Radio diary

Press, 25 September 1989, Page 21

Radio diary

By

JAMES HOMES

Food and what food does to us is discussed in You Are What You Eat, National Radio 8.05 this evening. This second of four 8.8. C. features looks at how natural is natural, and answers whether we should be worried about chemicals in our food. Veteran comedian Richard Briers is the paranoid Professor Leopold Nettles in "Largo Desolato” The Monday Play, Concert Programme 8 this evening. Nettles waits for the knock on the door after writing an essay that upset the authori-

ties. Vaclav Havel, himself imprisoned for four-and-a-half years for human-rights activities, wrote this dark comedy about dissent in Czechoslovakia; former Czech Tom Stoppard did the English translation. Writer Paul Theroux talks with Edward Blishen about “My Secret History,” his latest novel, in The World of Books, Concert Programme 7 tomorrow evening. The novel, described as Theroux’s most ambitious, follows the travels, development and sexual adventures of a writer. The

central character seems to have much in common with Theroux. Brilliant Australian horn-player Barry Tuckwell talks about his life and music on National Radio at 8.05 tomorrow evening. Tuckwell, unusually for a horn player, pursues a solo career, and he has his own method for the horn, arguably the most difficult orchestral instrument to play. In Barry Tuckwell: Come Blow Your Horn he chats with composer Michael Berkeley about the unique sound of the horn.

American Beat-Genera-tion patron saint Jack Kerouac features in Rebels — Standing out from their times, Concert Programme 9 Wednesday evening, the second in a three-part 8.8. C. series on those who made headlines during their lifetimes and are now seen as having made history. His novel, “On the Road,” is still having impact. Kerouac’s daughter Jan, biographer Gerald Nicosia, and friends and fellow writers Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Barry Gifford, and poet Allen Ginsberg are heard in the programme.