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Why you might want to be a simple oyster in the next life
What creature would you most like to be in another life? A cat? An eagle? Reincarnation, a playful poem made visual through a collaboration between the author Ellen Bass and the artist Jeff Scher, contemplates the frequently overlooked yet dignified existence of a simple oyster as a model of generosity, self-sacrifice – even love.
Animator: Jeff Scher
Poem: Ellen Bass
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Childhood and adolescence
‘Do worms cry?’ – and other questions collected from the mind of a curious child
4 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
Why Orwell urged his readers to celebrate the spring, cynics be damned
11 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
Leading 1950s thinkers on the search for happiness in trying times
29 minutes
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Stories and literature
Two variants of a Hindu myth come alive in an animated ode to Indian storytelling
14 minutes
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Food and drink
The passage of time is a peculiar thing in a 24-hour diner
14 minutes
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Spirituality
Through rituals of prayer, a monk cultivates a quietly radical concept of freedom
4 minutes
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History of technology
Replicating Shakespearean-era printing brings its own dramas and comedy
19 minutes
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Family life
The stream-of-consciousness thoughts and memories that emerge while cooking a meal
5 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
Wander through the English countryside with two teens trying to make sense of the world
10 minutes