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read to me. Since then I have been catching up!

Perhaps Madoc's best work on radio has been playing Brother Cadfael, the medieval sleuth created by Ellis Peters. These three serials were produced in the 1990s and were adapted by one of the best in the business, Bert Coules. The first two of these featured the late Sir Michael Hordern as narrator, while the third, presumably done after Sir Michael's death, was narrated by Michael Kitchen. All three are gems of the radio adapter's art and have been repeated on BBC7 several times. I don't know why no more were done at the time, but I do wish the BBC would now consider recording some of the later books in the series.

I have seen some of the excellent television versions starring Sir Derek Jacobi but comparison between him and Madoc wouldn't be fair; the mediums are so different. I don't know why people generally don't listen to radio drama. If it is because they think of it as a more limited medium then they should think again. Radio has fewer limits as more can be left to the listener's imagination and thus adaptations can be much more like the story than those written for television. Having said that, some scenes are all but impossible. The scene in Waiting for Godot' where the two tramps repeatedly swap a hat between them is impossible to adapt for radio without changing Beckett's text or resorting to a running commentary by a narrator. With such a classic play, changing the text is probably out of the question.

I have heard actors talk about radio drama and how much harder it is. All emotions have to be shown through the voice. That requires a considerable actor.

Learn more about this author, Brian Stephenson.
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