Melvyn Bragg’s ‘In Our Time’ proves media can be both serious and popular

Over the years, a select few BBC radio programmes have carved out distinctive niches in the nation’s affections.

High on many people’s lists of such radio treasures are probably programmes like the Archers, Desert Island Discs and, now into its second century, the Shipping Forecast.

Another shoo-in member of this small and exclusive club – broadcasting’s equivalent of the Order of Merit – is surely Melvyn Bragg’s long-running Radio 4 programme In Our Time.

In Our Time embodies something fundamental to media. It is living proof that it is possible to be both serious and popular.

So good was the programme, right from the start, that Bragg and his guests managed to turn one of radio’s traditional “graveyard” slots – the hour after 09h00 on a weekday – into one of the BBC’s most enduring jewels. They did it by the simple expedient of talking interestingly about important and sometimes difficult subjects. Who would have guessed?

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