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Audio Drama Modernism

The Missing Link between Descriptive Phonograph Sketches and Microphone Plays on the Radio

  • Book
  • © 2020

Overview

Authors:
  1. Tim Crook

    1. Department of Media, Communications and Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths, University of London, London, UK

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  • Offers an engaging exploration of the interplay between politics and audio modernism, questioning the role of MI5 surveillance and vetting of creative and political agitprop BBC radio features during the 1930's
  • Uniquely examines pioneering sound drama modernism of British record companies during the early 20th century
  • Provides direct links to an online archive of more than 100 audio dramas made between 1904 and 1939 that are now out of copyright

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Sound (PASTS)

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Table of contents (12 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-viii
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Introduction

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 1-9

  3. Audio Drama and Modernism: Gordon Lea 1926, the First Manifesto

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 11-26

  4. Radio Drama and the Avant-Garde: Lance Sieveking 1934, the Second Manifesto

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 27-39

  5. The Modernist Turn in Literature and Radio Studies: How It Changes Understanding of the History of Sound Drama

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 41-54

  6. Bridging Political Modernism Between Descriptive Phonographs, 1920s Political BBC Radio Drama and the 1930s Agitational Radio Features

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 55-78

  7. Modernist Phonograph Drama in a Belfast Street and a Montage on War: The Sonic Genius of Russell Hunting

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 79-86

  8. Great War Descriptive Sketches

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 87-131

  9. Angels of Mons and the Divine Service for King and Country

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 133-165

  10. Are the Sound Drama Phonographs Examples of ‘Modernist’ Propaganda?

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 167-194

  11. Reginald Berkeley: Pioneering Modernist Playwright and Political Radio Drama as Agitational Contemporaneity

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 195-246

  12. Direct BBC Censorship of Modernist Texts by D.G. Bridson and His Negotiation with Joan Littlewood and Olive Shapley of ‘Institutional Containment’

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 247-276

  13. Sound Drama as Political and Agitational Contemporaneity and Modernist Expression

    • Tim Crook
    Pages 277-289

  14. Back Matter

    Pages 291-339
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Keywords

About this book

Audio Drama and Modernism traces the development of political and modernist sound drama during the first 40 years of the 20th Century. It demonstrates how pioneers in the phonograph age made significant, innovative contributions to sound fiction before, during, and after the Great War. In stunning detail, Tim Crook examines prominent British modernist radio writers and auteurs, revealing how they negotiated their agitational contemporaneity against the forces of Institutional containment and dramatic censorship. The book tells the story of key figures such as Russell Hunting, who after being jailed for making ‘sound pornography’ in the USA, travelled to Britain to pioneer sound comedy and montage in the pre-Radio age; Reginald Berkeley who wrote the first full-length anti-war play for the BBC in 1925; and D.G. Bridson, Olive Shapley and Joan Littlewood who all struggled to give a Marxist voice to the working classes on British radio.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Department of Media, Communications and Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths, University of London, London, UK

    Tim Crook

About the author

Professor Tim Crook is an award-winning academic, playwright and journalist who specializes in investigative history projects that have social, political and cultural impact. He has been Head of Radio at Goldsmiths, University of London for 30 years, and President of the Chartered Institute of Journalists.

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Audio Drama Modernism

  • Book Subtitle: The Missing Link between Descriptive Phonograph Sketches and Microphone Plays on the Radio

  • Authors: Tim Crook

  • Series Title: Palgrave Studies in Sound

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-8241-7

  • Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Singapore

  • eBook Packages: Social Sciences, Social Sciences (R0)

  • Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2020

  • Hardcover ISBN: 978-981-15-8240-0Published: 20 November 2020

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-981-15-8243-1Published: 20 November 2021

  • eBook ISBN: 978-981-15-8241-7Published: 19 November 2020

  • Series ISSN: 2633-5875

  • Series E-ISSN: 2633-5883

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: VIII, 339

  • Topics: Social Sciences, general, Music, British Culture

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