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Dreaming of a Dark Christmas, in IcelandAt the darkest time of the year in Iceland scary creatures come out to play. Storyteller Andri Snær Magnason used to be terrified by his grandmother's Christmas tales of Gryla the 900 year old child eating hag and her thirteen troll sons - the Yule Lads - who would come down from the mountains looking for naughty children in the warmth of their homes. These dark lullabies partly hark back to a pre-Christian Christmas when people worshipped the Norse gods.As Iceland opens up to global influences after centuries of isolation Andri travels from farmstead to lava field and reflects on these traditions: whether the elves still crash your house to throw a Christmas party or the cows still talk on New Year's Eve; and what happens when you have to spend Christmas alone, locked inside Ikea?Featuring the Graduale Nobile Choir conducted by Árni Heiðar KarlssonPartially recorded in Binaural Stereo. Listen on headphones for the best effect.Additional sound design by Phil ChannellProducer Neil McCarthy.

Historian and psychoanalyst Daniel Pick of Birkbeck College, University of London tells the story of how aerial bombardment - from Zeppelins to B52s, from H-Bombs to drones - has made the unconscious mind a field of battle.Daniel explores how, in the shadow of the First World War, Freud turned his analytical eye from desire to the 'death drive', and how psychoanalysts probed what might happen if another war came.Would survivors of mass aerial bombardment hold up psychically, or would they collapse into infantile panic? Or would they become uncontrollably aggressive?And why do humans come to be so aggressive in the first place?When the war - and the bombers - did come to Britain, it appeared that survivors were much more stoical and defiant than had been expected.But, as Daniel discovers, brave faces concealed a great deal of psychological damage.With historian Lyndsey Stonebridge, he visits the Wellcome Library to see - courtesy of the Melanie Klein Trust - the case notes of the psychoanalyst Melanie Klein on her analysis of a troubled ten year old boy, 'Richard'.What do Klein's notes, and Richard's extraordinary drawings, reveal about his attitude to being bombed?Daniel examines how, with the advent of the Cold War and the distinct possibility that bombs and missiles could destroy civilisation, technocrats trying to plan for the end of the world coped with staring into the abyss.Finally, Daniel shows how a radical new turn in aerial bombardment opens up this field anew. Nuclear weapons can destroy the planet; but what does it do to the mind to live under the threat of 'surgical' attack by unmanned drones?With: Derek Gregory, Peter Hennessy, Dagmar Herzog, Richard Overy, Lyndsey StonebridgeProducer: Phil Tinline.

Why do some of us do bizarre things in our sleep? Like riding a motorbike, using a shoe to 'phone for a pizza or even having sex while sleeping? These are complex behaviours and yet sleepwalkers aren't aware of what they're doing and often have no memory of their strange night-time activities.These sleep disorders are known as non-REM parasomnias and include conditions like night terrors and sleep eating.So why does it happen? Sleepwalking usually occurs during deep sleep, when something triggers the brain to wake - but not completely. So the areas that control walking and other movement wake up, yet other parts, involved in awareness and rational thinking, remain asleep. What's confusing is that sleepwalkers look awake - their eyes are open - but they're really not awake. They're not really asleep either. The brain is awake and asleep at the same time. We have known this happens in some animals, who can sleep with half of their brain at a time. But recently, we have learnt that similar things can happen in the human brain.In the first of a three-part series, neurologist, Dr Guy Leschziner, talks to patients he's been treating at his sleep clinic at Guy's and St Thomas' hospitals in London. They include Jackie who began sleepwalking as a child and continued her strange night-time behaviour as an adult, riding her motorbike whilst sleeping. We hear from James whose night terrors have become so violent his wife has begged him to get help; from Alex who rescues people from floods in his sleep. And we talk to Tom, whose recent diagnosis of sexsomnia has had a significant impact on his life.These remarkable sleepwalking experiences help us to understand the complex workings of the human brain.Presenter: Dr Guy Leschziner Producer: Sally Abrahams.