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Radio 3's 'Cabaret of the Word' presented by Ian McMillan, with guests Jeet Thayil, Chris Beckett, Lowri Evans and James Ward.

Jeet Thayil's 'Narcopolis', is a dream-infused novel about opium dens in 1980s Mumbai; it was short-listed for the Booker Prize last year. He shares extracts from a work-in-progress, 'The Sex Lives of the Saints' , the sequel to 'Narcopolis' (Faber).

James Ward is the founder of Stationery Club, London's annual 'Boring Conference', and the author of a forthcoming book 'Adventures in Stationery' (Serpent's Tail). On this week's show he celebrates 'the man who didn't invent the paper-clip'.

Lowri Evans is a performance artist whose stage show about her own life 'The Secret Life of You and Me' is described as a live scrap book, that's still evolving. It had its premiere at The Lowry earlier this year and will tour this summer.

Chris Beckett's 'Ethiopia Boy' (Carcanet) is a collection of poems capturing the soundscape and friendships of a childhood spent in Ethiopia - his parents moved there from the UK in the nineteen-sixties. Chris reads new poems inflected with Amharic traditions.

Produced by Faith Lawrence.