Over the years, a select few BBC radio programmes have carved out distinctive niches in the nation’s affections. High on many people’s lists of such radio treasures are probably programmes like the Archers, Desert Island Discs and, now into its second century, the Shipping Forecast. Another shoo-in member of this small and exclusive club – broadcasting’s equivalent of the Order of Merit – is surely Melvyn Bragg’s long-running Radio 4 programme In Our Time.

In Our Time embodies something fundamental to media. It is living proof that it is possible to be both serious and popular. So good was the programme, right from the start, that Lord Bragg and his guests managed to turn one of radio’s traditional “graveyard” slots – the hour after 9am on a weekday – into one of the BBC’s most enduring jewels. They did it by the simple expedient of talking interestingly about important and sometimes difficult subjects. Who would have guessed?

In Our Time is a misleading title for a programme that is as much concerned with the timeless and the........

© The Guardian