Radio
Glenda Jackson is brilliant in Radio 4’s Zola adaptation - and terrifying
It was a stroke of genius to invite Glenda Jackson to make her return to acting as the star of…
You can’t forget what Will Self says - even if you wish you could
It lasted for just a few seconds but was such a graphic illustration of the statistics behind the bombing campaign…
Was Bach really a ‘tasteless and chaotic composer’?
It’s just not what you expect to hear on Radio 3 but I happened upon Music Matters on Saturday morning…
Radio 4’s ‘online first’ facility will destroy what makes the station so great
There’s been a lot of fanfare and trailers about BBC Radio’s new ‘online first’ facility. We can now get hold…
Agincourt was neither necessary, nor great. We’re mad to celebrate it
Can anyone explain this sudden enthusiasm for Agincourt, that unexpected victory over the French, now being celebrated, or rather commemorated,…
What’s it like to talk to a serial killer?
‘I’ve never met a human being who doesn’t appreciate being listened to, being taken seriously,’ said Asbjorn Rachlew, the Norwegian…
National Poetry Day's mistake: letting normal people do the reading
Imagine what Brennig Davies must have felt like just before 11 o’clock last Tuesday evening. The 15-year-old was about to…
Why we should embrace being average
Maybe what we love about radio is the way that most of its programming allows us the luxury of staying…
The Baroque composer who was a world music pioneer
On Private Passions this week the writer Amitav Ghosh gave us a refreshingly different version of what has become a…
Late Night Woman’s Hour assumes that all women think about is dating, desire and drinking
Late Night Woman’s Hour has created a Twitter storm with its twice-weekly (Thursdays and Fridays) doses of ‘mischievous and unbridled…
What’s the point of BBC Music?
To Radio 2 to meet Bob Shennan, controller of the BBC’s most popular radio station (the station attracts one third…
As the Hindenburg burned, you could hear radio news being born
It’s really hard to imagine now a world before 24-hour news, continually and constantly accessible in a never-ending stream of…
If the government have their way, will Radio 4’s dramas be broken up by ads for dentures?
‘Bait by Cartier,’ she growls as her priceless diamond bracelet is strapped to a piece of rope and dropped overboard…
Why it would be absurd to sell off Radio 2 - even if it could do with a refresh
The idea that Radio 2 should be sold off by the BBC to a commercial rival is as nonsensical as…
Listen: the gaffe from Nicola Sturgeon that everyone missed
It’s not surprising that politicians have such an on-off relationship with the broadcast media. One slip. One casual comment. One…
Roger Mosey and the questions you don’t ask at the BBC
There was a remarkable scene in one BBC Today programme morning meeting in about 1995, as all the producers gathered…
Why sound beats image when it comes to memory
It’s often not visual images that stimulate memory but a smell, a taste, the sound of pebbles crashing on to…
Just writing about this radio programme makes me feel nauseous
If you’re in the least bit squeamish you’d better stop reading now. What follows is not for those who blanch…
The history of India in 50 personalities
The idea of using objects — salt, cod, nutmeg, silk — to turn history lessons into something popular and accessible…
What happened to the children who survived the Holocaust?
‘I call Zelma Cacik who may be living in London,’ says the announcer, in the clipped RP accent of the…
Don’t believe Orson Welles, says his biographer Simon Callow — especially when he calls himself a failure
Orson Welles would have been 100 this month. When he died in 1985, aged 70, the wonder was that he…
This radio programme almost made me like Piers Morgan
An extraordinary black-and-white photograph of a young black boy taken on the Isle of Wight by Julia Margaret Cameron in…
Britain has the lowest percentage of women engineers in Europe. Why?
‘It’s hard to know how to tell this story,’ she said as she began. ‘Because it’s so loaded. It’s so…
‘Ratings aren’t a pressure for me,’ says the new controller of Radio Three
The new controller of Radio Three, Alan Davey, was on Feedback this week (Radio Four) talking to listeners about his…
Why Bette Davis loathed theatre
It was called Frankly Speaking and by golly it was. The great screen actress Bette Davis was being interviewed by…
