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Friday 9 January 2009

Missing the picture

And the Academy Award Goes To... (BBC Radio 4); Art Made in China (BBC Radio 4); Between the Ears (BBC Radio 3); A Good Read (BBC Radio 4)

The ‘lines’ — or rather walls — were first constructed in 1969 out of nothing more than barbed wire and rubble as a way of keeping the two communities, Catholic and Protestant, apart. They were at first not very high, and were thought to be only ‘temporary’. Now some of them rise to over 30 feet and are built from reinforced concrete or bricks. Twenty-six of them. Not something we hear about very often, and especially not from Westminster or Stormont. One, in particular, was symbolically made of one million bricks and cost, we were told, £1 million to construct. As Baroness (May) Blood, elected to the House of Lords after 40 years as a community worker in the heart of the Shankhill Road area, remarked, that £1 million could surely have been spent in a more useful way, working perhaps on ‘the walls in people’s minds’. As she spoke, we also heard the kind of soft, drawn-out, melodious music that is used in relaxation tapes. You might think this deflected attention from what was being said. In fact it seemed to echo the baroness’s thoughts, or rather to emphasise them, taking our minds on a journey from bigotry into something more reflective and harmonious.

Thank goodness, too, that A Good Read is back, hosted for this series only by the novelist Kate Mosse (mostly known for Labyrinth). She and her guests (the lawyer Shami Chakrabarti and gardener Carol Klein) between them chose a Harry Potter, a Graham Greene (The Comedians) and a subtly provocative first novel by Catherine O’Flynn, What Was Lost, which they were all so enthusiastic about that I wanted to rush out and buy it immediately. Three talking heads in conversation for 30 minutes about three books? Not something you are ever likely to see now on TV.

More articles from: Kate Chisholm | this section

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