. Yeah.

So it's obviously something that for millennia people have been doing. Absolutely. And again, we forget, don't we? I mean, nowadays we have artificial light. We can turn on a light any time we want to. We forget to work with the autumn and winter to actually say, well, is this a time of hibernation? and should I be listening to my body? Because our bodies respond to that.

So we can't fight our bodies. So in what ways might women be specifically affected? So interestingly, there was a study published in Nature in 2024, which showed that men actually get 52% more exposure to bright light than women. And that actually starts in early childhood and continues into adulthood. And most of those increased hours, if you like, are during the working week. Which potentially then means, if we don't, as women take note of that and actually try to do our best to get exposure to light,

we're going to be more at risk of low mood, SAD, seasonal affective disorder, for example, low energy levels, potentially our hormone levels being affected. The second thing that has been found is that women are much more sensitive or much more impacted by bright light or artificial light in the evening. So this is the kind of light we might get from our devices in the evening or artificial light. Their melatonin or their sleep hormone levels are more likely to be lowered. and that means that they'll have potentially greater risk of sleep disruption. Well, there are two elements.

The actual light and the impact the light has on us. And, you know, if you have a lack of light, that is presumably what will lead to seasonal effective disorder or sad syndrome, I think some people call it, don't they? So how many people suffer with that? So it's commoner than we think, but it's very, very difficult to pick up. And that is because it's a seasonal trend, basically. and we need to kind of look at that over a period of time. So SAD, it presents with the similar symptoms of depression.

So low mood, not enjoying things, having low energy, being more irritable, for example. But the difference with this is those symptoms only appear in those winter months when we have less natural daylight. And they then get better or improve during the spring and summer. So, you know, sometimes it can take a year, two years to see that pattern very clearly. But it's very important to be aware that that does exist. And you can also get something called reverse. SAD, which is where you get, some people get depressive symptoms during the spring and summer. And I understand that the NHS doesn't actually advise that we use those lamps that can help it.

But what's your opinion on that? So at the moment, there's currently no evidence that they're effective. However, they are things that people can try. And if they find useful and helpful, then that's absolutely fine. You just need to be careful with them because you need to make sure, obviously, that they're the right strength of light for a start. You don't have any conditions where you're light sensitive, any certain eye. conditions that could cause problems.

Rather, thank you for now. And you're staying with us so that we can further tap your expertise later in the programme. Let's turn the woman's hour spotlight on to two women for whom lighting is work and passion. Historically, probably due to the heavy equipment and men dominating jobs like engineering, lighting in a technical sense has not been seen as a woman's sphere. Well, that is no longer the case as our needs. next guests can testify. Paulie Constable is an award-winning lighting designer

with a trophy cabinet heaving under the weight of her Olivier and Tony Awards for Best Lighting Design. Her work spans theatre, opera, dance and music concerts. And Ruth Kelly Wasket is a lighting director at the Engineering Consultancy, Hawley, where she advises architects and engineers on lighting choices in public buildings. So let me ask you both. What are you both, why are you both passionate about light? Paulie, I'll come to you first.

I quite often say light discovered me in a way. I was always looking for something that was both technical and creative. It's very elusive. It's a storytelling element that you can play with. Play is the big thing for me. It's incredibly playful. It's communicative. But it's very secretive as well.

People aren't aware of how light. affecting their mood, their situation. I'm really interested with what your previous guest was saying around that. So, yeah, play is what brought me to light. Ruth, what about you? Well, very similar to Pauley, actually. I was looking for something that had that combination of science and art, and I absolutely love that combination.

And I think my work probably I get to play less than Pauley, but there is obviously a creative side. I think in architecture we have probably more constraints. then the kind of work that you do. Pauli, you're speaking to us from Gleinborn. What are you doing there? Oh, this is before the season starts. So I'm just preparing some shows,

one to go to Berlin, and then a couple of shows that are coming back this season. So the less glamorous part of my job, I'm in a kind of underground basement, crunching numbers. Yeah, that doesn't sound as exciting as playing with light somehow. A rudimentary question, though, Pauli, what does lighting do in a production? I mean, it's amazing how often people ask me what my job is,

and I say I'm a lighting designer, and they go, oh, that's nice, because people really, really don't understand what the job is. But if you imagine sitting in most live performances, the first thing that happens to you at the beginning of a show is that the house lights go down. So we go from being in a collective, open, shared space full of light, to creating a moment of intrigue, a moment of darkness, where everyone takes a breath in and leans in.

So we sort of say to the audience, we're going to tell you a story now and just sit with us and come with us on a journey. And that first step of the journey is taken by light. And so every corner, every twist, every moment of, are we inside, are we outside? Is it sunny day? Is it dark? Is it a big space or a small space?

