Woman's Hour - Women's rights in Afghanistan, Fleet street pioneer Julie Welch, Infertility, The works of Mary Stewart

Episode Date: August 17, 2020

Fawzia Koofi, a member of Afghanistan's peace negotiating team survived an assassination attempt on Friday. This come after the Afghan government announced a new council to safeguard women's rights and interests, amid fears peace talks with the Taliban could lead to the loss of hard-won gains. Mahjooba Nowrouzi from the BBC Afghan Service explains. In 1973, Julie Welch became the first woman to report on football for a British national newspaper. In her new book 'The Fleet Street Girls' she talks about her own battles for recognition, and the experiences of other female trailblazing journalists who also took on the male-dominated world of Fleet Street. Mary Stewart has been called one of the great British storytellers of the 20th century. The author who has sold over 5 million books is said to have invented the romantic suspense novel. Her 1954 best-seller Madame, Will You Talk? has been dramatised in two parts for Radio 4. We speak to the writers Jane Casey and Harriet Evans who are both fans of her work.Kat Francois is a performance poet and playwright. In coming to terms with her own infertility she came to the realisation that in all communities, but especially in black communities, infertility can be a taboo subject. She spoke to other women who shared similar experiences and weaved their stories along with her own into a performance piece.Presenter: Jane Garvey Producer: Dianne McGregor

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hi, this is Jane Garvey and this is the Woman's Hour podcast from Monday the 17th of August 2020. Hello, a very good morning to you today. I'm delighted to say I'm going to be talking to one of my journalistic heroines, Julie Welsh, the pioneer of female sports writing is on Woman's Hour this morning. We'll also hear about the taboo of infertility and we'll celebrate the late writer Mary Stewart. Madam, Will You Talk? is going to be dramatised on Radio 4

beginning on Saturday afternoon. And we'll chat about Mary Stewart, the novelist Jane Casey and Harriet Evans on Woman's Hour this morning. First, though, to Afghanistan, where the Afghan government has announced a new council to safeguard women's rights and interests amid fears that peace talks with the Taliban could lead to the loss of hard-won gains. But just a day after that announcement about the new council,

there was another attempt on the life of a prominent Afghan women's rights campaigner, Fauzia Kufi. She has survived. It was the second time that she'd been the target of an assassination attempt. Majuba Narosi is from the BBC's Afghan service. Majuba, Woman's Hour has talked very frequently about the situation for women in Afghanistan over the years. And to be blunt about it, it doesn't seem to have got any better. How would you assess things now? Well, that's true. Unfortunately, the situation is still very grim. And what I hear from Afghan women in Afghanistan, I mean, they are disappointed.

And this new council that you mentioned and some women, especially Fauzia Kofi, as you said, was a prominent lawmaker and a campaigner who was shot and injured in the right arm this weekend, was very positive about this council and she said that it was a positive step towards the right direction and that it could change the status quo after the incident she from a hospital bed said that a people who carried out the attack were enemies of the peace and women's freedom. I think this assassination attempt on her highlights the fact that the situation is very volatile and unsafe for Afghan women's activists. So the council will happen. It will go ahead. But it really doesn't sound as though it's going to do a great deal to protect, and I said at the beginning, the hard-won gains made by women.

Can we just talk about what those gains were? Well, that's right. First of all, I would like to say that this council, as you said, is apparently to safeguard women's rights and interests. And President Ashraf Ghani says that the council will empower women and promote their rights at home and implement Afghanistan's international commitments on women's rights. But it's not clear what kind of formal powers the council will have, if any at all. To be honest, many women say that it's just another window dressing attempt by the government. And that's a major concern among women at the moment.

But we spoke to the Deputy Minister of Women's Affairs just a couple of days ago. And she said that this council may not have any executive powers, but will have influence on strategies and one of the highest mountains in the eastern Afghanistan. So sometimes you think that that's not possible when the situation change, if the situation change, as it were in between 1996 and 2001. But one of the justifications for Western involvement in the country nearly 20 years ago was to improve the lot of women. Without being too downbeat, on the whole, not an enormous amount has changed for the better, has it? Well, there are some changes. I mean, it's not all doom and gloom. And women, now little girls go back to school and women work. But it's all in big cities, to be honest.

