It was such a shock. At first I couldn’t understand what was going on. Why were they all talking about Sid as if he was in the past?
It was such a shock. At first I couldn’t understand what was going on. Why were they all talking about Sid as if he was in the past? I’d only been away for a few days. Surely nothing really major could have happened in Ambridge in the meantime? And especially not to Sid, who as far as I knew was safely ensconced in New Zealand on the trip of a lifetime to meet his new grandson. I listened to the next episode and still had no clue. A party for Sid? But he’s not around. Jolene in tears? But she’s usually such a toughie.
A very nasty trick has been played on us by the scriptwriters. Much of the fun of listening to long-running soaps (and at 59 years The Archers has run longer than any) is figuring out what’s going to happen before it does. It’s a way of playing god with life. You know everyone in the cast almost as well as you know your family. You’ve been overhearing their petty deceits and minor disputes for as long as you can remember. Sometimes you tune in religiously every evening; at others you leave them to get along without you and when you tune back in nothing much will have changed. You become so familiar with the rhythm of life in Borsetshire that you feel able to detect the smallest hint of change or looming disaster. It’s that feeling of power that keeps us hooked in; a sense of control, of being in charge of things. It feels real, and yet has the boon of being fictional and therefore predictable. But I’d had no suspicions about Sid — or anyone else. There were no subtle suggestions that something bad was on the way, or, if there were, my usually reliable antennae failed to notice them. (Even the dreadful Vicky has been disappointingly soaped off so that the stepmother-in-law from hell has become almost lovable.)
I suppose I should have guessed that Sid’s trip was so completely out of character that it must augur something nasty. After all, he never went away. He was always there, behind the bar, fussing about the beer and complaining about the cricket team. But Sid is no more. Victim of a heart attack at 66 years old — or rather of the desire by Alan Devereux for a release (after 48 years) from his labours as ex-Brummie bad boy turned stalwart of the community. It’s surprising in a way that Devereux didn’t choose to retire earlier, after being forced to go through with the Great Shower Scene between Sid and Jolene (an ear-washing experience). What will happen to the Bull without him?
Once upon a time The Archers could be relied upon to explain in words of one syllable any new government policy or social trend. After all, that’s how it began, as an agency of the Ministry of Agriculture. But the team behind it have slipped up badly this time and, unless I’ve missed this too, they’ve failed to build into the script any warning that today (Saturday) is the last day of the Digital Amnesty. Yes, that’s right. You’ve got less than 24 hours to swap your old analogue radios for a swanky new digital set at a discounted price, ready for the moment when the analogue signal is finally switched off and your beloved Roberts will no longer pick up anything being transmitted in the UK. Some retailers are offering a discount of up to £20 (depending on which new digital set you choose). Meanwhile the old analogue sets are to be ‘reconditioned’ and sent off to Cape Town, where a new radio station has been set up to entertain sick children in hospital.
The trouble is very few people have taken up the offer — much to the surprise of the government and the retailers. They failed to realise that radio listeners are not like TV addicts. They care about their radios, which become part of their lives and are not to be discarded easily. I have three digital transmitters and yet none has quite the same magic as the old Roberts in the bathroom and bedroom. It’s these battered old boxes that bring me Book at Bedtime or Late Junction, that wake me up with Rob Cowan or wile away the boredom of flossing with The World Tonight.
A correspondent from Budapest tells me that such a plan to make us all go totally digital ‘would cause the most gigantic fuss here’, since Hungary only went over to FM about 15 years ago. He now has to listen to the World Service on the internet but tunes in to Kossuth Radio for morning news and chat, as well as Bartok Radio, the classical-music station, on FM. His letter prompted me to think that we should all be making a gigantic fuss about digital over here — just to show the government how much we care.
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