All of that is governed by lighting. So we're sort of quietly telling a story while the whole piece is going on for the audience. And you said that lighting found you. How did you actually get into the job you're doing now? Completely by accident. I had a flatmate who was working as a polyspot operator. She ran away to Spain in the days before the internet and mobile phones.

And I had no job and I was a student at Goldsmith. And I turned up at the Hackney Empire and pretended to be her with no experience or nothing. And it was really love at first light. I just... Oh, I love that. It was brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Would you say that the field that you're in

is a gender equal space? It's not gender equal in any way. And when I grew up, there were very, very few women working in lighting. That is changing. But traditionally, it's been a very male-dominated world. We're trying to make the change happen. You're making it happen.

The origins of lighting design involved women in the USA. So maybe you could tell us a little bit about that. why it didn't immediately cross over to the UK? It's tricky trying to work out exactly why, but in many ways in this country, the tradition of lighting design came from the days when a chief electrician, a kind of senior technician in a theatre,

would come and turn the lights on and off, essentially as a director, might want them. This is in the 40s and the 50s. And the idea of a craft of lighting design is something that's actually evolved quite recently in the theatre in the last sort of 40, 50 years really. So first off, it came from a tradition of men who climbed ladders, lifted up heavy pieces of equipment, very, very male-dominated jobs in the 60s and 70s. Slowly, that's

become much more creative. We are now creative designers in our own right. And so that job has evolved at the same time to being less dominated by men. But I do think there's a sense at times you're in the midst of this kind of boiling pot of making a show when you're making a new show. And I sometimes think people aren't aware of their unconscious bias when they turn and look at the person who's driving this big machine. In some ways, they want that to be a man. Whereas for me, I always wanted to be Lieutenant O'Hura. I wanted to be on the bridge, keeping my head together, surrounded by all those men panicking. And I love it.

What a lovely visual. Ruth, your work in lighting is in buildings and environments. Why did you want to work in that field? What was the glimmer that took you there? Well, I sometimes think about something that happened when I was a child, but that makes it sound like it was designed, you know, almost like I always knew I wanted to do this. And that's definitely not the case. A bit like poorly, most people in lighting, design in the architectural field came into it by accident

because they don't see it as a career. It's not a visible career path. And part of that is because a bit like in theatre lighting, it's only quite a recent actual profession. Historically, I think this role was kind of performed by architects or maybe interior designers if they existed. And then electrical engineers as well. So, yeah, when I was a child, I visited an ancient monument in Ireland called New Grange. And it's a fascinating place. and it has this wonderful solar alignment

where the internal passageway is perfectly aligned with the sun on the winter solstice. And when you visit any time other than the winter solstice, they simulate this using a really basic kind of light bulb that sort of dims up, if you like. But it's very theatrical and it's amazing. It's so dark in there

and then the sun slowly starts to creep along the sun, I should say, in quotes. In inverted. for those who can see. And yeah, it's an amazing experience. And I think it lodged something in the back of my mind about how buildings can relate to light. And that includes natural light.

So, you know, it's a hugely important part of my work and it really resonates with everything that Radda was saying. So you are passionate about getting daylight into buildings. Why is it important for you and for us who inhabit these buildings? Well, I can't really overstate the importance of it because we have become an indoor species. You know, we spend the majority of our time in buildings. There is a statistic that gets bandied around 90% of our time indoors.

It's very hard to know whether that's exactly true or not, but I think we can all say that we do spend a lot more time indoors. And therefore, the built environment becomes really important in how it can help or hinder our health, well-being and natural light is a really important part of that. So personally, are you one of these people who really enjoys these longer days of light and being outside? Yes, I am.

However, I think there's an interesting kind of counterpoint to it, which is that the winter can be an important time of turning inwards as well, because I do love that period of the year. I like the candles and the fire and the coziness. But I think darkness is important for our health and well-being as well to maintain the sleep quality. And our world now is full of light. You know, it really is.

Artificial light. Mainly, yes. And I think that's the issue is that we don't have a shortage of light. What we have a shortage of is the right type of light at the right time. Yeah. And can you actually not like the day? dramatic theatrical sunrising lamp you saw as a child. Can you in any way recreate sunlight? I think you can recreate the feeling of daylight and sunlight. The technology we have now is fantastic

in that respect. It's so flexible. We can. We've started to cross over a lot more into that experiential design, you know, sort of side of things. So we have amazing potential to be able to recreate moments of drama, but the actual quantity and wavelength of the light that it generates... Is not going to hit all those things that Dr. Radha was talking about? No. Paulie, how close have you come to recreating, say, a sunrise or that early morning light? I think I can do it pictorially. I can tell an audience the story of the morning or the end of the day. But what I can't do is actually regenerate that feeling, that kind of... You're tuning into people's sense of euphoria and that love of moments of change that we're you all adore. But it's not literally the same thing. It's a kind of, it's an abstraction of it. As someone who's been in the industry for 40 years, you've seen a lot of advance.

