RADIO VIEWSREEL

New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 452, 20 February 1948, Page 8

RADIO VIEWSREEL

For Fond Parents O the fond, or even to the conscientious parent, a talk on Child Psychology can nevef come amiss. To the fond it conveys the flattering unction that parenthood is a vocation as well as an indulgence of the emotional nature, and to the conscientious it seems to provide a scarlet thread of logic to guide us through the labyrinth of that rather dubious abstraction, the Child Mind. Not that any parent ever doubts that the child has a mind of its ownthe point is merely that it takes an expert to reveal its workings. Miss K. M. Hursthouse has probably earned the gratitude of many listeners for the talks she has given recently from 2YA, which

reveal her as mistress of the polished phrase and the unvarnished idea. I must confess that it was the first time I had heard the "You must eat your vegetables before you have your pudding" canon airily dismissed as a piece of vestigial Puritanism, but I always feel that the more ideas we cast into the melting pot the more raw material is made available for the manufacture of new and better ones. .

The News UR broadcasters of the news bulletins at 9.0 p.m. have set and maintained a standard that compels admiration. They have not followed the BBC custom of announcing themselves, nor do they appear as yet to have followed that not very commendable American terminology of styling themselves "newscasters." Whether they make up their bulletins themselves, or read something that is already prepared, is beyond the layman’s knowledge, but the news is free of propaganda, and does not smack of partisanship. It has also the great merit that it is brief, and to the point. And the Slips T is pleasant to receive the day's news in this manner. The news reader’s presentation in clear and concise English makes easy listening. Nor is it often dull. But one reader must have been grateful in a recent broadcast for" his cloak of anonymity. He was outlining the emergency correspondence lessons for school children. Listeners heard him say: "Children who have changed their address, or their parents, ‘should notify headmasters." I wonder how many did. : Documentary of the best documentary programmes I have heard was Radar, the first in a BBC series entitled "Science Made the Grade." Later, perhaps, when the novelty has worn off and the men themselves are degéé4, we may welcome dramatization and elaboration

of this theme. But while we can still have the cool matter-of-fact descriptions by these scientists themselves, the straight simplicity of their accounts is more vivid and telling than any dramatic production. And with the film version of the discovery of Radar for comparison, one’ can feel that this is not an idle statement. Of the two I could feel no doubt which had made the deeper impression. Yet afterwards, thinking about the radio programme, I realised there was no story there of personal difficulties and disappointment, nothing until the very end, but a typically scientific account of the development of a great invention. And this, necessarily incomplete, was rounded off by a very fine tribute to the spirit of the men involved-and to the nature and performance of the Boffin. From the Jungle T was an unadvertised inspiration that brought us on a recent Sunday evene ing the Voice of Sabu in excerpts from Kipling’s Jungle Book. Why the unfortunate Sabu, who has a strong American accent. and who uses the Anglicised mispronunciation of the Indian names, should be considered particularly~suited to lay these offerings at the shrine of Kipling is beyond me. "Excerpts" was rather an optimistic claim. A .re-hash of character and incident seems a little nearer the truth. However, the story was apparently incidental to the music. So the programme began and ended with a statement of the animals involved, each followed by an extract of well-chosen descriptive music. I thought the, python in particular a masterpiece of musical description. This alone, with a short reading from the original, would have made a very fair programme. But the series of climaxes,, each faithfully echoed by the music, was unconvincing and exhausting.