WordTheatre (http://wordtheatre.com/about/index.php) in the morning set us up beautifully for the rest of the day. This initiative presents award-winning short stories read by world-class actors. Who could have asked for more than the expression of Harriet Walter reading Hilary Mantel, or indeed of Juliet Stevenson (who could hold my attention even if she was reading the cricket scores). The audience sat quietly and attentively, spellbound by literally being told a story. Excitement followed with Henry Worsley's surprisingly moving account of retracing Shackleton's steps during the ill-fated 1908-1909 expedition to the south pole. Not usually one for "leadership" tales, especially those delivered in Worsley's rather military style, I was nevertheless very moved by the attempt made by descendants of the original expedition team to replicate the aborted expedition, during which Shackleton made the heart-wrenching decision to turn back a mere 97 miles from the pole, after hundreds of gruelling miles, because saving his team's lives was more important than the race to the southernmost point on the planet. The original expedition photos juxtaposed against the modern team's images of the same places were eerie and thought-provoking, in particular the modern team's photo taken at precisely the same coordinates as the point at which Shackleton abandoned his effort, exactly 100 years earlier. Worsley presented with honesty and commitment, bringing the sheer effort of the expedition to life as he described his thoughts and feelings as well as the practicalities and hardships endured by the team. For more information on the expedition, see the expedition website at http://www.shackletoncentenary.org/
We returned in the evening for another dose of literary matters. I wasn't quite sure what would be on, arriving early to be certain of getting seating space for Robin Ince's Double Science. We were in for a treat, as we arrived just in time for Andrew Smith's reading from his book "Moondust: In Search of the Men who Fell to Earth". The book describes his search for the nine surviving men who landed on the moon between 1969 and 1972, but the reading was a detailed, incredibly gripping, blow-by-blow account of the first lunar landing. Complete with video shot from the Eagle as it approached the lunar surface, and atmospheric music by Brian Eno to set the scene, our hearts were aflutter even though of course we knew how it all turned out in the end! Smith brought to life the ticking seconds as Armstrong tried to find a landing spot, having missed the spot originally planned, and finally got the capsule down with zero seconds to spare before it was set to abort the mission and automatically return to the orbiting command module. You could have hard a pin drop (if the main music arenas hadn't been thumping away in the background - the eternal problem with Latitude).
For a great review of Smith's book, which sounds fascinating, see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2005/apr/24/biography.features.
And last but not least, Robin Ince presented Double Science - maths and chemistry on this occasion. As Adam Smith said over 200 years ago, "Science is the great antidote to the poisons of enthusiasm and superstition", and fortunately there is now a cadre of scientists and comedians, like Ince, together with Ben Goldacre, Brian Cox and some others, determined to champion rational reason as the basis of decision-making (at least to the largely already converted radio 4 types they attract!). Robin Ince is one of the foremost among them, and presented a wonderful session that combined humour with passion: passion for the natural world, and for how just how truly amazing and fascinating science is. Matt Parker, stand-up mathematician, blew the cover off a "mystical" tabloid story about the arrangement of ancient British sites in perfect triangles by finding exactly the same result for the old Woolworth's shops, and Dr Andrea Sella did some cool stuff with carbon dioxide, the serious point of which was that we've known without doubt about CO2's properties for a long time, so it's disingenuous to question and doubt some of the climate warming conclusions that have been proposed in recent times. In between times we laughed a lot, and that's probably the most notable aspect of this genre - it brings home profound insights about our world and our position in it, without taking itself too seriously for too long.
If you like the sound of this try "The Infinite Monkey Cage" on Radio 4. Althought the latest series is finished now it can still be podcast from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/timc
The Literary Arena, Latitude Festival
SB
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