She's pulling a face at me here. Is it 40 years? I think it probably. That's a badge of honour. What are the major developments that you've experienced in your career? I think everybody who's listening to this will be able to relate to the introduction of LED lights in our domestic lives and we've had that same shift in theatre. Using that contemporary technology that uses less energy has become a big part of making theatre. The problem is the lights we used to use, those lovely golden glowing light bulbs that you remember in the house, tungsten. We had those tools in the theatre and you could fade them. They could kind of breathe like natural light, like flame. They could glow and they could have a real narrative in the way they behave. And

they're a very sensual thing to work with. LED doesn't do that. As you know in your bathroom, if you have a cold LED, it's quite a brutal form of light. Yes. You know, it's not flattering, is it? No. So that's been the big changing technology.

We're trying to get LED lights that will kind of recreate that beautiful kind of lyrical expression of tungsten. And how does being a woman make a difference to your job poorly? I feel I'm very sensitive to light. I feel I'm very sensitive to the changes in light, but also I'm not frightened of the kind of lyricism of what it brings. What draws me to it is its essence. Now, whether that's because I'm female or because that's particular to me,

I don't know. I can only experience what I experience, but it was pretty unique when I came into the industry to have somebody who worked as lyrically as I try to, I think. So I think I'm tuning into a different thing and bringing new possibilities. I think I've done that through my career, or I hope I have. Ruth, same question to you.

So, yeah, I wonder, I'm trying to avoid falling into stereotypes about women having empathy in design because I think everyone can have empathy in design. However, I do think that there is something about the way women encounter the architectural world or the architectural space, how we use buildings and the kind of buildings that we frequent, Like, for example, the healthcare sector, you know, many of us have to have probably more contact with medical buildings than we might like. And so I hope that what I'm bringing and other women are bringing is an awareness of how that space can be experienced by people, you know, including women.

So a hospital and their lighting could actually affect everybody's health in some way or the other? Absolutely, yeah. And that includes the natural or lack of. of natural light in those spaces as well. So, Ruth, the best lighting is the kind that we don't notice. So for you in buildings or hospitals, will you just explain that a little further? Yeah, so I suppose it's one of those annoying things, really, is that when we get it right, people probably won't comment.

Apart from when it's shouty, like in a different kind of building where the lighting is a feature, in a building like a hospital, if it's done right, it complements the architecture in a way that means it's, you know, almost not noticeable. Yeah. And if it has kind of in my ideal world, that capability of being able to change its colour temperature, by which I mean how warm or cold it is, then that can be done in a way that is very subtle.

And people might only know if they're there for a very long period that that lighting could be helping to kind of support, not replace natural light, but to support their circadian rhythm as well. Yeah, Paulie, you were agreeing with. that and I just wanted to end by asking you in your day-to-day life, what way do you focus on lighting? I think it dominates my every thought. I feel like I've spent my career trying to tune into light and what it does and how it makes me feel and others feel. And yeah, I can't help. It's

noisy for me. I see it all the time and I experience it all the time. Ruth, is it noisy for you? I would say, yeah, I'm very conscious of lighting everywhere I go. Probably that's quite annoying for my friends and family when I go to restaurants and things. Tell me what you do. Well, I noticed things maybe that. I'm not looking for them. I want to enjoy myself too. But what bothers me is when I can see something that could have very easily been done better.

Missed opportunity. It doesn't have to be fancy. It doesn't have to be complicated. A lot of the time it can be simpler. I just wanted to agree with what Ruth was saying. I think the thing about light is it's really precious. And that's one of the thing about noticing it is to take care of it.

Poorly Constable and Ruth Kelly Waskett, thank you so much. If you've only just joined us a little earlier in the programme, I was speaking with Dr. Rada Modgill, who's still with us in the studio. We discussed the physical impact that daylight has on our bodies and we touched on what the lack of it could do. Can we talk about vitamin D rather? Because I just suppose people would like to know

why we need it. And also what does that have to do with light? So vitamin D is a really important part of our diet, our body makeup, but we can't get it from diet alone. So we have dietary sources, so fortified breakfast cereals, eggs, for example, oily fish, very good sources of vitamin D. But that's not enough. We need it to convert that sometimes to an active form of vitamin D. And we need natural sunlight to do that. So the natural sunlight will basically hit our skins and our skin that has its own mechanism for making vitamin D. In the spring and summer, so between March and October,

most of the time we can get our vitamin D that we need from our diet alone or from supplements if we want to take those. But in the autumn and winter months, so from October through to March, there's not enough natural daylight for that to actually be enough. So we tend to need a supplement, a 10 microgram supplement every day to make sure our vitamin D levels are sufficient.

