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Melvyn Bragg

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The Right Honourable
The Lord Bragg
CH HonFRS FRSL FBA
Official portrait, 2017
Born (1939-10-06) 6 October 1939 (age 85)
Carlisle, Cumberland, England
Alma materWadham College, Oxford
Occupations
  • Broadcaster
  • presenter
  • interviewer
  • commentator
  • novelist
  • screenwriter[1]
Years active1961–present
Notable workIn Our Time
TelevisionThe South Bank Show
Political partyLabour
Spouses
Marie-Elisabeth Roche
​
​
(m. 1961; died 1971)​
​
​
(m. 1973; div. 2018)​
Gabriel Clare-Hunt
​
(m. 2019)​
Children3; including Marie-Elsa
Melvyn Bragg's voice
Recorded May 2013 from the BBC Radio 4 programme Front Row

Melvyn Bragg, Baron Bragg (born 6 October 1939) is an English broadcaster, author and parliamentarian.[2] He is the editor and presenter of The South Bank Show (1978–2010, 2012–2023), and the presenter of the BBC Radio 4 documentary series In Our Time.[3]

Earlier in his career, Bragg worked for the BBC in various roles including presenter, a connection that resumed in 1988 when he began to host Start the Week on BBC Radio 4. After his ennoblement in 1998, he switched to presenting the new In Our Time,[4] an academic discussion radio programme, which has run to more than one thousand broadcast editions and is also a podcast.[3] He served as Chancellor of the University of Leeds from 1999 until 2017.[5][6]

Early life

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Bragg was born on 6 October 1939 in Carlisle,[7] the son of Stanley Bragg, a stock keeper turned publican, and Mary Ethel (née Park), who worked alongside her husband in the pub.[8] Both the Braggs and Parks, Cumberland families, were agricultural labourers, also working at collieries and in domestic service.[9] He was given the name Melvyn by his mother after she saw the actor Melvyn Douglas at a local cinema.[10] He was raised in the small town of Wigton,[10] where he attended the Wigton primary school[11] and later The Nelson Thomlinson Grammar School,[7] where he was Head Boy.[10] He was an only child, born a year after his parents married. His father was away from home serving with the Royal Air Force for four years during the war. His upbringing and childhood experiences were typical of the working-class environment of that era.[10]

When he was a child, he was led to believe that his mother's foster mother was his maternal grandmother. His grandmother had been forced to leave the town owing to the stigma of her daughter being born illegitimately.[10] From the age of 8 until he left for university, his family home was above a pub in Wigton, the Black-A-Moor Hotel, of which his father had become the landlord.[10] Into his teens he was a member of the Scouts and played rugby in his school's first team.[10] Encouraged by a teacher who had recognised his work ethic, Bragg was one of an increasing number of working-class teenagers of the era being given a path to university through the grammar school system.[10] He read Modern History at Wadham College, Oxford, in the late 1950s and early 1960s.[9]

Career

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Broadcasting

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Bragg began his career in 1961 as a general trainee at the BBC.[7] He was the recipient of one of only three traineeships awarded that year.[10] He spent his first two years in radio at the BBC World Service, then at the BBC Third Programme and BBC Home Service.[12] He joined the production team of Huw Wheldon's Monitor arts series on BBC Television.[12] He presented the BBC books programme Read All About It (and was also its editor, 1976–77)[7] and The Lively Arts, a BBC Two arts series.[13] He then edited and presented the London Weekend Television (LWT) arts programme The South Bank Show from 1978 to 2010.[14] His interview with playwright Dennis Potter shortly before his death is regularly cited as one of the most moving and memorable television moments ever.[15] His interest in popular music as well as classical is credited with making the arts more accessible and less elitist.[15]

He was Head of Arts at LWT from 1982 to 1990 and Controller of Arts at LWT from 1990. He has made many programmes on BBC Radio 4, including Start the Week (1988 to 1998),[16] The Routes of English (mapping the history of the English language), and In Our Time (1998 to present), which in March 2011 broadcast its 500th programme. Bragg's pending departure from the South Bank Show was portrayed by The Guardian as the last of the ITV grandees, speculating that the next generation of ITV broadcasters would not have the same longevity or influence as Bragg or his ITV contemporaries John Birt, Greg Dyke, Michael Grade and Christopher Bland.[17]