And once you go a little bit further, the situation is still very, very volatile. And it's this women cannot go out. And the situation is pretty much similar, to be honest. Something you wrote a couple of weeks ago, really, really did shock me. And I didn't think I could be shocked anymore about the lives led by afghan women and it was about the fact that actually it's rather difficult if not impossible for an afghan woman to say her own name in public or to allow her name to be known that's yeah that's very i mean even when i was writing it. And I spoke to a few women and the campaigner. And I spoke to a few women who have gone through such problems. I mean, the problem is that using women's name in public is frowned upon

and can be considered an insult to men. And many Afghan men are kind of reluctant to even say the names of their sisters, wives and mothers in public. And I don't even get it why women are generally only referred to as the mother, daughter or sister of the eldest male in the family. And can you imagine that? And Afghan law dictates that only the father's name should be recorded on the birth certificate. And that's a problem for women and they cannot accept that and they want to change. In practical terms then, let's say a woman in Afghanistan in a rural area gets the symptoms of the coronavirus. Could she be treated? Well, one incident was that one woman who did have coronavirus,

and she went to the doctor and she was diagnosed to have coronavirus. And then she went back home and a name on the prescription and get the husband because the husband said, how dare you give your name to a strange man, and in this case, a doctor. So, but I don't think so because women do not have access to, especially in rural areas of Afghanistan, to access to education, access to health services, or they're not allowed to go out without a male companion. So, yeah, that's still the case in some areas of Afghanistan, unfortunately.

Yeah, well, it is absolutely breathtaking. And we just should emphasise that, of course, the Taliban are not in control of the whole of Afghanistan at the moment. And that's the situation. Without them being in control, you really do worry about what might happen if the Taliban gain ground when the Americans leave. That's it, yes. I mean, a few days ago, a coalition of women and individual activists representing thousands of Afghan women had written an open letter to the militant groups. And I've said that the Taliban's willingness to enter peace talks has given them hope. But Taliban's public statements and their behaviors on the ground have continued to trouble Afghan women. And Taliban's leadership now say that they recognize women's rights and rights to education and work according to Sharia and Afghan traditions. But now Afghan women want explanation

that what is their interpretation of Sharia and the Afghan traditions, because it's very vague description and it may change if they are part of the power, if they are in the politics. So that's their major concern and they want clarity and they don't want the history to repeat itself. Thank you's their major concern. And they want clarity. And they don't want the history to repeat itself. Thank you very much for that really interesting stuff from Majuba Nerozi,

who's from the BBC's Afghan service. Our thanks to her. If you want to contact this programme at BBC Women's Hour is where you'll find us on social media, or you can email the programme via our website whenever you like. Now, when I was a little girl, I used to scan the sports pages of the papers for anything to do with Liverpool Football Club. And I used to love it when Julie Welsh's name appeared as a byline in The Observer. She was the only woman I knew about. I think genuinely the only woman writing in newspapers at the time about football. She's written a book called The Fleet Street Girls. Julie, welcome to the programme.

Good morning to you. Oh, good morning. Now, The Fleet Street Girls is actually about a whole series of pioneering women. I guess you were on the front line of Fleet Street back in the day, weren't you? That's the idea of the book. Yeah, I mean, I never really thought about it at the time. It was only later that it was pointed out to me that, you know, I was a pioneer.

But also, I think a lot of us were pioneers because in the sort of intake in which I came into, we're talking early 70s, it was almost an entirely male universe. I mean, which was fantastic in lots of ways because you got to meet lots of fantastic and interesting and very witty men. On the other hand, you know, it was quite isolating. And I think that the work we did in the 70s and the 80s was what changed newspapers to make it more kind of appealing to the 50 percent of the population, which didn't actually have a voice. Yeah. I mean, was there a genuine sisterhood at the time? Did you look out for each other? It was very hard to look out for each other because where were we? I think that I was very isolated because for a long time in the 70s I was the only woman really working not only in football but as a general sports writer so it it was just me

um I think that um and this is rather interesting um there were other women who were coming in at the time who also uh felt isolated and there was a sort of um atmosphere of, you know, because there's so few of us, let's slightly pull up the ladder. You know, we don't want any other women to come in. Yeah, well, I've heard that said before, and I sort of understand it as it was a protective thing. Oh, yeah. And it's bad, really.

I mean, there were a lot of, if you worked in a sort sort of womanly department, then, yeah, women did help other women. But if you were out there doing sport, news, business, all that sort of stuff, you kind of hung on to your job and didn't really want to help anybody else up the ladder. Well, you were not in a womanly department you were there um at the football um and I vividly remember and I'm sure you do too your first trip to a football ground um take me to that experience Julie um well it was sort of I had no idea that it was going to be such a big deal. I just, it was a sort of, it did feel a bit like a dare that you get at school, you know, like putting your housemistress's bicycle on the staff room roof and stuff like that. The sports editor at the time said, you know, OK, OK, go and report a football match.