If we don't have enough vitamin D, then we can get bone aches, joint aches, muscle aches. we can feel very tired. So it really is a very important constituent of lots of different chemicals in our body. Very important we think about it. So if we're getting our vitamin D from, say, 20 minutes to half an hour of arms and hands exposed, face exposed, I'm assuming that that's correct. So the guidance is this balance, isn't it, between vitamin D but also obviously minimizing the risk of skin cancer. That's what I was coming to.

That's what we need to be really careful of. So current guidelines suggest about 15 to 20 minutes of two, three times a week. of sun exposure, not between 11 and 3. Okay, even in the UK? Even in the UK, absolutely. And this is a thing. So we tend to think, you know, if we're feeling like we're burning, we've been in the sun far too long.

You know, light comes, UV rays come through cloud. On a cloudy day, you can still get burnt. We all know that if we've been out on the sea, on a cloudy day. Or we've been, you know, we've forgotten to put our sunscreen on. So it's about getting that balance between those two different things. We're talking about waking up in the morning and taking that light. What about our sleep? How does that change as the days get longer?

Well, this is a thing. Days don't get longer. The daylight gets longer before somebody writes in. It feels like the days get longer. So it's fine. That's all the psychological kind of layering of light, isn't it, in how important it? But as we've said, we can't talk about light without talking about dark. And, you know, they're two sides of the same coin.

So just as important it is for natural daylight, we need to make sure that we are having, you know, we've got a good bedroom environment where we're actually getting enough darkness and quiet to have not just enough sleep in terms of quantity at seven to nine hours a night on average, but also good quality sleep where it's so important. Sleep is the kind of, it's the relative at Christmas that you don't want to talk about that's shoved in a corner and ignored when we talk about our health. It's a really proactive process. It might look like we're lying there and nothing's happening, but, you know, our cells repair, our memories get laid down, our emotions

get processed. There's all kinds of hormonal things that are going on. So sleep is absolutely vital. And And it's the same thing when you're talking about light, you know, light and sleep. These are things we just don't talk about, but they affect every single minute of a day. If you haven't slept properly overnight, you know about it, don't you? Well, I do. I'll tell you everyone else around me, but I can't speak with the rest of our audience. Dr. Ruther Modgill, thank you so much for those insights. You may remember that in May last year, we dedicated a whole program to women and farming.

When we were thinking about the impact of light on our lives, we thought, who better to ask than early rising farmers? So we caught up with Cheneid Fenton, an edible flower and herb farmer in East Sussex, and dairy farmer Lorna Burge from Waterhain Farm in East Devon. It's just after 5.30 in the morning and I'm going out to work. I definitely find that in the spring it's a lot easier to wake up naturally before the alarm as the mornings are getting lighter. Things I get in the cows in for milkings also easier when it's a bit light.

because we can see what we're doing. We're not relying on head torches or lights from vehicles. So it just makes the whole morning flow a lot easier when we're actually working in the natural light. And also the cows get up a bit earlier as well because their body clocks are regulated by the daylight. So they're already up and grazing when we go to collect them for morning milking.

And so everybody's just ready for the day just that little bit earlier. The cows are now in the milking parlour being milked. And either end of our milking parlour is open. so we get lots of natural light coming in. So at the moment, from the front of the parlour, I can actually see the sun rising over the hill to the right of our farm

and lots of nice natural light coming in. And all the birds as well we can hear also during morning milking, which is just really lovely that you can hear nature waking up around you at the same time as when you're working. It's definitely something that in the wintertime we miss. Although in the wintertime occasion when it is dark, in the evenings, we are here in the owls starting to come out and hunt.

out and hunt because we have got a nice number of hours on the farm as well. But definitely these lighter mornings with the sun rising really just makes you feel a lot more alert, a lot more awake and a lot more ready for the day rather than doing a lot of the work during the darker hours during the winter months. Just shutting the cows back out in their field after morning milking and it looks like it's going to be an absolutely glorious day. The sun is up and it is touching every acre in the valley where we farm. All the fields are around. me are a delicious shade of rich green because the grass is busy growing, the soil's warmed up and the grass is taking up nutrition from the soil to grow and is busy photosynthesizing

and producing really good quality grazing forage for our cows. This afternoon during milking, I'm probably not even going to need to have the lights on in the milking parlour because we've actually got clear plastic panels in the roof of the milking parlour. So lots of good sunlight is going be coming through later on today. And just everything around me just really feels like it's coming alive during spring. And it really makes you yourself feel a bit better after what feels like a long, dark, cold winter to be out on a day where it's nice and warm and the sun is shining and the birds are singing and just everything's growing. It's just lovely. Hello, it's Shanade from Orside Farm. I like being in tandem with the seasons as it does.

