Wodcast

What if words can never mean exactly what we want them to mean?
Stephen Fry has spent a lifetime exploring language: writing it, performing it, studying its history, and delighting in its strange contradictions. In this final episode of Season One, we sit down with Stephen to explore what words can and perhaps cannot do.
We begin with “happy”, a word Stephen traces back to hap, meaning chance or what happens. From there, the conversation opens into a much bigger question: if language is metaphorical, and words can never map perfectly onto the things they describe, how do we ever understand one another? Stephen argues that “there isn't a pure word for anything” and that we couldn't find “absolute words for absolute things.”
We move through etymology, translation and the peculiarities of English; the relationship between language and thought; and the way AI is forcing us to reconsider how our own minds process ideas and language. Stephen reflects on anagnorisis, the moment of recognition or discovery in a story, and why real life rarely gives us the neat revelations that fiction does.
And then we talk about writing. What makes someone a writer? Stephen's answer is refreshingly uncompromising: writing is difficult because the story comes hard. The mechanics of writing matter far less than whatever is happening underneath them, the thing that is trying to push the words out.
Throughout, Stephen returns to his love of words not simply for what they mean, but for how they sound, move through the mouth and feel when spoken. Language, he says, is our treasure.
And at the very end, we ask Stephen the question we ask every guest: if there were one word you would like to be remembered by, what would it be?
Topics include:
The strange origins of the word happy
Why there are no “pure” or absolute words
Why words are not mathematical
Etymology and the history hidden inside language
Translation and why English is so peculiar
AI, language and how we understand our own minds
Anagnorisis, revelation and the turning points in stories
Why writing is supposed to be difficult
The difference between words and stories
The sensory pleasure of language
Finding the word underneath all the words
More from the Wodcast
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A note as we reach the end of Season One
For a whole season, we’ve been asking what words mean, where they come from, what they carry, and how they change when we use them.
And perhaps, as Stephen Fry reminds us in this final episode, there are no absolute words for absolute things. What matters is the meaning we make with them.
Next week, we’ll gather for our final Season One live on Substack, taking three of Stephen’s weight-bearing words and exploring their origins, histories and the meanings they carry.
Then, before we close the season, we’ll release a special bonus episode, in which we ask each of our guests to reflect on one final word: our word of the season given to us by Sarah Ogilvie.
Join us on Substack for the final live and stay with us for the bonus episode that brings Season One to a close. ✨

Today, Wodcast sits down with Sir Tim Rice one of the world's most celebrated lyricists and one of only a small number of people to have won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony, for a wide-ranging conversation about words, songwriting, storytelling and the strange alchemy of turning language into something that lasts.

From Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita and Chess to The Lion King and Aladdin, Tim has written some of the most recognisable lyrics of the last half-century. But this conversation is less about the hits themselves and more about what happens inside the words: how a lyric comes together, why a title can change everything, and why sometimes the smallest rhyme can make a song feel complete.

Tim shares the story behind “Hakuna Matata”, including the lost verse that never made it into The Lion King, and explains how a phrase from a Swahili dictionary became one of the most recognisable expressions in popular culture. He reflects on the difference between writing for a character and writing from your own experience, and why a lyricist has to be able to imagine lives they've never lived.

Together, they explore the hidden architecture of lyrics: rhyme, rhythm, titles, repetition and the words that somehow lodge themselves in our memories. Tim reveals why “Don't Cry for Me, Argentina” almost had a completely different title, why vagabond was the perfect word for a line about kings and vagabonds, and why sometimes the best explanation for a particular word is simply: “It rhymed.”

The conversation also wanders into the life of words themselves. Tim reflects on how words change meaning, why he thinks “hopefully” is often used incorrectly, and whether words are losing their meaning altogether. They discuss the power of songs as one of the oldest forms of storytelling and how a song can sometimes communicate something faster and more directly than a novel.

This is a conversation about the craft of words, the life of words, and the extraordinary things that can happen when the right words meet the right melody.

