The Guardian's Audio Long Reads

We are raiding the Audio Long Reads archives and bringing you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors. This week’s article: Our fixation with the sexy powerplays of the Tudor court shows no signs of fading. What is it about this 16th-century dynasty that still obsesses us? By Charlotte Higgins

Thousands of young women leave home in Nigeria every year on the promise of a good job in Europe, only to be trapped by debt and forced into prostitution. But one joined forces with investigators in Italy to expose the traffickers. By Ottavia Spaggiari

Something has gone badly wrong with the way we keep pets. Our casual cruelties are a symptom of our unhealthy relationship with other species. By Esther Woolfson

We are raiding the Audio Long Reads archives and bringing you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors. This week: For centuries mystics have channelled the hopes and fears of Afghans. With the nation in turmoil, their services are as popular as ever. But can they survive the latest crackdown by religious hardliners?

Most chairs aren’t designed to serve human bodies – but a better seat is possible. By Sara Hendren

We cannot fully understand the current upheavals, or almost any turning point in American history, without accounting for the human pyramid that is encrypted into us all: the caste system. By Isabel Wilkerson

We are raiding the Audio Long Reads archives and bringing you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors. This week, from 2015: When a black South African student threw a bucket of excrement over a statue of Cecil Rhodes, it kicked off a protest movement that is shattering the way the country sees its past

During my medical training, it was almost always assumed that my patients would be white. That prejudice is harmful in its own right – and when it comes to dangerous skin conditions, it can be deadly. By Neil Singh

Official policy in the UK and US – unlike in many other countries – is to never make concessions to kidnappers. Those taken sometimes die as a result. Is it time to rethink? By Joel Simon

We are raiding the Audio Long Reads archives and bringing you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors. This week’s article: Skip Lievsay has created audioscapes for Martin Scorsese and is the only sound man the Coen brothers go to. But the key to this work is more than clever effects, it is understanding the human mind. By Jordan Kisner