Transience
Everything passes; nothing stays the same. Even the monuments of man and the mountains of nature are ephemeral. Samira Ahmed explores transience and what we are to make of it.
How should we deal with the idea of transience 鈥� in our daily lives and in the natural world around us?
Should the fact that everything and everybody we hold dear (including ourselves) is impermanent and passing worry us? Or should we ignore the idea of transience and get along without considering the constant turmoil of change in both the mundane world of the everyday and in the wider cosmos?
Samira Ahmed explores the role of transience in our lives. She looks at the various ways in which transience pops up beyond the obvious cycles of birth, death and short-lived lives. She considers the understanding of science and examines the transience of memory and its play within the rapidly achieved stages of life.
Samira also looks at the effects of transience on the world we have constructed so solidly around us 鈥� describing the transience of a city she has got to know well, Berlin, as it undergoes yet another transformation.
And how central is an appreciation of transience to any spiritual understanding? She looks at both the Christian and Hindu traditions to see how they express ideas of impermanence. With music, poetry, and extracts from key thinkers on the subject throughout history, she considers how we might best cope with this potentially distressing reality.
Produced by Anthony Denselow
A Whistledown production for 大象传媒 Radio 4
Last on
Music Played
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The Metamorphoses by Ovid (Translated by David Raeburn)
Ovid uses the image of the sea to demonstrate time passing.
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The Ecclesiastical History of the English People by Venerable Bede
A haunting metaphor for human transience 聳 a bird flying through a great hall.
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聭Freud's Requiem: Mourning, Memory and the Invisible History of a Summer Walk 聮 by Matthew Von Unwerth
Freud considers 2 contrasting attitudes to the passing of time.
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聭Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors 聮 by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyen
Compared to the life of the Cosmos, human existance is fleeting.
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Poem 聭Rising Five in 聭Selected Poems 1940 聳 1982聮 by Norman Nicholson
A powerful poem about the human struggle to experience the present.
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聭Goodbye to Berlin聮 by Christopher Isherwood
Isherwood remembers his last morning in a changing Berlin.
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聭What is Maya聮 (Traditional Hindu Myth 聳 Vedanta)
Vishnu teaches the Sage Narada a tough lesson about impermanence.
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聭Transience聮 by Sarojini Naidu
A soothing and hopeful poem on the healing power of time.
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Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf
Adagio Non Molto
Performer: Failoni Orchestra. Performer: Hanspeter Gm眉r.- Sinfonias on Ovid聮s Metamorphoses Numbers 4 -6.
- Naxos Label.
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Edvard Grieg
Lyric Pieces, Op.57, No 1, Vanished Days
Performer: Sandra Mogensen.- Piano Music of Edvard Greig Vol 2.
- Chestnut Hall Music.
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Ludwig van Beethoven
String Quartet No.13, Opus 130, Cavatina
Performer: Budapest String Quartet.- Voyager Golden Record - Music.
- Nasa.
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Meredith Monk
Little Breath
Performer: Alison Sniffin. Performer: Bohdan Hilash. Performer: John Hollenbeck. Performer: Katie Geissinger. Performer: Meredith Monk. Performer: Theo Bleckmann.- Impermanence.
- ECM Records.
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17 Hippies
Adieu
- El Dorado.
- Hipster Records.
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Krzysztof Penderecki
Verganglichkeit
Performer: Michaela Kaune. Performer: Agnieszka Rehlis. Performer: Antoni Wit. Performer: Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra. Performer: Warsaw Philharmonic Choir,. Performer: : Wojtek Drabowicz.- Symphony No.8: Dies Irae, Ausden Psalmen Davids.
- Naxos.
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Anoushka Shankar
Maya
- Traces of You.
- Decca.
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Kirsty MacColl
Days
- The Best of Kirsty MacColl.
- Virgin.
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John Tavener
Glory to God for this Transient Life
Performer: San Francisco Girls Chorus.- Heaven and Earth.
- San Francisco Girls Chorus.
Broadcasts
- Sun 6 Apr 2014 06:05大象传媒 Radio 4
- Sun 6 Apr 2014 23:30大象传媒 Radio 4
- Sun 4 Jun 2023 06:05大象传媒 Radio 4