In 2012 he brought The South Bank Show back to Sky Arts 1.[18] In December 2012, he began The Value of Culture, a five-part series on BBC Radio 4 examining the meaning of culture, expanding on Matthew Arnold's landmark (1869) collection of essays Culture and Anarchy.[19] In June 2013 Bragg wrote and presented The Most Dangerous Man in Tudor England, broadcast by the BBC. This told the dramatic story of William Tyndale's mission to translate the Bible from the original languages to English. In February 2012, he began Melvyn Bragg on Class and Culture, a three-part series on BBC2 examining popular media culture, with an analysis of the British social class system.[20] Bragg appeared on the Front Row "Cultural Exchange" on May Day 2013. He nominated a self-portrait by Rembrandt as a piece of art which he had found especially interesting.[21] In 2015, Bragg was appointed as a Vice President of the Royal Television Society.[22]

Writing

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Having produced unpublished short stories since the age of 19, Bragg had decided to become a writer after university. He recognised that writing would not, initially at least, earn him a living, and he took the opportunity at the BBC that arose after he had applied for posts in a variety of industries.[10] While at the BBC, he continued writing. Publishing his first novel in 1965, he decided to leave the BBC to concentrate full-time on writing.

A novelist and writer of non-fiction, Bragg has also written a number of television and film screenplays. Some of his early television work was in collaboration with Ken Russell, for whom he wrote the biographical dramas The Debussy Film (1965) and Isadora Duncan, the Biggest Dancer in the World (1967), as well as Russell's film about Tchaikovsky, The Music Lovers (1970). Most of Bragg's novels are autobiographical fictions, set in and around the town of Wigton during his childhood.[10] In 1972, he co-wrote the script for Norman Jewison's film Jesus Christ Superstar (1973). Although Bragg published several works, he was unable to make a living, forcing a return to television by the mid-1970s.[10]

Bragg received a variety of reviews for his work, some critics declaring it outstanding and others suggesting it was lazy. Many suggested that splitting his time between writing and broadcasting was detrimental to the quality, and that his media profile and his known sensitivity to criticism made him an easy target for unjust reviews. The Literary Review's prize mocking his writing of sex in fiction, according to The Independent, was awarded not on readers' nominations, but simply because it would be good PR.[23] From 1996 to 1998 he also wrote a column in The Times newspaper; he has also occasionally written for The Sunday Times, The Guardian and The Observer.[11]

Peerage

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Bragg's friends include the former Labour Party leaders Tony Blair and Neil Kinnock, and former deputy leader Roy Hattersley.[11] He was one of 100 donors who gave the Labour Party a sum in excess of £5,000 in 1997, the year the party came to power under Blair in the general election.[24] The following year he was appointed by Blair to the House of Lords as the life peer Baron Bragg, of Wigton in the County of Cumbria,[25][26] one of a number of Labour donors given peerages. This led to accusations of cronyism from the defeated Conservative Party.[24]

In the Lords he takes a keen interest in the arts and education.[10] According to The Guardian in 2004, he voted 104 times out of a possible 226 in the 2002/3 session, only once against the government, on the Hunting Act.[11] He campaigned against it on the grounds that it could affect the livelihoods of Cumbrian farmers.[27] In August 2014, Bragg was one of 200 public figures who signed a letter to The Guardian opposing Scottish independence in the run-up to September's referendum on that issue.[28]

Advocacy

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Bragg has defended Christianity, particularly the King James Bible, although he does not claim to be a believer, seeing himself in Albert Einstein's term as a "believing unbeliever", adding that he is "unable to cross the River of Jordan which would lead me to the crucial belief in a godly eternity."[29] In 2012, Bragg criticised what he claimed to be the "Animus and the ignorance" of the atheism debate.[30]

In August 2016, Bragg publicly accused the National Trust of "bullying" in its "disgraceful purchase" of land in the Lake District, which could threaten the Herdwick rare breed of sheep as well as the Lake District's historic farming system, for which the region was nominated as a Unesco World Heritage site.[31][32]