So I thought, OK, yeah, I will, because I knew lots about football and I was a Spurs supporter and blah, blah, blah. And when I got there, well, I must have been very nervous, but I don't remember feeling terrified. I was just sort of keyed up and I walked into this press room and the sort of silence fell just for a moment and then everybody all the men there just sort of um suddenly got on with what they were doing again and I just sort of sat there and I thought oh well and um I don't know it was a thrill and I thought yeah I'm special you know blah blah um but I also very, very concerned that I didn't mess it up. Because, of course, if I'd done that, I would have let other women down because all men everywhere would have said, oh, well, OK, so that's really interesting. Then how do you prove yourself?

I think that what I wanted to do at first was sort of, you know, spend a few months or a year or so reporting football, showing that women could do it. And then I'd go off and be a proper writer. But because there was suddenly an enormous amount of kind of scepticism and opposition to a woman writing football, I thought, right, I'll show you. And I stuck in there for years and years and years. And fortunately, a few other women came along to join the gang, so to speak. Now, on the whole, I gather the footballers themselves were pretty responsive. They were good to you. Oh, they were fantastic.

I mean, can't you imagine, though? It was just so lovely to be able to meet all these fabulous men, you know, people who had been heroes on the pitch. Suddenly I was sort of, I was interviewing them. I always vow never to say, you know, in my day and all that sort of stuff. But in that, that in my day you actually had access to footballers and football managers in a way you don't do now and I could the the second um interview I did with a footballer was the um very loved and and very lamented Norman Hunter uh who died recently bite your legs yes but he didn't at all at all. He was just great. I walked into

the reception at Ellen Road, the Leeds United ground, and he was sitting there on a sofa and he was in his track suit. He had just finished training and he had this can of Johnson's baby powder in his hand, which I thought was so sweet. And he was such a nice man. You know, he had these lovely blue eyes and he was very, he was just open and honest. And I think that a lot of footballers were sort of intrigued by being interviewed by a young woman.

Yeah, so that's what interests me. It wasn't the footballers that gave you problems, but nevertheless, there was at least one incident when another journalist, I think, treated you really, really quite badly. Well, yes. Now, this is a bit later on in my in my journalism career. There was one journalist who I'm not going to name because I'm still terrified of him and he's still alive, who was adamantly against women reporting football. And I remember walking into the press box at Sellers Park, the Crystal Palace ground. And he was so outraged to see me that he actually shoved a chair into my leg, which is, I mean, really strange behaviour, isn't it? Yes.

And quite rightly, I mean, nowadays a young woman would not stand for that. I mean, it was a minor assault. But, I mean, that was what happened. But I just thought, what do I do? Well, I can't do anything, you know. He's him. You do you, I thought. And nobody took it up at all. That's just what you had to live with.

It's interesting, of course, when we're talking about football and you and I both happen to be football fans, we are talking about men's football. The thought of women's football was another planet, wasn't it? Oh, yeah, it was. And in the 70s, it was, you know, very much a minority interest. It's only recently, thanks to Meg Rupino, that, you know, people are actually paying attention to it. But I used to avoid doing anything about women's football because I thought, you know, that's the way to be ghettoised. You know, I'd just be shoved off into reporting minority sports because

women's sport then was very much in the minority. Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. It's a bit depressing though, that, isn't it? Well, it is depressing, but I just thought, you know, you're trying to send me to do this sort of story which won't get much interest because I've got a vagina. So send off the person with the vagina to interview a lot of other people with vaginas.

I mean, I really just thought that, no, I want to report about men's sport because that's where the news is. Steady on, Julie. You're just talking about my working life there. I'm shattered. It is worth saying that you mentioned you're a Spurs fan and my dad took me to the football

and it didn't actually take me that often I realise now when I look back. But one game I was at was in 1978 and you'll know the game I was talking about as a Spurs fan because Liverpool beat Spurs 7-0 on that day and you had these two fancy Dan Argentinian players

and Liverpool gave them a right lesson, a footballing lesson. Well, look, let's not have a Twitter fallout about this. You know, it's all in the past. Spurs, that was such an injustice, you know. No, I can't even think about it. But the lovely Steve Perryman, who was, you know... A Spurs fan, a player, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. He still goes on about it a bit. You know, we just couldn't beat them. For some reason, we had this incredibly talented team and, you know, Liverpool always did us. That's all I'm going to say jane yeah well i was there julie anyway um go on no i just was gonna say i'm glad i wasn't there because i just would have wept you know i wept with sheer kind of rage and disappointment and shame um it's been