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Topics include:

• The art of lyric writing
• The Lion King and “Hakuna Matata”
• Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita and Chess
• The power of song and storytelling
• Why titles matter
• Rhyme, rhythm and scansion
• How words change their meanings
• Childhood and memory
• Writing from other people's perspectives
• The lost verse of “Hakuna Matata”
• “Vagabond” and the words we remember
• Poetry, music and meaning
• Language, mortality and the mystery of existence

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More from the Wodcast:

➟ Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/wod.cast/

➟ Apple Podcasts – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wodcast/id1896893830

➟ YouTube – https://youtube.com/@wodcast_channel

➟ Substack – https://wodcast.substack.com/

➟ Website – https://wodcast.co.uk/

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More from Tim Rice:

➟ Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/tim_rice_words

➟ Website - https://www.timrice.co.uk

Join the Wodcast on Substack

Explore the words between episodes, discover our upcoming live events, and subscribe to join us along the way.

What does freedom really mean when you have spent part of life without it?

Today, the Wodcast sits down with Waad Al-Kateab journalist, filmmaker and activist for a deeply personal conversation about freedom, home, family, language, community and the power of imagining a different future.

Waad grew up in Syria under the Assad regime and began documenting life in Aleppo during the Syrian revolution. Her extraordinary archive became For Sama, the acclaimed documentary that brought the realities of war, motherhood, love and survival to audiences around the world. In this conversation, she reflects on what happens when the words we use to describe our lives, freedom, home, refugee, family, become lived experiences rather than abstract ideas.

Together, they explore the richness of Arabic, and how difficult it can be to translate not just words but entire experiences between languages. Waad speaks about being displaced from her home, finding family and community in unexpected places, and the complicated relationship she now has with both Syria and the UK.

They discuss freedom a word Waad says she has “tasted” many times. From the moment she first heard people chanting for freedom at university, to the extraordinary day Syria was finally free of Assad, she reflects on what it means to fight for something, lose people for it, and discover that even when a regime falls, freedom itself remains something that must be protected.

The conversation also turns to empathy, solidarity, memory and imagination. Waad describes the people who helped each other survive during the siege of Aleppo, the humour that remained present even in unimaginable circumstances, and the responsibility she feels towards those who did not survive.

And ultimately, they return to the power of words. Can words help us imagine a different future? Can a chant become a reality? Waad's answer is nuanced: words can keep hope alive, but “just saying alone is not enough.” Change requires action, community and people willing to move together.

This is a conversation about the words we inherit, the words we fight for, and the words that help us imagine what comes next.

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Topics include:

• What freedom really means
• Syria, revolution and resistance
• Language and translation
• Arabic and the richness of meaning
• Home and belonging
• Family, friendship and community
• The refugee experience
• Empathy and solidarity
• Memory and collective action
• Imagination and dreaming
• The power of words
• For Sama
• Filmmaking as testimony
• Hope, courage and the impossible

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More from the Wodcast:

➟ Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/wod.cast/

➟ Apple Podcasts – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wodcast/id1896893830

➟ YouTube – https://youtube.com/@wodcast_channel

➟ Substack – https://wodcast.substack.com/

➟ Website – https://wodcast.co.uk/

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Join the Wodcast on Substack

Explore the words between episodes, discover our upcoming live events, and subscribe to join us along the way.

