Authors Electric

  Sociology in story form, Victorian style... I’ve become a regular Archers fan. I’ve always known The Archers were there, and sometimes listened to the episodes. What made me a regular fan was when, four years ago, I spent 6 weeks in hospital: I’d been lent a tiny device, with earphones, and one 15-minute broadcast of The Archers caught me up out of that grim and peculiar place, where everyone was either ill or caring for the suffering, and there was no escape from the long dreary days and the impossible, noisy nights, into ‘real life’. The Archers back then led a bit more of a charmed life than they do now, and their antics, indoors, outdoors, in and out of relationships, pottering along with family and village crises which always seemed to resolve (bar Helen’s abusive relationship) lifted me right out of all that for 15 minutes twice a day. Then I kind stuck with them: since when The Archers have continued to move further into a greater ‘real life’ and are battling car...