In Our Time
Listening last week to the episode on the great Wall of China, and the week before to the one on Roman satirists, it occurred just what a strangely unique, and marvelous thing BBC Radio 4’s In Our Time is. I may only be interested in half the subjects, the delivery may be dry, but that's the point, this is the 'life of the mind' in its academic form, unadorned and unprettified. What a contrast to the sad decline of Melvyn Bragg's other flag-ship, ITV's South Bank Show. Before you mourn the passing of that, don't forget it's misguided populism reduced it to covering shit like The Darkness before it flopped out. In Our Time is by contrast totally uncompromising in its approach, and Melvyn does a great job stewarding the academics on it, from his impatient, rushed "hello" (no time for frivolities like introductions!) which starts each programme onward. Where else could you hear forty straight minutes of discussion on everything from James Joyce to anasthetics, from empiricism to Merlin the magician, from the Greek myths to nuclear physics? On a national prime time programme?? The complete archive of the programme is now available here, a truly formidable powerhouse of pure knowledge. Dive in.
Everytime the BBC comes under fire from slime like the Mail defenders pop up to say such and such a programme is "worth the licence fee for that alone." Its never quite true. But I'd say that this programme comes closer than others. Which other national broadcaster would, or could create a programme like this? One more reason among countless many to keep the vermin out of power, and their hands off it.