brilliant to talk to you thank you so much uh Really appreciate it. And Julie's book is called The Fleet Street Girls. As she says, it's not just about her and her experiences in journalism, but she talks about and to lots of other women who were prominent in journalism in the 70s and onwards, all pioneers doing brilliant stuff. Now, fertility issues affect one in seven women. Cat Francois is a performance poet and a playwright. Now, she came to terms with her own infertility. She realised it is still something of a taboo,

especially in black communities. She spoke to Antonia and to Natalie, also women of colour, who shared their experiences with her in a performance piece for Woman's Hour. I come from a long line of fertile women who only seem to have to sniff sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant, think about sperm to become pregnant. My cousins fall pregnant so easily. Someone in my family always seems to have a bun in the oven. Sperm eagerly seeks out their eggs, breaks through its hard shell with only a light knock and is welcomed with open arms

and blaring triumphant trumpets. But month after month my eggs wash away, flush away, go astray and the cycle starts all over again and I have no stories to share. Of map-like stretch marks or swollen ankles, of weird cravings so strong my partner is forced to leave the house and find a late-night shop just to put an end to my moaning. I have no stories to share. Of morning sickness, of excess weight gain, no droopy breast to lament over after months of breastfeeding or tales of woe

when weeks after weeks after giving birth, my pre-pregnancy clothing still refuses to fit. Your name? Antonia. And your age? I am 23. 23. Oh, to be

23 again. I essentially have a genetic condition which is a chromosome deficiency um it manifested in a few different ways so I've got one kidney I'm very very short what's the name of the condition? Turner's syndrome yes I have heard of it yeah okay yeah so it's Turner's syndrome the growth and then and then also the ovary issues so often your ovaries come out like next to non-existent. They're underdeveloped. Underdeveloped, slashed, all of the things.

So yeah, that's what's happened with me. The term they used was medically infertile. Wow. So there was the possibility that I could have children, but maybe not, and that I wouldn't be able to have children without medical assistance. And I think just to hear that,

I was blindsided, like it wasn't something that I ever thought about to consider it happening to me. Your partner, how did he react? Till now, I just think he was cocky and thought his Nigerian sperm was going to be extra strong. Because he was really just like, when it's time, it will be time. And that's really what he was like for the whole process.

Anything I asked of him, he just did it. So when you told him and he had that reaction, then how long after that did you start talking to your wider circle, like your sisters? It was probably quite quick after. And it was just my family and maybe one friend and that wasn't even a conscious thing it was just a it's not really like oh guess what type conversation you can't pick up the phone be like guess what I'm infertile. I come from a long line of fertile women who only seem to have to

sniff sperm to become pregnant look at sperm to to have to sniff sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant, think about sperm to become pregnant. Every month is met with failure, the familiar tug in the bowel of my stomach as my period once again pays an unwelcome visit. IVF is the only option. I only tell close relatives, not through want but to stop the questions. I am one of seven children with a large extended family who in the last few years have been blessed with not one but two sets of twins. Even my eldest sister has had a baby. Getting pregnant should not be a problem. I am meant to be super fertile, earth mother, black mother,

mother Africa, first mother. I am none of these things. The daily hormone injections I self-administer take some getting used to. The clear vials sit nonchalantly in the fridge door in between the cheddar cheese and the strawberry jam. The frequent trips to the clinic, the invasive internal exams all take their toll, but they are a means to an end, hopefully a happy end. My mum was always very open with me when I got the diagnosis. In my memory, it's never me finding out that I won't biologically have children. So you're okay with it? Your issues are more about your future relationships and how everyone else around that relationship is going to be around it.

Whether you're going to be supported by your future mother-in-law. Right, exactly. Whether you end up with a partner who's willing to take on those issues. I feel like it's more the mother-in-law, that generation side of things, I think is more where the conflict, if conflict is the right word, is going to come from. I come from a long line of fertile women who only seem to have dismissed sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant,

think about sperm to become pregnant. Today is IVF egg collection day. My bladder is full. I lay back on the hospital bed. There is a picture of a beach of a beautiful blue sea plastered on the ceiling and all I can think about is the fact that I really need to pee. I really, really need to pee. All the water I was told to drink before the procedure is swimming in my bladder,

