The Guardian
Rewind radio: Life and Fate; Charles Hazlewood; Out in the World – review
Radio 4's 13-part dramatisation of Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate was engrossing, Charles Hazlewood's dissection of an Elbow song merely frustrating
Kenneth Branagh plays Viktor Shtrum in Radio 4's 'gripping' adaptation of Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate.
Life and Fate (R4) | Download
Charles Hazlewood (R2) | iPlayer
Out in the World (R3) | iPlayer
Trailed for, ooh, about a couple of years now, Radio 4's 13-part adaptation of Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate finally arrived on the airwaves. If you're someone who has Radio 4 chuntering on as life's background noise, you can't have missed this: Grossman's epic tale, which centres around the battle of Stalingrad, took over every single drama slot, beginning last Sunday, with nuclear physicist Viktor (Kenneth Branagh) and his family moving back to Moscow after time spent as evacuees in the countryside.
If I'm honest, I found it hard to get involved at first: the family scenes were stagey, Viktor's character an irritant. But by episode 5, where we joined Sofya, a Jewish doctor captured and put, with other Jews, on to a cattle truck to Poland, I was utterly gripped. In fact, I had to switch the radio off just before the episode's end, when Sofya and others, including a small boy called David, were herded towards what they thought was a nice warm bath. Too upsetting. A previous scene had an SS officer, Liss, showing Eichmann around the facility – "We transform all life into organic material" – followed by the pair lunching in the actual gas chamber. I yearn for a long, lonely car drive and to listen to the whole drama all in one go.
Some light relief needed. On Radio 2, Charles Hazlewood took one song – in this case, Elbow's "Lippy Kids" – and explored its connections to other pieces of music. Great idea, but, sadly, a frustrating programme. Hazlewood's musical leaps were too casual and, sometimes, quite wrong. He mentioned the track's repetitive piano loops, the falling melody lines. Yes, yes, but surely the most important aspect of "Lippy Kids" is the contrast between those and the soaring of the "Build a rocket, boys!" line? Hmm. It was hard not to think that Hazlewood was just skipping through notions and picking pieces of music out of the air. He equated nostalgia with homage, though they're not the same thing. And then – I still can't believe this – he used this as an excuse to play one of the worst records ever made: Wyclef Jean's hip-hop version of Kenny Rogers's "The Gambler". Hazlewood! Control yourself! That's not a leap of imagination – that's jumping into a cowpat.
On Radio 3, the Reverend Richard Coles began a four-part series on the global history of homosexuality, Out in the World. What a great programme this was: revelatory, fascinating, funny. Did you know that the idea of being gay only came about in the last 100 years? (Before then, the lines between sexuality were less rigidly drawn.) We learned about 19th-century Yorkshirewoman Anne Lister, who dressed as a man and desired women: should we label her a lesbian or is that a modern classification?
And oh, the sniggery joy in hearing a British Museum academic say: "Here we have a papyrus which shows the naked god of the earth, Geb, curling over… and sucking himself off." Sometimes, I really love the BBC.
Charles Hazlewood (R2) | iPlayer
Out in the World (R3) | iPlayer
Trailed for, ooh, about a couple of years now, Radio 4's 13-part adaptation of Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate finally arrived on the airwaves. If you're someone who has Radio 4 chuntering on as life's background noise, you can't have missed this: Grossman's epic tale, which centres around the battle of Stalingrad, took over every single drama slot, beginning last Sunday, with nuclear physicist Viktor (Kenneth Branagh) and his family moving back to Moscow after time spent as evacuees in the countryside.
If I'm honest, I found it hard to get involved at first: the family scenes were stagey, Viktor's character an irritant. But by episode 5, where we joined Sofya, a Jewish doctor captured and put, with other Jews, on to a cattle truck to Poland, I was utterly gripped. In fact, I had to switch the radio off just before the episode's end, when Sofya and others, including a small boy called David, were herded towards what they thought was a nice warm bath. Too upsetting. A previous scene had an SS officer, Liss, showing Eichmann around the facility – "We transform all life into organic material" – followed by the pair lunching in the actual gas chamber. I yearn for a long, lonely car drive and to listen to the whole drama all in one go.
Some light relief needed. On Radio 2, Charles Hazlewood took one song – in this case, Elbow's "Lippy Kids" – and explored its connections to other pieces of music. Great idea, but, sadly, a frustrating programme. Hazlewood's musical leaps were too casual and, sometimes, quite wrong. He mentioned the track's repetitive piano loops, the falling melody lines. Yes, yes, but surely the most important aspect of "Lippy Kids" is the contrast between those and the soaring of the "Build a rocket, boys!" line? Hmm. It was hard not to think that Hazlewood was just skipping through notions and picking pieces of music out of the air. He equated nostalgia with homage, though they're not the same thing. And then – I still can't believe this – he used this as an excuse to play one of the worst records ever made: Wyclef Jean's hip-hop version of Kenny Rogers's "The Gambler". Hazlewood! Control yourself! That's not a leap of imagination – that's jumping into a cowpat.
On Radio 3, the Reverend Richard Coles began a four-part series on the global history of homosexuality, Out in the World. What a great programme this was: revelatory, fascinating, funny. Did you know that the idea of being gay only came about in the last 100 years? (Before then, the lines between sexuality were less rigidly drawn.) We learned about 19th-century Yorkshirewoman Anne Lister, who dressed as a man and desired women: should we label her a lesbian or is that a modern classification?
And oh, the sniggery joy in hearing a British Museum academic say: "Here we have a papyrus which shows the naked god of the earth, Geb, curling over… and sucking himself off." Sometimes, I really love the BBC.
No comments:
Post a Comment