get lighter, it is that indication that the days will get longer. Equally, on the other side of the year, as a day to get shorter, the work gets shorter, and then you are entering that kind of slumber. And it just feels like I'm very close to the natural world that I'm one with it. And I really enjoy that part of working on the land and working seasonally. I think for me, it feels like how we're supposed to be doing it, linked with the light and the sun. What it does mean is that my days do get longer. I'm just in for a break now, just having a bit of a sit down, a snack and a cup of tea before heading out for a bit. But as the season goes on, I do wake up with sunrise and I am often out working with sunrise. So a lot of edible flowers need to be picked early in the

morning. So from about May onwards, I'll be up and out from five in the morning. In the peak of the season, it can be about 4.30 in the morning. The light really, really, makes a difference, but with light, you also get a lot of heat. So if it's a sunny morning, I need to make sure I'm picking things from the polytunnels as quickly as possible in the mornings because they heat up really quickly. And if there's one thing that edible flowers hate, it's heat and humidity. It will make them wilt really quickly. So the light really does change the timings of when things need to be picked, but also has a really big effect on the temperatures that things are picked at.

This winter's been really, really dark and I've really struggled this winter to get outside, not just because it's been incredibly rainy, but just the lack of energy of not really being able to kind of get a lot done just because I haven't really had that power. And then as soon as that sun came out, probably about a couple of weeks ago, we had a good few days of sun. It just felt like I was a different person. But as soon as that sun went back in, that was me again done. exhausted and tired. So I really do feel myself very linked to those sunny days. But it's nice

as things are getting brighter naturally now because we have a lot more light. And yeah, it just really feels like the season has begun. Farmers, Chenade Fenton and Lorna Burge. For years, I've sounded like a broken record. I do not want kids. I do not ever want to have kids. I don't want to have a kid. Don't want to have a kid. Don't want to have a kid. I'm in my 40s now. The door is almost closed. And suddenly, I'm not so sure. The story has always been no. I'm just wondering to what degree it's just a story. Definitely just a story.

From CBC's personally, this is Creation Myth. Available now, wherever you get your podcasts. You're listening to Woman's Hour, and on this Easter Monday, we're talking about light. We're not live today. but we have been asking you over the past week or so to tell us about your spring rituals and what the new light means to you or brings out in you. Sam Mary Hall emailed us to say,

I'm in my 80s, currently using a zimmer, but still want to be hitting a tennis ball against the wall of the house in the lighter evenings. Ridiculous, but I get the same urge every spring. Like Sam, many of us find ourselves really feeling the impact of the rest of the rest of. rising sun and the change in light and longer days. And that got us thinking about the past and how our ancestors behaved and what they believed.

To help us explore that, I'm joined by Caroline Larrington, Emeritus Professor of Medieval European Literature at the University of Oxford, and Dr Jennifer Wexler, who's curator of history for English heritage. Caroline, I'm going to come to you first because you've been researching myths related to the arrival of the sun and spring. the most famous, I think, being Possephony. Will you tell us a bit more? Yes, I think Pesephani is the most famous myth,

and it's a myth from the Greek classics. Pesophony is the daughter of the goddess of fertility and growth and agriculture, Dmita. And Pesophony is walking in the fields one day when she's kidnapped by Hades, the god of the underworld, and dragged off down to his rather gloomy, kingdom. Her mother, Demeter, went more or less on strike and said there will be no growth, no animals will be born, no crops will flourish. And it's clear that some compromise must be reached. And Persephone will be allowed back from the underworld, back to rejoin her mother for six

months of the year. And so her return from the underworld is the herald of spring, when Demeter cheers up and allows the crops to grow again and the animals to give birth. So is this a common theme in global mythology? The theme of spring is rebirth? Yes, oh, enormously common, yes. And it's interesting to see how often, I think, if you ask the man in the street or the woman in the street, what gender they thought the sun and the moon were. I rather suspect that most people would say that the sun was male and the moon is female.

