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John McCarthy considers the cultural and metaphorical significance of breathing.

For most of us breathing is so continuous, so easy, that it's something we take for granted. But without breath nothing is possible. Breath energizes movement and enables bodily activities. It punctuates speech, and is central to singing and the playing of many musical instruments. And in particular situations, giving birth or meditating, it becomes the focus of our attention and is bound by specific techniques.

John McCarthy explores a range of different breathing experiences. From God's breath of life, blown into Adam's nostrils at the dawning of the World, to the Navajo Indian idea about a Little Wind hidden in our ears, he looks at how the breath has traditionally been understood as something that connects spirit and body. We talk about a first and last breath as marking the beginning and end of life, it's also affected by mood and emotion.

The programme features readings taken from the Sonnets to Orpheus, Book II by Rainer Maria Rilke, Phenomenology of Perception by Maurice Merleau-Ponty's and Breathing by Josephine Dickinson. Music comes from Maria Callas, Nick Cave and the New Zealand All Blacks.

The readers are Helen Bourne and Brian Fenton.

Producer: Emily Williams
A Whistledown production for ±«Óãtv Radio 4.