Author: BBC Radio 4

The Latin scholar Shadi Bartsch has written a new translation of Virgil’s The Aeneid. She tells Kirsty Wark how this timeless epic about the legendary ancestor of a Roman emperor has been constantly invoked and reinterpreted over its two thousand year history. She argues that this poem still has much to say to contemporary readers about gender, politics, religion, morality, nationalism and love.

It was while arguing about the merits of the Aeneid’s tragic queen, Dido of Carthage, that the classicist Natalie Haynes decided it was time to rescue the women in ancient myths. Centuries of male interpretations, she argues, has led to the demonization and dismissal of the likes of Medusa, Phaedra and Medea. In Pandora’s Jar: Women in Greek Myths she goes back to the original stories, reinstating the more complex roles given to these women in antiquity.

In the 17th-century the Italian painter Artemisia Gentileschi drew inspiration from the women in ancient myths, allegories and the Bible, as seen in a new exhibition of her work at the National Gallery in London. The curator, Letizia Treves, says that Gentileschi challenged conventions and defied expectations, painting subjects that were traditionally the preserve of male artists, and transforming the meek into warriors.

Producer: Katy Hickman

(Picture credit: the National Gallery)

The pandemic has exposed serious weaknesses in Western governments, according to John Micklethwait, editor-in-chief of Bloomberg and former editor of The Economist. In The Wake-Up Call he argues that the Covid crisis has accelerated a shift in balance of power from the West to East. Micklethwait tells Andrew Marr that unless the West can respond more creatively to what is happening, the prospect of a new Eastern-dominated world order, with China at the centre, will be inevitable.

But the historian Rana Mitter argues that China is increasingly presenting itself as the creator and protector of the international order, rather than its threat. In China’s Good War he explores how the country is revisiting its role as an Allied Force in World War II, to assert newfound confidence abroad and to shape a new nationalism at home.

And Katya Adler, the BBC's Europe Editor, looks at the problems facing the EU, including the relationship of China and the impact of coronavirus. She assesses how Macron, Merkel, Ursula von der Leyen and other leaders have handled this year's challenges.

Producer: Hannah Sander

Fake news, conspiracy theories, and weaponising data to influence elections are all aspects of contemporary politics. But Amol Rajan explores their historical roots with two eminent historians, Jill Lepore and Sir Richard Evans.

Decades before Silicon Valley tech companies had access to our personal information, The Simulmatics Corporation was dealing in the weaponisation of data. In her latest book, If Then – How One Data Company Invented the Future, Jill Lepore looks back at how algorithms that were supposedly able to forecast and influence human behaviour gained huge currency in the 1960s, and what happens when they were allowed to develop unchecked.

Sir Richard Evans is one of the world’s leading authorities on Nazi Germany. In The Hitler Conspiracies: The Third Reich and the Paranoid Imagination, Evans investigates key conspiracy theories that flourished at the time and still continue to arouse debate. Through painstaking research and evidence-based argument he reasserts the boundary between truth and fiction, and looks at why fake news takes hold.

Producer: Katy Hickman

We are facing a crisis in care that could prove disastrous, according to the journalist Madeleine Bunting. Over five years she travelled the country to explore the value of care, talking to underpaid care-givers and distraught patients and families. She tells Andrew Marr that the impact of the care crisis will be felt throughout society, from the young to the old.

Jeremy Hunt was the longest-serving Health Secretary in history and added Social Care to his portfolio in 2018. He is now the Chair of the Health and Social Care Select Committee, having previously served as the Shadow Minister for Disabled People under a Labour government. He outlines the scale of the social care crisis, and explains why policy solutions have proved so difficult to enact - and so fiercely controversial.

Dr Helen Kingston is a GP in Somerset who recognised the impact loneliness was having on the physical health of her patients. She helped set up the ‘Compassionate Frome’ project in 2013, bringing together more than 400 local care providers and volunteers to help people reconnect with their community. As well as having a huge impact on individual lives, studies have shown a dramatic drop in hospital admissions in the area.

Producer: Katy Hickman

We are facing a crisis in care that could prove disastrous, according to the journalist Madeleine Bunting. Over five years she travelled the country to explore the value of care, talking to underpaid care-givers and distraught patients and families. She tells Andrew Marr that the impact of the care crisis will be felt throughout society, from the young to the old.

Jeremy Hunt was the longest-serving Health Secretary in history and added Social Care to his portfolio in 2018. He is now the Chair of the Health and Social Care Select Committee, having previously served as the Shadow Minister for Disabled People under a Labour government. He outlines the scale of the social care crisis, and explains why policy solutions have proved so difficult to enact - and so fiercely controversial.

Dr Helen Kingston is a GP in Somerset who recognised the impact loneliness was having on the physical health of her patients. She helped set up the ‘Compassionate Frome’ project in 2013, bringing together more than 400 local care providers and volunteers to help people reconnect with their community. As well as having a huge impact on individual lives, studies have shown a dramatic drop in hospital admissions in the area.

Producer: Katy Hickman