Radio Diary

Press, 3 November 1986, Page 17

Radio Diary

The late readings on the National programme this week (Monday to Thursday, 10.40 p.m.) are from the novel, “Falstaff,” adapted and performed by David Buck. , Robert Nye’s first novel, “Falstaff” won the Hawthornden Prize and the ' Guardian Fiction Prize and when performed as a play in London it received rave reviews.

The novel fleshes out (so to speak) the life of the jolly, fat knight created by Shakespeare. Sir John, in his 81st year, presents his unexpurgated memoirs and looks back on a life of fighting, feasting, drinking and wenching. . “Plato’s Republic” on Concert at 9.00 today is the first part of a threepart 8.8. C. dramatisation of Plato’s classic of philosophy, sociology and politics.

The “Republic” written more than 2000 years ago, is one of the masterpieces of world literature and is

Still a starting point for studies in philosophy, ethics, sociology and politics. Plato expounds his ideas through Conversation between Socrates and some young friends. Socrates sets out to examine the nature of justice, happiness and goodness. From the nature of man he is led to the nature of the state and a plan for the ideal republic. In this adaptation Socrates is played by Leo McKern, whose performance was described in a review in “The Times” as “a masterly blending of authority, wit, irony, flexibility, humanity and — at the root of it all — humility.”

Part two can be heard at the same time next Monday.

The second-last programme in William Southgate’s series, “The

Sound Processor (Concert, 7.30 this evening) is titled “Footnotes”'and focuses on music in dance.

Barry Gustafson, the biographer of Michael Joseph Savage, New Zealand’s first Labour. Prime Minister, is . interviewed by Neville Glasgow, in “From the Cradle to the Grave” (Concert, Wednesday, 9.00 p.m.). In this, the first part of a two-part programme, Savage’s life, from his Australian origins to his electoral victory and the creation of the welfare State, is dealt with. Rugby: The All Blacks face yet another French Selection at Bayonne in their warm-up before the week-end’s first test. A live commentary by John Mcßeth can be heard on the YC network at 8.00 a.m. on Wednesday. —John Hickey.