TURN OFF BECAUSE:

. . . if Radio 4 was interesting, there would be fewer car accidents.

Have you ever driven down a motorway with the Afternoon Play on? I have. It is aural diazepam, except that you feel suicidal as well. I’m always overcome with an urge to drive the car into the central reservation and just end it all. Perhaps it’s the sound effects: there always seems to be a grandfather clock ticking in the background, a reminder of time passing, that we’re all going to die. Perhaps it’s a thematic problem: “An academic in 1960s Prague meets an eccentric porcelain collector.” “A housewife sends audio tapes to her new pen pal on death row,” to give you two examples from this week’s schedule. I mean, what is the matter with whoever commissions these things? And why are the actors. Speaking. So. Slowly?

. . . there are too many awkward silences.

On other radio stations, dead air is considered a bad thing. When there’s an unanticipated silence, a pre-recorded tape or some music kicks in. Not on Radio 4. The dead air on Radio 4 can stretch on for what feels like minutes. It’s an intimate thing, listening to your radio. And when it goes silent for no reason, and suddenly it’s just you alone in the kitchen in a vacuum of total nothingness, either you assume that there’s been a power cut or the existential thoughts begin to take over.

. . . it’s so dated, it’s almost postmodern.

If you’ve ever wondered why The League of Gentleman have never spoofed a radio dating show from, say, 1948, it’s because Radio 4 is doing it every day.

. . . Britain is nothing like The Archers.

Change the accents in The Archers and it could be set in Poland, in Saskatchewan, anywhere. And as for that maypole dance theme tune. . . On April Fool’s Day, 2004, both The Independent and The Today Programme claimed that BBC executives had commissioned Brian Eno to record an electronic version of Barwick Green as a replacement for the current theme. Hilarious! Didn’t you just split your sides laughing with relief when you found out that, no, they were going to keep that creepy theme tune that’s typically English in the same way that The Wicker Man is English: cultish and weird?

. . . music is not frightening.

The spoken word is not drowned out if accompanied by music, at appropriate times. Desert Island Discs cuts off anything poppy after 30 seconds. And music can help a subject along. Please can somebody at the BBC take an example from National Public Radio in America? Its wonderful regular programme, This American Life, holds up a mirror to that country in the most affectionate and fascinating way. Radio 4 should reflect the cultural richness of England.

TUNE IN BECAUSE

. . . Radio 4 is grown-up broadcasting, and being grown-up has nothing to do with age.

It is patronising to devise programming for “young people” and generally doomed to failure (think of the woeful Go for It, now thankfully axed, and the frightful self-conscious whackiness of late-night comedy slots). Quality is what’s wanted, whether you’re 25 or 75. By all means improve programmes or get rid of them (goodbye, You and Yours), and lift the interactive menu, as PM has done with blogs and IPM, but chasing a demographic is fool’s gold. And anyway, since practically every other channel is full of shouty, supposedly youth-oriented sound bites, interspersed with moronic phone-ins and apparently aimed at a listener with the attention span of a flea, we should be doing everything to preserve the haven that is Radio 4.

. . . it is witty and wise.

I’m happy to indulge Sebastian Faulks and John Walsh showing off on The Write Stuff and Jeremy and Paul being funny clever-clogs on the News Quiz (and so are my twentysomething children, by the way). I love my free history lessons on the brilliant America, Empire of Liberty, the courteous, enlightening exchanges on Andrew Marr’s Start the Week, the chance to hear genius speak on Front Row: surely you don’t have to be middle-aged to be thrilled by listening to John Updike, Michael Nyman or Jeff Koons.

. . . it tells home-grown stories.

In this respect Radio 4 is unlike television, which these days has to rely on American imports such as The Wire for high-quality drama. How incredibly lucky are we to have Simon Russell Beale in The Spy Who Came in From the Cold. And all this week the beautiful, closeted, high-octane emotion of Sarah Dunant’s dramatised novel, Sacred Hearts, enhanced by specially commissioned, celestial choral music (excellent use of the licence fee). The quality of the afternoon play is patchy, admittedly, but it’s an important nursery for new writing and there are many more gems than doozies.

. . . it keeps you in touch with humanity.

From Our Own Correspondent, Crossing Continents, Costing the Earth, File on 4, World at One, The World Tonight: intelligent people asking questions on our behalf, throwing light on dark corners, holding ideas and people to account — and, crucially, giving you time to think. And, love it or hate it, The Today Programme sets the current affairs agenda for the day.

. . . Radio Four is great company.

It is a broad church — everyone is welcome — and companionable even when you’re not really listening to it. In Our Time, The Shipping Forecast, Farming Today . . . soothing, dependable, all’s-right-with-the-world punctuations to our diurnal rhythms. OK, so Saturday morning is a bit of a desert, but every relationship needs a break. And no, I don’t expect young people to tune in to The Archers — I can’t even listen to it with anyone else in the room, it’s a private indulgence. But in between the bleating of sheep and stilted dialogue, there’s always a decent plotline to reel you in: currently the monstrous Vicki luring dull Mike to the altar. It is a virtual community, like Radio Four itself, and community is a big human need.

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