But in fact, the further north you go in Europe, the more likely it is that the sun is gendered female and the moon is male. And the moon therefore is rather dependent on the sun. The sun is the female figure who returns because, of course, the sun vanishes completely once you get into the Arctic. And the day when the sun returns is a very special one and you find all kinds of ceremonies taking place to welcome her back. again. The moon is also important because the moon is the only light that you have in winter. And if you're in Greenland, for example, it's the moon that gives you the light to hunt for seals to keep you going in that time. But as soon as the sun comes back, we find, again, this idea of rebirth, the animals are going to start producing their young, crops are going to start

growing, the reindeer will start giving birth as well in the north of Scandinavia. So the sun has a huge importance in those northern myths. And we also find it in some other places. For example, the sun is responsible for feeding her brother, the moon. And sometimes she thinks he's got too fat and she becomes cross with him, puts him on a diet, which is why the moon wanes. And then when he gets very thin and disappeared, she rethinks the position. Where is that from?

South American, South American myth that is found among very South American tribes. And so they're in a kind of strange relationship to one another, the sun and the moon. Let me turn to you now, Jennifer. Your work involves looking into the history of prehistoric sites in the UK. What do we know about those in terms of being related to sunlight? It's really interesting because actually a lot of the discussions today have touched on the same sort of themes, wellness, architecture and how you control light,

and mythology. And we know that there is an ancient belief system around the power of the sun. And it goes back to really these early farmers. So having farmers today discuss about their experiences and their patterns is very relevant. But we get the first farmers coming to the British Isles around 6,000 years ago.

And in that, in the first couple thousand years they're here, we start to really get extraordinary structures starting to be built and the rise of monuments. And actually Ruth mentioned one of the ones that's a really key one to understanding this kind of with its fake sun coming up. Yes, in Ukraine. Sadly, I've only seen the fake sun as well. But it is pretty extraordinary and it does give you sort of shivers down your spine to see it.

And you realize that around 5,000 years ago, people start to build these extraordinary structures and the initial structures are tombs. So places for the dead, places to actually worship the ancestors, but they're also seemingly kind of temples, possibly to the sun. And there is a belief system that seems to arise around controlling that power of the sun and actually controlling it specifically using architecture. So I can see where you were so inspired, Ruth. And at Newgrained, you know, as you're explaining, you get this kind of ray of sun if you get the sun on the winter solstice. So on the shortest day of the year, the longest night. But there you get it right where the year turns, where suddenly the light returns,

and you get the sun kind of coming down the central passageway. And what it's lighting up at the end of that passageway is human remains, is a burial. So you're really getting this strong connection between death and burial and the regenerative power of the sun. And that connects very well to the myth that we were just talking about. And that idea continues in lots of monuments. And the most famous one that we have it at is Stonehenge. Stonehenge, yes. And Stonehenge is a really interesting monument.

New Grange is a tiny bit older, and some of the ideas may have started in places like New Grange, but it moved across the British Isles to Stonehenge. And Stonehenge actually is also a cemetery, which a lot of people don't realize. So initially there was a smaller circle that had cremated remains. And again, you know, to think about women's roles, a lot of times we think, oh, the great men of history and, you know, but actually in these burials we have, which are cremated, cremations, we have men, women and children represented. So you get a full intersection of society.

You get the sense of communities coming and gathering at this place. And about 500 years after they started burying people on site, they put up the big stones, as we see Stonehenge Day, what we call the Saracens or the big grey stones. And those are aligned on a solstice access. So they align with both the summer and the winter solstice. but we think the wind one was the important one. And it's not just sites of interest that seem to harness light.

Tell us about the adornments that also do that. Yeah, so the sun becomes so important to these people. And in the sort of intervening period, right after we have these giant monuments like Stonehenge, we start actually people start using metal for the first time. And we start getting a new group of people coming from Europe with metalworking technology. And it's kind of a slow movement, maybe over 500, 600 years of people. people, and we get actually a genetic shift. So it is a new population. And we know that now from all the recent DNA studies. What's really fascinating is some of the really early ornaments we get. So people start making tools, obviously, out of metal. But the things that seem to be really important are beautiful gold objects. So some of the earliest objects we get is personal adornments. And some of these are beautiful gold collars that we call lunila, because they're sort of crescent moon-shaped. A lot of those original in places like Ireland, but we get them also in southwest Britain and France.

And they're highly polished. It's super beautiful. I mean, they look very contemporary in their style because they're very simple, but highly polished with a little bit decoration on the edges with solar imagery. And you also get things like little sun discs, which are sort of circular things that you would have sewn onto your clothing and have a cross shape that would actually be representative of the sun rays at the setting or rising in the sun. So you start to get these really extraordinary kind of cosmic objects and people wearing the power of the sun as personal ornaments. Caroline, when it comes to myths, you said that you knew that there was a difference between the way people were when there was very little sunlight like in the north. What sort of

differences are there according to those locations and the arrival of sunlight? You spent time in Swellberg, didn't you? Yes, I was in Svalbard. I went there in the winter and that was quite an extraordinary experience to get off the plane and look around and think, I can't make much sense of the layout

of Longyear being, the main town on Svalbard, but I'll figure it out in the morning. Oh no, I won't because it will look exactly the same in the morning. And when I was there, it was sort of late in January, And you could just see the glimmering of dawn over the mountains.