sloshing back and forth and back and forth. Later, a nurse informs me they've managed to collect five eggs and they will put them in a dish with my partner's sperm and force them together, then watch them grow. Hopefully my eggs and his sperm will be attracted to each other and cling together like long-lost lovers. It's a very different thing oh i've married someone and then we found out we can't have children that's that's that's tragic if anything whereas i'm marrying someone who i know won't be able to bear children it's a little

bit more of a that's a bit more of a decision rather than just a tragic realization you know i think it's um it's a very different thing to to to find out after say a wedding and then you have that tragic realization and you get the sympathy and you deal with it as the as the family unit that has formed whereas i know this person won't be able to give me biological children and i'm still going to marry her that's a very deliberate decision and it's almost sacrificial and I think that's going to be harder to tell someone of a more traditional black or African or Caribbean background that that you actually like this is okay and an active decision you're making when my story started I was blindsided like it wasn't something that I ever thought about happening to me. Sharing parts of my story with other people I realised that there are lots of other women in the community that

have experienced the same things or are experiencing the same things and it's just if I almost if I hadn't shared my story they never would have spoken about theirs and they would have just kept it to themselves. Why do you think it's something that is seen as so taboo, especially with women of colour? Why do you think we don't feel comfortable talking about it? Because we're the mothers, right? We're the ones with the child-bearing hips and we're naturally seen as very maternal.

We're the reproducers, right? That's our job. And I don't necessarily think the world is OK with women not being good at doing their job, particularly women of colour, because if you're not birthing children, what are you doing? I come from a long line of fertile women who only seem to have to sniff sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant,

think about sperm to become pregnant. Only two embryos survive the five days of incubation. Both are implanted. We will have to wait two long weeks before we take a pregnancy test. For the first time in my life, I walk around knowing that I could be pregnant. It is a sweet secret.

I try not to get too excited, knowing it will make any impending disappointment even harder to bear, but I can't help it. What if both embryos catch? What gender will they be? Who will they look like? What kind of pregnancy will I have? The two weeks are up. The pregnancy test

I shakily take is negative. The IVF has failed. The embryos rejected each other, slipped through my womb like melted butter, back to square one. What do you think are the cultural barriers to black women being honest and open about issues around infertility? What is it? Why don't we talk to each other? I think there's that thing about having to be strong, dust off and keep going. There's something about the softer emotions, like us not sharing those experiences that maybe show weakness.

In some circles, people will just say, pray about it. And at certain times, that's not what you're... You just want to offload your feelings. You're not necessarily looking for them to help fix it. But that isn't always helpful. Just a space just to talk about it, not necessarily... Yeah. Oh, there's an answer, because there's not always answers.

It's a woman thing. Maybe it's a black woman thing. It's just that thing of body betrayal. If I'm a woman that can't have a child, what am I then? I come from a long line of fertile women who only seem to have to sniff sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant, think about sperm to become pregnant. I tell the consultant to be truthful.

Do not hide the facts, I can take it. For some reason, I do not possess many eggs. He explains that I could have been born this way, or maybe they just died off faster than normal. Either way, the outcome is the same. Another treatment is highly unlikely to work. His words are harsh and direct but honest I send a text to family to inform them of the news

They soon stop asking questions It's all a bit awkward as no one is sure what to say I am a woman I am an infertile woman I do not know anyone else who has gone through this So my truth sits hidden in the folds of my tongue. At the gender reveal party, in honour of my cousin's impending twins, I end up hiding out in the toilet. Her swollen belly and the family joy is a stark reminder of what could

have been. My tears remain private. If the twins are girls, they will come from a long line of fertile women and I will still have no stories to share of hours of excruciating labour, of a screaming newborn child covered in my blood, placed on my relieved chest. No stories of the tears of happiness shared with my partner or extreme tiredness due to interrupted sleep.

Of crawling, standing or those precious first steps, I have no stories to share. I come from a long line of fertile women who only seem to have to sniff sperm to become pregnant, look at sperm to become pregnant, think about sperm to become pregnant. That was the performance poet and playwright Cat Francois talking to Antonia and to Natalie. And actually, since that piece was made, Natalie has given birth to a daughter.

There are going to be sources of information and support on the Woman's Hour website a little later today. Not there at the moment. We've just checked. I'm sorry they're not there, but they will be later on today. Got a few technical problems first thing this morning. Now let's talk about Mary Stewart. She has been called one of the great British storytellers of the 20th century. She sold over 5 million books. Her 1954 bestseller, Madam, Will You Talk, is going to be on Radio 4 in two parts. Starts this Saturday afternoon at 3pm and then you can hear the second part the following Saturday. We're going to celebrate Mary Stewart in the company of the novelists Jane Casey and Harriet Evans in a moment or two. But first of all, let's just have a little, just a clip of Mary herself talking and telling the BBC why she thinks her books sold so well.