https://wodcast.substack.com/

What if surrender isn't the opposite of creation, but part of it?
Today, the Wodcast sits down with musician and songwriter Nick Mulvey for a wide-ranging conversation about words, music, faith, creativity and the things that can only be felt beyond language.
Nick arrives with the word “yield” a word that can mean both to produce and to surrender. From this apparent contradiction, the conversation opens into a deeper exploration of creativity, control and what happens when we stop trying to do everything ourselves. Nick reflects on the role surrender has played in his own life, and why he believes some of the best things that have happened to him have come through yielding.
The conversation moves into faith, masculinity, the sacred feminine and Nick's evolving relationship with Christianity and the natural world. He reflects on the process of integrating seemingly opposing forces, and on how his understanding of God, Earth, fatherhood and masculinity has changed over time.
They also explore the limits of language: the moments when words become inadequate, when music can say something that language cannot, and why there is “a lot that is ineffable.” Nick reflects on songwriting, the mysterious process of hearing something larger than himself, and the relationship between poetry, music and the questions we spend our lives asking.
This episode is an invitation to loosen our grip: to consider what might emerge when we stop forcing, make space for the unknown, and allow ourselves to listen for what cannot always be put into words.
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Topics include:
• Yield and surrender
• Creativity and the unknown
• Music, poetry and songwriting
• The limits of language
• Dark Harvest
• Faith and Christianity
• Masculinity and the sacred feminine
• Nature and belonging
• Duality and integration
• The ineffable
• The words behind Nick's lyrics
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More from the Wodcast:
➟ Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/wod.cast/
➟ Apple Podcasts – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wodcast/id1896893830
➟ YouTube – https://youtube.com/@wodcast_channel
➟ Substack – https://wodcast.substack.com/
➟ Website – https://wodcast.co.uk/
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Join us live on Substack next Wednesday.
Mabel & Ben will explore three of Nick's weight-bearing words their origins, histories and the meanings they carry before slowing down for the final 15 minutes with music and time to write together, inspired by the words and ideas from the conversation.
We'd love for you to join us. ✨

What lies in the silence between who we have learned to be and who we are becoming?
Today, the Wodcast sits down with Remi Olajoyegbe, founder, female empowerment coach, business leader, co-founder of Medicine Festival and founder of the Isumataq Collective, for a deeply personal conversation about success, transformation, grief and what it means to live and lead from a place of wholeness.
Having built a highly successful career in investment banking, Remi reflects on what she calls “the void of success”: reaching the milestones, ticking the boxes and receiving the external validation, while still experiencing a deeper yearning for something more. What happens when the language of success we've inherited no longer reflects the life we want to live?
Together, they explore Remi's extraordinary relationship with words, from growing up between Assamese and Nigerian cultures and learning to understand “the weight of the unspoken,” to the words that have accompanied profound periods of loss, grief and transformation in her own life. Remi shares why she believes “words are spells,” and how finding new language can help us move beyond the identities, systems and expectations that once defined us.
The conversation moves through feminine and masculine polarities, leadership, jealousy, belonging, ritual, the wisdom of the body and our inner world or “interiority.” Remi reflects on why transformation cannot be forced, but instead requires spaces where we feel safe enough to soften, tell the truth and allow previously hidden parts of ourselves to emerge.
Ultimately, this is a conversation about wholeness: what becomes possible when we stop dividing ourselves into the parts that are acceptable and those that are not, turn the lens inward, and begin to remember who we really are.
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Topics include:
• The void of success
• Why “words are spells”
• The weight of the unspoken
• Grief, loss and transformation
• Belonging and the language we inherit
• Masculine and feminine polarities
• Living and leading from wholeness
• Interiority and the inner world
• Jealousy as a window into desire
• Ritual, ceremony and transformation
• Listening to the body
• Female leadership and collaboration
• When there are no words
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More from Remi & the Isumataq Collective
➟ Isumataq website: https://www.isumataqcollective.com/
➟Isumataq Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/isumataqcollective/
➟ Remi’s website: https://iamremi.co.uk/
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More from the Wodcast:
➟ Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/wod.cast/
➟ Apple Podcasts – https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wodcast/id1896893830
➟ YouTube – https://youtube.com/@wodcast_channel
➟ Substack – https://wodcast.substack.com/
➟ Website – https://wodcast.co.uk/
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Join us live on Substack next Wednesday.
Mabel & Ben will explore three of Remi's weight-bearing words their origins, histories and the meanings they carry, before slowing things down for the final 15 minutes with music and time to write together, inspired by the words and ideas from the conversation.
See you there ✨