Eratosphere - Speccie Competition Lines on the Beeb

Bazza is his usual excelent self, but I must say I give MY cigar to Adrian Fry.

Lucy Vickery 31 May 2014
In Competition No. 2849 you were invited to submit a poem in praise or dispraise of the BBC. The entry felt a bit flat this week and you seemed to be lacking in any real conviction either way. Roger Theobald’s opening lines pretty much reflected the general mood: ‘To praise or dispraise: well, if that’s the question,/ The record is too mixed to be quite sure.’ An honourable mention goes to Jerome Betts for his pithy four-liner. Basil Ransome-Davies romps home with the extra fiver and the rest pocket £30 each.

I always treasured Auntie. She was such a damn good sport.
Thanks to BBC steam wireless I was entertained and taught.
She had lofty Reithian standards and she never sold them short,
But Auntie isn’t quite herself these days.

We had ITMA kicking Hitler with a touch of the absurd;
We had talks and foreign music on the high-falutin’ Third;
The Home Service kept us civil. Public service was the word.
Don’t Aunties love to cling to settled ways?

Then the market, brute and powerful, came along with shark-sharp teeth.
It was build the corporate profile now, forget the dreams of Reith.
You want to mourn the Beeb that was? Just leave a funeral wreath
(Forgetting Jimmy Savile, if you please).

What’s left after the scandals, the largesse, the Birtist blight?
A micro-managed omnishambles, scorned by left and right,
Whose populist agenda — keep it simple, safe and light —
Is eating umpteen million licence fees.
Basil Ransome-Davies

When I have fears that it might cease to be,
Culled by some spineless vengeful government
Whose plot to sabotage the licence fee
Turns on the argument of how it’s spent;
When I fear ‘public service’ thrown away,
Sold to the dodgiest bidder with a taste
For game shows, adverts, chatter, everyday
Endless banality, good gone to waste;
That’s when I cling to Rev and Radio 3,
Today, the shipping forecast, In Our Time,
Programmes in depth on art and history,
Even the drenching gloom of Scandi-crime,
And trust for all its faults the BBC
Can hang on and see out the century.
D.A. Prince

These tribute lines are hard to write. The reason — simply this:
That while my thoughts are thus engaged I’m rueing all I’ll miss,
There’s Radio 4 and Woman’s Hour, the Play this afternoon
And, even worse, tonight’s TV, unless I finish soon.
I’m keen to laud the BBC and render praise in rhyme
But not to forfeit listening hours or precious viewing time;
I need to follow Eggheads, watch whatever follows on,
Then catch up on EastEnders (not the same with Lucy gone).
Of global fame and world renown, the matchless BBC
Has, from the days of Mrs Dale, meant all the world to me,
The shipping forecast bids me sleep and wakes me with a smile
And all that’s broadcast in between makes living life worthwhile.
What other service meets the mark with programmes guaranteed
To entertain, inform, delight and answer every need?
There’s more to praise but, having toiled beyond the watershed,
It’s almost time for Newsnight now. Take further praise as read!
Alan Millard

Paedophile scandals execs try to shake off,
Vacuous programmes like Strictly and Bake-Off,
Wittering airheads on Radio Three —
I say let’s close down the whole BBC.

Cokeheads from Hoxton, their salaries hefty,
Greenlighting comics as long as they’re Lefty.
Chaps in Compliance reacting with glee —
I say we wind up the damned BBC.

Camp antique dealers and chefs sporting dickies,
Stripped across daytime to occupy thickies.
In primetime, car chases from CCTV —
I say let’s put down the poor BBC.

News that’s now ninety per cent speculation,
Severance schemes that are pure peculation,
Digital channels no one wants to see —
Stop it all, gentlemen; make me DG.
Adrian Fry

Poor Auntie’s reputation
Is trampled in the dirt,
With media accusations
Of hiding shame and hurt
And paying tons of money
To those who did the least,
In fact she looks as tawdry
As a pier-end show artiste.

But still she educates us
In science and the arts,
With drama and true stories
She’ll move our minds and hearts,
So no matter what has happened
Within the BBC
Of all the world’s broadcasters
She’s still the one for me.
Katie Mallett