Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4

Craig Brown, critic and satirist, best known for his parodies in Private Eye. In The Independent on Sunday he is Wallace Arnold, he's Bel Littlejohn in The Guardian, and he has a diary in Private Eye under a number of topical guises. As well as writing comedy shows such as Norman Ormal for TV, Craig has a regular column in The Daily Telegraph, and his books include The Little Book of Chaos, The Marsh Marlowe Letters and The Hounding of John Thomas. Katie Birkwood, the rare books and special collections librarian at the Royal College of Physicians, London, where she's worked for three years and recently curated a hugely popular exhibition on the life and book collection of John Dee. Katie regularly contributes to the journal Library & Information History, and has published on topics as diverse as the 16th century manuscripts collector Robert Cotton; the 17th archbishop James Ussher; depictions of venereal disease in early printed books, and the 20th century astronomer Fred Hoyle. George Monbiot, a journalist best known for his environmental activism. His celebrated Guardian columns are syndicated all over the world, and he is the author of the bestselling books Captive State, The Age of Consent, as well as the investigative travel books Poisoned Arrows, Amazon Watershed and No Man's Land. His investigations in Africa, Asia, and the Americas have led to him to be declared persona non grata in seven countries, sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment in Indonesia, shot at, beaten up by military police, shipwrecked and stung into a coma. This week, the Museum’s Guest Committee appreciate a mythical hotel from another age; a book that was stolen from the greatest library of the Tudor age; and the greatest bear that ever lived. The show was researched by Mike Turner and Anne Miller of QI. The producers were Richard Turner and James Harkin. It was a BBC Studios Production.