The Middle

From taking the middle ground to the mid-life crisis, Middle England to middle managers, to being a middle child - is occupying a position in the middle out of fashion? Anne McElvoy hosts Radio 4's ideas discussion programme and her guests this week for a middling conversation are: Journalist Catherine Carr. Her new book Who's the Favourite?: The Loving, Messy Realities of Sibling Relationships explores being a middle child and the relevance of birth order Writer and broadcaster Mark Lawson, who has written novels set in middle England Symeon Brown, home affairs correspondent at Channel 4 news, whose forthcoming book is The Good, the Black and the Boujee: The Story of Britain's New Black Middle Class Adrian Wooldridge, journalist, author and Global Business Columnist at Bloomberg Opinion. His recent book is entitled Centrists of the World Unite! The Lost Genius of Liberalism. and Claire Ainsley, former adviser to Keir Starmer, now at the Progressive Policy Institute. Producer: Eliane Glaser

You can listen to The Middle online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

The Middle is an episode from Arts and Ideas by BBC.

This episode is 57:00 long.

This episode was published on May 8, 2026.

Yes. Use the heart button on the episode page to add it to your favorite episodes list.

Yes. This page shows related episodes from Arts and Ideas when more episodes are available from the podcast feed.