My heroines do tend to have the same basic ideas of right and wrong that I have. The readers identify themselves very readily with the people I write about never want to identify myself with an anti-hero or one of these sleazy slobs of women who just have nothing better to do than sit and think about the next chap they're going to bed with. I always think, well, that would be very nice, but why don't they get out and do a job of work? And then they would find that their lives smoothed out and were filled. Yes, you get a real sense of her personality there. That was Mary Stewart. Welcome to our contributors and our fans of Mary Stewart, the novelists Jane Casey and Harriet Evans. Good morning to you both. How are you both? Very well, thank you. Good, good to hear. Now, Jane, I know you are a fully paid up fan, long time devotee. Why do you love Mary Stewart? Well, I had the classic experience of discovering Mary Stewart, which is common to

an awful lot of people, where at the age of about 12, I was browsing through my mother's bookshelves and found Madam, Will You Talk? And sat down and started reading it. And it was as if the whole world changed that day, the way that I saw everything just changed because she was such a compelling writer. So she always centered women in the story. It was told from a woman's perspective. The setting was incredibly vivid. The peril was really well done. I was there with the heroine, having the same experiences as her, even though I was a 12-year-old sitting on the floor of my bedroom. And the hero was incredibly dashing. And the whole thing was just such a heady combination.

And I think from that point on, I just wanted to read more and more of that sort of thing. Now, I think Madame, Will You Talk is set, is it the south of France? It's a rather a racy location, isn't it? It's set in Provence. And she said that she originally, the reason that she wanted to write it was because? It's set in Provence. And she said that she originally, the reason that she wanted to write it was because she wanted to write about Provence. She wanted to sort of bring it to life.

She missed it. So she was writing in the post-war era where, you know, everything was a bit grim. And Madame Will You Talk is really full of sunshine and good food and fast cars and glamorous locations and all the things that, you know, people have really missed out on. All right, well, you've set it up brilliantly for us.

Let's just hear a little clip from the BBC dramatisation of Madam, Will You Talk? I found myself in Avignon, in a room in the Hotel Tistet-Vedene, unpacking my sun creams, listening to the chorus of cicadas through the half-open shutter. How was I to know these were my last moments of peace and innocence? That I was about to have a walk-on role in a drama of revenge, fear, murder.

Indeed, most of the actors in the tragedy were already assembled at this unpretentious little Provençal hotel. All but one, the murderer. And he was not far away. Sounds so soothing. But if you had to lump everybody in the car and try and get back to beat quarantine over the weekend, you probably won't have found your Avignon experience all that relaxing this time round. Harriet Evans, I know that you've come relatively recently to The Charms of Mary Stewart.

Is that right? About, I was in my late 20s and I was recommended her by just a variety of friends of mine who had the same reading tastes as me. So people who love Georgette Heyer or Agatha Christie or, you know, mid-century, 20th century female authors. And so I didn't have the experience,

which lots of my friends and Jane have had. And when I put on Instagram and Facebook that I was coming on, you know, the number of people who said, I love Mary Stewart. I read her when I was 12. I read her when I was 14. You know, I read her a bit later. And it was that thing for me of, which is quite rare, and especially in these lockdown times is really valuable. You are totally transported to a specific place. And she wrote such different kinds of books each time.

But whether you're in, you know, the wilds of Skye or Crete or a crumbling palace in Lebanon or in the south of France, you know, the descriptions in Madame Will You Talk, you just totally believe you're there. It's so escapist. It's wonderful. And was she critically acclaimed in her heyday, Harriet? Well, I looked this up because I'm a member of the London Library and they have lots of useful things online and I did some research on her yesterday and there's a really interesting piece by a researcher called Faye Keegan about how she was reviewed compared to Ian Fleming because they wrote exactly the same number of books pretty much and they were writing

he was writing James Bond was at the same time her roughly the same number of books, pretty much, and they were writing, he was writing James Bond, it was at the same time, roughly the same time hers was being published, and the disparity between the way they were received is just hilarious. Well, and it's, you know, irritating, and I'm sure she probably found it a bit irritating. All his reviews, he gets reviewed far more than she does, but his reviews also refer to his kind of mastery of the genre and how he's really great.