But the sun never rose. And it wasn't due again for about another six weeks or so, I think. But elsewhere in the world, we find that the return of the sun isn't such an important annual idea in mythologies. Because if you're on the tropics, the length of the day and night don't particularly shift. So what people are interested in there is the difference between the wet and the dry. and the idea that when the wet season comes, it's quite often the case, as in Australia's, the great rainbow serpent lets the waters out from the sky again,

and then you get monsoon-type rains. And then in the dry, the serpent has crawled back into its hole or has disappeared in some other way. So this sense of the importance of the coming of spring very much depends on latitude. And tell me very briefly, the seasonal symbols of today seem to be Easter eggs and rabbits. Is that a global trend or is that just here in the UK

where we like to consume lots of chocolate at this time of year? Eggs are certainly always a symbol of rebirth. And you find that widely across Europe that people think about eggs. Hens are starting to lay more frequently. And the egg is such a nice little package. It looks as if it's closed up, but new things come out of it. either delicious eggs to eat or chickens, of course.

And originally it was a hare rather than a rabbit, because rabbits only came to England with the Norman conquest, in fact. And in Germany, it's the Easter hare, the Osterhasa, not the Easter rabbit. And it's something about it. Again, hairs are very emblematic of the coming of spring. It's when they mate, when you see them racing around in pairs over the fields, fighting with each other. So both the eggs and the hair, I think, are at.

absolutely wonderful symbols across Europe of the coming of spring. Jennifer, what would be your symbol of the coming of spring? There is a change in light that happened at this time of year. It's kind of the sun's on the horizon in a different way. And I think that makes you feel brighter. And it actually connects to a lot of what you were saying about health. And so for me, it's the return of the light, really. Thank you.

Professor Caroline Larrington and Dr. Jennifer Wexler, thank you both so much. We've been hearing about the ways in which people use light in their work and their lives. What about recreating light? Is it possible to give the impression of light through other media? Well, we're joined by Cecilia McDowell, who's one of the UK's leading composers of sacred and secular choral music. And she's won many awards for that.

Cecilia's latest album is inspired by nature, and she's here to tell us about writing music that's inspired. by light and changes in the season. So, Cecilia, you've written a piece about Easterlight, which is obviously very timely. How did that come about? And when can it be performed? Well, chiefly at Easter,

it was a work that was commissioned by Colonial Williamsburg Church, and I was asked to work on it with an American poet, Angier Brock. Angier Brock is a master naturalist, and when I was staying with her, she introduced me to the sound of Bert Song, and in particular one called the Eastern Meadowlark. So knowing that it was going to be very specifically performed in Williamsburg, I looked for a way to try and make it apply to that. So in the organ accompaniment, I have tried to replicate the sound of the Eastern Meadowlark.

And because it's Easter, and many people will know, that during Lent time, the word alleluia is not spoken. It's described as a verbal fast. Did you all know that? Nobody did. Shame on us. No, no, no. There's also a tradition in many churches called burying the alaluea,

which can be a physical thing when you have a sign that says, hallelujah, and it is hidden and put away until Easter Sunday. So you can start singing them on. after that because Christ is risen. That's right. Yeah. It's interesting because some years ago, a choir said to me, they asked me if they could perform a piece of mind, not this one, but something else that's actually stuffed full of allelurias. But they said their problem was they wanted to perform it during Lent. Would I mind very much if they removed the word alleluia and substituted it was something else? So this was something that I hadn't come across back then.

But just recently, our lovely local vicar had told me about a wonderful, dramatic thing that happens on Easter Sunday in Florence in the Dubomo. And at 11 o'clock on Sunday, the Archbishop lights a fuse that is lit by Holy Fire, which I think is created with flints. And the fuse shoots up a column, and it strikes a rocket-shaped dove, which then, goes zipping along a wire, it goes right out of the cathedral and smashes into a cart that's full of explosives. What? So it just showers into fireworks. And then when it's done that, it zips back again into the cathedral. But apparently, if the fireworks don't go off, or if the duff doesn't return, it's bad news for the harvest. Okay. Well, I didn't think we were going to go there. So that increase that cascading that you talked about that conveyed so much, what are the instruments

