Christopher Frayling

Christopher Frayling

Author: BBC Radio 4 November 2, 2003 Duration: 37:06

This week Sue Lawley's castaway is Professor Sir Christopher Frayling the Rector of the Royal College of Art and a champion of popular culture. He was born into an affluent family living in London. His father, Major Arthur Frayling, was a successful furrier, and his mother was fascinated by the arts and cars - she won the RAC Rally in 1952. At six he was sent to boarding school, which he hated, and it was there that he developed his life long love of film acting and design. He studied history at Cambridge and did a doctorate on Jean Jacques Rosseau and the French Revolution. He fought his father's ambitions for him to enter advertising and chose an academic career path, becoming a lecturer at the Universities of Exeter and Bath in the 1970s. At that time he worked on the programme The World at War and he's since become an accomplished broadcaster known for his work on Radio 4. He won an award at the New York Film and Television Festival for a six-part Channel 4 series about advertising called The Art of Persuasion.

He's published 13 books to date with an eclectic range of titles from spaghetti westerns to The Face of Tutankhamun and Clint Eastwood - a critical biography. As well as being Rector of the Royal College of Art, Sir Christopher is also the longest serving Trustee of the Victoria and Albert Museum and is Chairman of the Design Council.

[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]

Favourite track: Il Triello by Ennio Morricone Book: Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Luxury: V & A Museum


The Desert Island Discs: Archive 2000-2005 podcast opens a unique window into a pivotal era, drawing from the BBC Radio 4 archives. This isn't just a collection of interviews about music; it's a deeply personal exploration of life, ambition, and memory through the voices of the early 21st century. Each episode presents a guest from this period-be they an artist, a politician, a scientist, or an activist-facing the program's enduring and revealing premise: selecting the eight pieces of music they would take if stranded alone. The conversation that unfolds around these choices is where the magic happens. The host gently guides them from their selections into stories of childhood influences, career-defining moments, personal triumphs, and profound losses. You'll hear the crackle of a vinyl record lead into a confession, or a symphony cue a tale of resilience. Listening to this podcast feels like uncovering a time capsule of cultural and emotional history, where a pop song can explain a political stance and a classical adagio can frame a love story. It’s an intimate study of character and a testament to how the soundtrack of our lives shapes our identity. These archived conversations, preserved in this podcast, remain compelling because they bypass the superficial, using music as the key to unlock genuine human experience.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Desert Island Discs: Archive 2000-2005
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