And at the same time say, this bit was completely unbelievable. That wasn't good. Whereas Mary Stewart is sort of castigated the whole way through. And there's this absolutely hilarious description of what she's bought with her royalties in a review of one of her books.

And it says, with her royalties, she's bought her Jaguar, some Chinese porcelain and a deep freeze. Who would care what Ian Fleming bought with his? And there's constant references in reviews of her work to her husband, who was a very well-respected professor of geology, and to Michelle, who was married, as if that's relevant. And it's this constant thing with female writers which endures today of,

let's just sort of try and put you in a box. If we can kind of do you down a little bit, then we'll be able to contain you whereas you know Ian Fleming go forth you know wow aren't you amazing at your at your um at your profession your craft I was looking up Alastair McLean who is um he published his first book in the same year as Mary Stewart. He had a very sort of similar blend of action and romance. But of course, he was a man. He was writing about men. His first novel, he was paid $50,000 for his first novel,

which was headline grabbing and huge. And, you know, he'd sold very well. Mary Stewart was paid £50 for her first book. She also wrote, and I really, I was intrigued by this, about the Court of King Arthur, Merlin, all the mystical stuff. And she was good at that as well, Jane. She was. I mean, she always wrote the books that she wanted to write,

which is the sort of sentence that strikes terror into a publisher's heart because you really didn't know what she was going to come up with um she really was passionately interested in the story of merlin and the story of arthur and she wrote in 1970 i think a book called the crystal cave um which her publishers sort of said you know this we're not sure about this but we'll put it out and see how it does and it was a phenomenal bestseller um so much so that she ended up writing four more or three more in the same vein. And I think actually, it did her reputation as a crime writer no good at all, because they were perceived as being much more respectable, and much more like literature,

than, you know, these silly little adventures with women in them. And I think they sort of overshadowed her a little bit. And maybe that's why we don't have such a strong sense of her as the innovator and the incredible creative power that she is. Well, a lot of her fans have contacted Woman's Hour. This is from Mary, who's in Florida. And she says, Stuart's novels are beautifully written and contain more depth than some other works in the so-called literary canon. Reading Stuart's novels in high school developed in me a love of poetry because every chapter is prefaced by a quotation from a poem. Her books deepen my passion for literature and I went on to study at university and have taught for over 25 years. So that's brilliant. Thank you for that, Mary in Florida.

And from Sally, my favourite Mary Stewart novel is The Ivy Tree. We reread it for the nth time along with some more of her books during lockdown. It was perfect comfort reading. I am going to force you both to name your favourite Mary Stewart so people can perhaps get started with her, with everything she's done. So, Jane, what would you recommend? I think my absolute favourite is My Brother Michael which is set in Greece just after the war and deals with World War II shenanigans it's a really beautiful beautiful book. Thank you for that and Harriet? Mine would be The Gabriel Hounds, which is about a very plucky, fearless young woman

who ends up in Beirut and then goes up into Lebanon to find her aunt who lives in a crumbling castle. And it's just such a feat of imagination and such a wonderful exploration of a part of the world that we, you know, sadly know all too well now, but seen in a different way. The writers Harriet Evans and Jane Casey discussing the life and times of Mary Stewart. And you can hear the dramatisation of Mary Stewart's Madam, Will You Talk? beginning on Radio 4 this Saturday afternoon at three o'clock.

And then you can hear part two on the Saturday after same time. Jane Casey's most recent novel is called The Cutting Place. Harriet Evans is the author of The Garden of Lost and Found. And when we talk about best-selling writers, they're both best-selling writers in their own right. So it was good to get them on the programme today. Mary Stewart, I confess I have not read anything by her, but I'm sorely tempted because they both made a very good case for her. And you also clearly really like Mary Stewart. Let me just find the emails we've had about Mary.

This is from Linda. Thank you very much for talking about Mary Stewart this morning. Despite many book culls due to several downsizes in my life, I have kept my Mary Stewart's. My introduction, and therefore a favourite, is called Heirs Above the Ground. As soon as I finish my current Stella Rimmington binge, I will revisit Mary.

Thank you. Yes, Linda, I understand what you mean about binges. I'm going through a massive Anne Cleaves fest at the moment, brought on by, I've just, I can't believe how lucky I was to get the new Vera which I read on holiday last week and Anne is going to come on the

programme very soon to talk about the latest Vera novel but it's really I can't basically I don't really want to be here I want to be back home finishing off that book it's absolutely brilliant and I'm just loving my Veras and Glenys says just listening to your item about Mary Stewart I've just discovered her at 65 and I'm about to my Vera's. And Glenys says, just listening to your item about Mary Stewart,

I've just discovered her at 65 and I'm about to start on my third of her novels. She is great, very vivid and engaging. Glenys, I hope you enjoy the next Mary Stewart you pick up. On the subject of fertility, this is from Linda. I wept at that performance piece this morning. My daughter found out that she was postmenopausal at the age of 32, just after she'd started a new relationship. The relationship survived.