or technique that you're using to say evoke that the sun is rising? Oh gosh, I wish I could describe that because I think if I could, that would solve all my problems and I'd be able to write everything the way I wanted every time. But is it a harp, for example. The harp is helpful, percussion instruments, but voices as well. And of course, this is just about a shower of voices falling over each other, singing the hallelujah. And the alleluia is in so much liturgy, so it is always there. We heard Lorna, our farmer, tell us earlier how the cows are more relaxed as the weather changes. I think you've had a similar experience, haven't you? I have, yes. Back in 2006, I was given a commission with a poet, Christy Dickerson, and we were

given the opportunity to go to five different farms across the UK, each one very different. dairy, turkey farming, sheep farming and livestock and so on. And the very first one we went to, and this was all in springtime. So we were there right at the beginning of May. And the first one we went to, we were very quickly aware of what, these lovely farmers we've been hearing talking about, the surge, the rush, everything happening, tumbling one thing over another. and that we were really lucky to be there on a day

when the cows were let out of the barn. And it was really quite comical and joyful because as they rushed into the fields, you could see them jumping around and sort of frolicking around, but also kicking up their hind legs and just sort of skipping. And you don't associate cows with doing that,

but certainly you do on the first day they're out. And will you talk to me about grading eggs? Well, yes, I think possibly rather rationally, the farmer we were with, it was a dairy farm, let us loose on grading eggs. I hadn't realised before that when you go to the shops and you buy small, medium and large, somebody has sorted those out. And so you're given a chute. It's one of these things where you roll an egg down the chute,

and if it's small, off it goes, medium and so on. And the thing was we were so grateful that we didn't smash any eggs. We spent a whole day doing it, but not one egg was broken. Birdsong is also something that you've recreated to evoke spring and daylight. How do you do that? Oh, gosh. Well, I'm not so sure that I have recreated it. Evoked it.

It evoked it. And it's a great inspiration. I mean, also again, when, because I'm a city dweller, I haven't really been in the country very much at the time of dawn. And another thing that we found was we were woken up really early by some really rowdy birds and hadn't appreciated it. I think it's the larger birds that start to sing first because their eyes are larger and they can see through the light.

Comes back to what you were saying rather about the photo receptors. Yes, right, yes. And then smaller ones join. in later. But yes, I mean, it's always a great inspiration. In terms of emotion, in your religious music, how can you evoke that feeling of enlightenment, for example? Again, I wish I knew. I suppose part of it is trying to be faithful to the words. So finding the best meaning I can in what I hear, what I see and trying to give it the best representation. I mean, there are perhaps in choral music, it's easier to do that,

but also in orchestral music. There's a work I've written called the Da Vinci Requiem, and the very last movement of it is Luxeterna, which, of course, is the closing moment of the Requiem. And in that there are harps, there are percussive moments, and also voices as well, trailing into the light. So your latest album also includes some pieces about the spring and light. And you also have one which captures dawn.

Will you tell us about that? Yes, this is a piece called Before Dawn, and it's a setting of words by Sheila Breyer. I have used three of her poems, and they form a piece called Night Flight. But this last one, before dawn, it is really, I was very aware when I was commissioned to write this in 2012, that there was an American avatrix called Harriet Quimby

who had flown from Dover to Calais and nobody knew about her. Many Americans had never heard about her. And the reason for that is that her flight was the day after, the morning after, the sinking of the Titanic. So nobody was interested in what she had achieved. She flew in dawn.

And so this piece before dawn really is about her flight across the channel. Cecilia, are you someone who personally relishes the arrival of spring? And if so, in what way? Oh, gosh, I do love it. Well, I'm King Gardner as well as everything else. So it's a wonderful moment when everything comes to life. And hearing what the farmers were saying about the growth, things coming back again. It's a wonderful, exciting moment.

Cecilia McDowell, thank you. And Cecilia's new album is A Tree is a song. It's out on the 10th of April. And that's all the light talk we have time for today. Thank you for your ears. Join us again next time. Some events have far-reaching consequences. The white noise, everything goes black, and apparently I was screaming.

That's the moment that my life changed forever. I'm Dr. Sean Williams, and I'm meeting the people whose lives have been reshaped in unexpected ways. That broke my heart. I just thought that it's so cruel. Personal stories of loss, discovery, and starting over. We do talk about it time to time and about how grateful we are to be in this country

to be able to be free. Life changing from BBC Radio 4. Listen now on BBC Sounds. For years, I've sounded like a broken record. I do not want kids. I do not ever want to have kids. I don't want to have kids. Don't want to have a kid, don't want to have a kid.

I'm in my 40s now. The door is almost closed. And suddenly, I'm not so sure. The story has always been, no. I'm just wondering to what degree it's just a story. Definitely just a story. From CBC's personally, this is Creation Myth, available now, wherever you get your podcasts.