All Episodes
Great Lives — 413 episodes · page 1 of 5
Tony Juniper on EO Wilson
Russell Kane on Iris Murdoch
Ruby Tandoh on Brian Jacques author of the Redwall series
Eric Ashby, Silent Watcher of the New Forest
Pauline Black of The Selecter on Poly Styrene of X-Ray Spex
Actor Laurence Olivier with Derek Jacobi and Tim Walker
Cartoonist Naji al-Ali
Cleopatra picked by Kate Williams
Ade Edmondson on singer Sandy Denny
Tony Garnett picked by Harry Bradbeer
Peter Cook picked by Jon Harvey aka Count Binface
Coco Khan picks Edith Garrud, the jujitsu fighting suffragette
William Gladstone, four-time PM
Alistair McGowan on HE Bates
Beverley Knight on Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the godmother of rock and roll
Daisy Dunn on Marcus Agrippa, ancient Rome's king of cement
Dr Sian Williams nominates Anna Freud
Pianist and broadcaster Keelan Carew nominates Russian composer Nicolai Medtner
Comedian Helen Lederer on Joan Rivers
John Cooper Clarke on Johnny Green, road manager of The Clash
Helen Carr picks Christine de Pizan at the Gloucester history festival
Alex Wheatle, the Bard of Brixton
Spitfire pilot Jeffrey Quill picked by astronaut Tim Peake
Oliver Postgate
Sylvia Plath
Elizabeth Day on Hatshepsut
Comedian Stewart Lee on Derek Bailey
Jock Stein, first British football manager to win the European Cup
Benjamin Franklin
Miles Jupp on JL Carr, author of A Month in the Country
Helen Castor on Richard II
DJ Deb Grant on John Prine
Sir Seretse Khama, first president of Botswana
Emily Williamson, co-founder of the RSPB
Tina Turner
Raymond Blanc on Professor Nicholas Kurti
Dervla Murphy, author of the classic Full Tilt
Ned Ludd mythical leader of the Luddites
Richey Edwards of The Manic Street Preachers
Benny Hill
Maggi Hambling picks muse and lover Henrietta Moraes
Harriet Harman on Maria Callas
Kate Raworth on Donella Meadows
Mark Billingham chooses George Harrison
Jake Arnott on John Gay
Ellen E Jones nominates Florynce Kennedy
AN Wilson selects Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Jessica Fostekew on Boudica
Reginald D Hunter selects Eugene V Debs
Pen Hadow nominates Sir Peter Scott
Lauren Cuthbertson on Margot Fonteyn
Dr Hannah Critchlow picks Professor Colin Blakemore
Doug Allan on Captain Jacques Cousteau
Ekow Eshun on the first openly gay footballer, Justin Fashanu
Anneka Rice picks the largely forgotten Jane Morris, muse to Rossetti and wife of William Morris
The surgeon Henry Marsh picks 'the saviour of mothers' Dr Semmelweis
The Roman Emperor Nero
Film director Julien Temple on Elizabethan bad boy Christopher Marlowe
Zing Tsjeng on Swedish painter Hilma af Klint
Miriam Margolyes on Charles Dickens
Mary Portas on Anita Roddick
Lady Rachel MacRobert, chosen by Hayaatun Sillem
Queen Emma
James Dyson on Frank Whittle
Katherine Rundell on E Nesbit
Antoni Gaudi
Sir Bruce Forsyth
Harry Enfield on Gerard Hoffnung
Alan Freeman picked by Simon Mayo
Actor Niamh Cusack on the life of poet Mary Oliver
Mr Motivator picks Harry Belafonte
Jimmy Wales on Thomas Jefferson
Eartha Kitt proposed by Faye Tozer
John Gray on JG Ballard
Iszi Lawrence on Diana Barnato Walker
Mohammad Mossadegh, PM of Iran ousted in a coup
Ludwig Koch
Lady Eve Balfour
Ken Loach on Gerrard Winstanley
Chi-chi Nwanoku on Jessye Norman
Ninette de Valois
Sophie Scott on Hattie Jacques
Stamford Raffles, founder of Singapore and London Zoo
Susie Dent on Thomas Mann
Tony Benn
Jon Ronson picks Terry Hall of The Specials
Sir Edward Coke, prosecutor of Guy Fawkes
Kofi Annan
Frank Zappa
Frederick the Great of Prussia
Arthur Ashe
Astrid Lindgren, creator of Pippi Longstocking
Adjoa Andoh on Zora Neale Hurston
Comedian Chris McCausland on Kurt Cobain
Roger Deakin, wild swimmer and author of Waterlogged
Minette Batters on Henry Plumb
Bob Harris on Sir Matt Busby, Manchester United manager
Noddy Holder on Chuck Berry
Olivia Laing on Christopher Lloyd, Gardener and Writer
Olia Hercules on Alla Horska, Ukrainian painter