I write for radio by choice, as an extension and amplification of writing for the printed page; in its most essential sense. . . radio retains the atavistic lure, the atavistic power, of voices in the dark, and the writer who gives the words to those voices retains some of the authority of the most antique tellers of tales.
(Angela Carter)
Radio is a wonderful medium for the writer, as it is capable of conveying anything that words, sound and the imagination working together can summon up. It gives the writer a privileged and unique access to the listener: a whispered monologue into a microphone can bring the listener right into the thoughts and consciousness of the character, with a startling intimacy that is very different from the theatre auditorium.
Played out in the theatre inside the listener's mind, it can, at its best, become powerful and spell-binding, real, in a way that is unique to this medium. In fact the collaboration with the listener's imagination is one of the particular delights of radio writing, but one that the writer must learn to wield sensitively.
At the other end of the scale, radio does epic for a fraction of the cost of television or film-you want your scene set on a battlefield, a sixteenth-century fair, the Arctic, an exploding volcano? No problem; all can be achieved instantly. The humblest radio play can reach hundreds of thousands, even millions of listeners, simultaneously; yet as people tend to listen alone, the radio play is essentially written for and to one listener. And as opposed to theatre, film or television, every listener's imagination will create a different visual world in response to your writing. In some ways structurally closer to film or television than it is to theatre, in the rapidity with which it can change location, radio is also wonderful for creating drama or stories that bend reality; that open the door to hauntings, ghosts, layers of time, overlapping voices, swift changes of location, the inner world of madness or despair...
Paradoxically, however, because radio listeners are rarely giving it their undivided attention (the BBC Commissioning guidelines will tell you exactly what proportion of the audience are ironing, in the bath, washing-up or picking up the kids from school) narrative drive and story-telling must be rigorously strong and clear.
Many of our most celebrated writers have made work specifically for radio, including Angela Carter, Samuel Beckett, Tom Stoppard, Dylan Thomas, Caryl Churchill, and Harold Pinter, amongst a host of others. Equally radio has probably given a platform to more first-time writers than either television, film or theatre, owing to its relative cheapness to make, and the hunger in the schedules for new drama (a new 45 minute Afternoon Drama is aired every day, Monday to Friday on Radio 4; as well as the Saturday Drama; other slots include the 90 minute Drama on 3; the 15-minute Fact to Fiction; the five times 15 minute Woman's hour drama series various slots on Radio 4 Extra and so on.)
Aims
This module will explore the artistic and practical aspects of writing for radio. We will listen to a wide range of radio drama, and discuss the aesthetic possibilities that radio offers the writer. We will articulate some principles and useful tools for constructing a radio play; whilst also looking closely at the state of radio drama today. Much radio drama is easily and plentifully available not just on the radio but via BBC iPlayer, and the BBC Writer's Room online also provides lots of resources, scripts you can read online, advice and tutorials etc: see www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/.
Learning Outcomes
Listening and discussing radio plays will be a core aspect of the module sometimes; this will take place in the seminar itself, with focused discussion afterwards about the effectiveness of the writer's work and how certain effects were achieved. Students will also be asked to try their hand at some of these radio drama formats, and we will workshop scripts in class by reading them aloud and discussing them.
(Angela Carter)
Radio is a wonderful medium for the writer, as it is capable of conveying anything that words, sound and the imagination working together can summon up. It gives the writer a privileged and unique access to the listener: a whispered monologue into a microphone can bring the listener right into the thoughts and consciousness of the character, with a startling intimacy that is very different from the theatre auditorium.
Played out in the theatre inside the listener's mind, it can, at its best, become powerful and spell-binding, real, in a way that is unique to this medium. In fact the collaboration with the listener's imagination is one of the particular delights of radio writing, but one that the writer must learn to wield sensitively.
At the other end of the scale, radio does epic for a fraction of the cost of television or film-you want your scene set on a battlefield, a sixteenth-century fair, the Arctic, an exploding volcano? No problem; all can be achieved instantly. The humblest radio play can reach hundreds of thousands, even millions of listeners, simultaneously; yet as people tend to listen alone, the radio play is essentially written for and to one listener. And as opposed to theatre, film or television, every listener's imagination will create a different visual world in response to your writing. In some ways structurally closer to film or television than it is to theatre, in the rapidity with which it can change location, radio is also wonderful for creating drama or stories that bend reality; that open the door to hauntings, ghosts, layers of time, overlapping voices, swift changes of location, the inner world of madness or despair...
Paradoxically, however, because radio listeners are rarely giving it their undivided attention (the BBC Commissioning guidelines will tell you exactly what proportion of the audience are ironing, in the bath, washing-up or picking up the kids from school) narrative drive and story-telling must be rigorously strong and clear.
Many of our most celebrated writers have made work specifically for radio, including Angela Carter, Samuel Beckett, Tom Stoppard, Dylan Thomas, Caryl Churchill, and Harold Pinter, amongst a host of others. Equally radio has probably given a platform to more first-time writers than either television, film or theatre, owing to its relative cheapness to make, and the hunger in the schedules for new drama (a new 45 minute Afternoon Drama is aired every day, Monday to Friday on Radio 4; as well as the Saturday Drama; other slots include the 90 minute Drama on 3; the 15-minute Fact to Fiction; the five times 15 minute Woman's hour drama series various slots on Radio 4 Extra and so on.)
Aims
This module will explore the artistic and practical aspects of writing for radio. We will listen to a wide range of radio drama, and discuss the aesthetic possibilities that radio offers the writer. We will articulate some principles and useful tools for constructing a radio play; whilst also looking closely at the state of radio drama today. Much radio drama is easily and plentifully available not just on the radio but via BBC iPlayer, and the BBC Writer's Room online also provides lots of resources, scripts you can read online, advice and tutorials etc: see www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/.
Learning Outcomes
Listening and discussing radio plays will be a core aspect of the module sometimes; this will take place in the seminar itself, with focused discussion afterwards about the effectiveness of the writer's work and how certain effects were achieved. Students will also be asked to try their hand at some of these radio drama formats, and we will workshop scripts in class by reading them aloud and discussing them.