Alan Taylor's Diary: Tune in to drop out

0 Comments | Sunday Herald, The, Sep 1, 2002 | by Alan Taylor

YESTERDAY afternoon Radio 4 broadcast Ronald Frame's play Greyfriars. It was written, directed, produced and performed in Scotland. You may perhaps be wondering why this play was not broadcast on Radio Scotland, the so-called national station. At BBC Scotland the view from the top is that this is not an issue. As Maggie Cunningham, head of Radio Scotland, intimates in a letter in today's paper a large part of Radio Scotland's role is to make programmes for BBC stations furth of Scotland. During the Festival, for instance, BBC producers in Scotland "deliver the Radio 3 concerts to the UK network".

Ms Cunningham thinks this is laudable and I suppose I would too were Radio Scotland not so woeful. Instead of literate plays, interesting, informative and entertaining documentaries, inspirational music, intelligent interviews and brilliant book adaptations we are force-fed a diet that is the mental equivalent of deep fried Mars bars. Of course, one could always twiddle a few knobs (nobs???) and find a station which caters for those whose brains have not yet turned to tripe. But why should one have to? Why can't BBC Scotland at least attempt to embrace the spirit of devolution rather than pretend it hasn't happened? Why must it be so subservient to Broadcasting House?

With a will, Radio Scotland could be a proper national station of which we could be proud. As it is, its schedule is a list of presenters, the content of whose shows is a mystery. Consequently, listeners are tuning in elsewhere. The latest figures for Radio Scotland (between April and June) record a drop of around 10%, down 109,000 to 927,000. How much further must they fall before the Beeb's powers-that-be decide that dumbing-down is not the answer?

David may recall he used to be wanted

THE knives - albeit picnic ones - appear to be out for David McLetchie, leader of the Scottish Tories. Far be it from me to add to the travails of a fellow Hearts sufferer but it's my duty to reveal that he was once an enthusiastic supporter of all things European. During the 1975 referendum, when Mr McLetchie was a gangly 23-year- old, he handed out pro-Euro leaflets around Scotland with his mentor, Labour MP George Foulkes. "He was very good and very hard working," recalls Mr Foulkes, "and I never regretted recruiting him." Ouch!

Waterstone's little book of cock-ups

NOT for nothing is my middle name Scoop. By spooky coincidence I had an appointment with Iain Banks on the day that Waterstone's "marketing co-ordinator" decided that it would be "inappropriate" to discuss his new novel, which opens on the day the Twin Towers were attacked, in one of its Edinburgh shops on September 11. As own goals go it was a humdinger as Ottakars, Waterstone's main rival north of the border, stepped gleefully into the breach.

It was, alas, another nail in the coffin of that once-illustrious chain. Last week, for example, Waterstone's withdrew copies of Irvine Welsh's Porno from shop windows, doubtless because they were worried they might offend a posy of shrinking violets. In its golden age, when it was run by bookmen like its eponymous founder, Waterstone's was an adornment in otherwise humdrum high streets. I recall visiting its branch in Edinburgh's George Street on a stormy night after Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses was banned in India. Even after the fatwa was issued, Waterstone's continued to stock the novel despite dire threats.

Goodness knows how Waterstone's hierarchy of bean counters and marketing co-ordinators would behave today. Not with honour, I suspect. As its decline continues and its shops increasingly look like garage sales, its disillusioned staff are leaving in droves, unmourned by managers whose past is in "retail" and who have no more emotional attachment to books than they do baked beans. Its flagship store in Princes Street recently hired a new manager. Previously, he was with the Disney store. Even Iain Banks would have a hard time making that up.

Bookfest is worth its weight in words

WATERSTONE'S could do a lot worse than follow the example of the Edinburgh International Book Festival, which manages to be both deadly serious and hugely popular. This year the festival, which is sponsored by the Herald and the Sunday Herald, was more successful than ever, with sales of tickets and books up by 40% - outstripping the performances of all the other festivals by a lang Scots mile. Around 550 authors descended on Charlotte Square Gardens, all of whom, stresses festival director Catherine Lockerbie, are given the same token fee, "whether they're Harold Pinter, Seamus Heaney or Maisie McShoogle fae Tollcross." Apparently, one anxious publisher phoned on behalf of a distinguished philosopher who'd misread the invitation letter and thought he was required to pay to take part. No, his name isn't Wittgenstein. In the authors' "yurt" - described by Iain MacWhirter in last Sunday's paper as, "one of the most civilised places on the planet" - there's a visitors' book into which Ms Lockerbie had hoped her distinguished guests might write a profound or poetic word or two.