The Critic, Newspaper Radio Criticism and the Heyday of Radio

Abstract

This chapter explores how radio criticism developed during the Second World War and after, from 1939 till 1959. This was a period when radio became the dominant national media, often attracting huge audiences; indeed, the BBC, as the only legal provider of radio at this time, came out of the war with its, and radio’s, reputation enhanced (Williams 2010: 173). The war was a time of great change, socially, culturally and politically, and this led to the BBC to create new popular channels during and after, such as the Light Programme launched in 1945 (Crisell, An Introductory History of British Broadcasting (London: Routledge), 1997: 60–6). However, as will be explored, while radio has a good war, for most newspapers it was a time when, because of the rationing of newsprint, radio coverage declined. After the war radio coverage never fully returned to the amount that was there before, with the returning entertainment pages in the popular papers slowly being dominated by the coverage of television, though the quality papers continued to provide radio coverage alongside that of television.