In fact, they are now married. They had donor egg IVF and were successful at the fifth attempt with the final two embryos. And their twins just bring us so much joy. Please tell people to keep on hoping. Miracles do happen. And I should say that there are now helpful, what we hope are helpful links on the Woman's Hour website if you're keen to know more about that subject.

So that's bbc.co.uk forward slash Woman's Hour, and you'll find information there, I hope. Anna is another listener who says, don't always believe the medics. I was diagnosed with cysts on my ovaries and was told that when I wanted to try for a baby, I should go back to them and they would treat me for infertility. I decided in the end to try without their help and I got pregnant as soon as we stopped using contraceptives and then I did so a second time without any trouble either. Anna that's wonderful for you of course that isn't an

experience that everybody has but I'm delighted that was the case in your experience. Ruth just says it was fantastic to hear Julie Welsh on Woman's Hour one of my heroes as a teen as well a brilliant football writer at a time when women weren't supposed to even like it, let alone be knowledgeable about it. I used to grab the paper from my father in order to read her column. And from Mark, I remember working as a sports officer at Brighton Poly and we had the best sports teams around. A young woman journalist used to contact me on a weekly basis to get our results. Her name was Carolyn Wyatt. I met her at the Houses of Parliament when I was representing Great Britain at Paralympic football.

A very nice person to work with, and I'm just sorry she didn't get the chance to be a sports journalist. No, but she did go on to... Well, she still works for the BBC. Carolyn's absolutely brilliant. I think often to be heard on Saturday evening doing PM. She's absolutely fantastic. And Maura on Twitter

says, delighted the car radio is tuned to Radio 4 when I got in the car this morning. There was a lovely feature on Mary Stewart. Can't wait to listen to the adaptation of Madam Will You Talk. The car chase through Provence is one of my favourite sequences in any of her books.

Well, Maura, that's good. I'm delighted that the feature met with your approval. I just want to end with this one from, we don't need to mention the contributor's name, but it's a man actually. He says, I'm not 100% aware of what the subject was because I'm self-medicating for a slipped disc with Prosecco. Now, I should say at this point that I'm very sorry about your slipped disc and that I know that can be absolutely agonising. Obviously, this programme cannot endorse sipping Prosecco as a way of getting through it, although I haven't been there and who knows, it might well help, but they go on. But the interviewee, that was Julie Welsh, made some quip about being fed

up with being sent to talk to other women merely because she had a vagina and so had they. Jane then made a throwaway remark about how that summed up her entire career. I'll just go on here because why not? It's lockdown still and we're all up against it. This exchange between Garvey and whoever it was, Julie Welsh, deserves to go down among the classics of pure BBC wit. Like that old cricket commentator dude who collapsed into breathless hysterics, which I frankly didn't find all that funny, but I can see how it might amuse a duller

witted person. I bet it won't become an instant classic, but I'd like to register my respect for Jane at this stage. Thank you very much indeed. We'll just leave it there. If only there were more emails of that nature, I could read out shamelessly, stuffing them into the Woman's Hour podcast. My thanks today to Sarah and to Di and to Donald who have kept this show on the road. We are back tomorrow. Amongst other things, we're talking about

whether sex offenders can ever change. Other things to look out for on the programme this week. Hoping very much, everything crossed, that I get the chance to talk to the Hollywood actor Annette Bening. She's made a new film with Bill Nighy about the end of a marriage in middle age. And then later in the week, in fact, on Friday, the novelist Wendy Holden will be on the programme.

Her new book is about a woman whose name you might know, Marion Crawford. She was the Queen's governess. Quite a story, this, actually, and it's a sad one in lots of ways. So Wendy Holden joins us on Friday morning for the programme. But we're back tomorrow, live, of course, and the podcast will be here too.

Are you still there? Good. There's someone I want you to meet. Their name is Sean, they're 16, and they're in trouble. Follow Sean's journey by subscribing to Power Up on BBC Sense. The world is dying. It's time to take action. Power Up.

Power Up. Power Up. Power Up. Power Up. Power Up. 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's faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody.

Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig. 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.

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