Personal life

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In 1961[7] Bragg married his first wife, Marie-Elisabeth Roche b. 1939), and in 1965 they had a daughter, Marie-Elsa Bragg.[33] Roche was a French viscountess studying painting at Oxford.[10] In 1971, Roche died by suicide.[34] In an interview with The Guardian in 1998, Bragg said, "I could have done things which helped and I did things which harmed. So yes, I feel guilt, I feel remorse."[35] This was in part a reference to his infidelities which included Cate Haste, whom he married in 1973.[7][36] She was also a television producer and writer, whose literary work includes editing the 2007 memoir of Clarissa Eden, widow of Anthony Eden, and collaborating with Cherie Booth, wife of Tony Blair, on a 2004 book about the wives of British prime ministers. They had a son and a daughter.[37]

In June 2016 it was reported that Bragg and Haste had separated amicably, and that Bragg now shared a home with former film assistant Gabriel Clare-Hunt, with whom he had an affair that began in 1995. She is 16 years younger than him.[34] The marriage between Haste and Bragg was dissolved in 2018 and Haste died in April 2021.[38][39] Another reported affair was with Lady Jane Wellesley between 1979 and 1987.[34]

In September 2019 he married Clare-Hunt at St Bega's Church in Bassenthwaite, part of the Lake District National Park. His eldest daughter, Marie-Elsa, a priest, conducted the service. His second daughter, Alice, read a lesson, while his son, Tom, was an usher. Guests included Cumbrian mountaineer Chris Bonington and the ceremony featured the premiere of music specially written by Bragg's friend, composer Howard Goodall.[37][40]

Bragg has publicly discussed two nervous breakdowns that he has suffered, one in his teens and another in his 30s.[41] His first breakdown began at the age of 13. Inspired by a passage in Wordsworth's The Prelude, he found ways to cope, including exploring the outdoors and the adoption of a strong work ethic, as well as meeting his first girlfriend.[10] The second followed his first wife's suicide.[15] He traces the origin of a lifelong nervousness of public speaking to the experience of giving a reading from the lectern as a choirboy at the age of six.[10]

At the age of 75, he was profiled in the BBC Two television programme Melvyn Bragg: Wigton to Westminster, first broadcast on 18 July 2015. He lives in Hampstead, London,[15] but still owns a house near his home town of Wigton.[10] He is a member of the Garrick and Chelsea Arts clubs.[15][37]

He also takes an interest in football, supporting both Carlisle United[42] and Arsenal.[43] He is the vice president of the Carlisle United Supporters Club London Branch.[44]

Bragg is a relative of William Henry Bragg and his son Lawrence Bragg, who were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1915 for their work in x-ray crystal structure analysis. He presented a Radio 4 programme on the subject in August 2013.[45][46]

Positions and memberships

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Awards and honours

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Literary prizes
Film & television awards
  • Broadcasting Guild Award (1984)
  • British Academy of Film and Television Arts Dimbleby Award (1986)[7]
  • BAFTA TV Award for An Interview with Dennis Potter (1995)
  • BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award (2010)[54]
  • Best New Radio Series for Routes of English (2000)[11]
  • Royal Television Society Lifetime Achievement Award (2015)
  • Sky Arts Awards Lifetime Achievement Award (2024)
Other awards

Bibliography

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Novels

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  • For Want of a Nail (1965)
  • The Second Inheritance (1966)
  • Without a City Wall (1968)
  • The Cumbrian Trilogy:
  • The Nerve (1971)
  • Josh Lawton (1972)
  • The Silken Net (1974)
  • Autumn Manoeuvres (1978)
  • Love and Glory (1983)
  • The Maid of Buttermere (1987) (based on the life of Mary Robinson)
  • A Time to Dance (1990)
  • Crystal Rooms (1992)
  • Credo (1996) also known as The Sword and the Miracle
  • The Soldier's Return Quartet:
    • The Soldier's Return (1999)
    • A Son of War (2001)
    • Crossing the Lines (2003)
    • Remember Me... (2008)
  • Grace and Mary (2013)
  • Now is the Time (2015)
  • Love Without End: A Story of Heloise and Abelard (2019)

Non-fiction books

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  • Speak For England (1976)
  • Land of The Lakes (1983)
  • Laurence Olivier (1984)
  • Cumbria in Verse (editor) (1984)
  • Rich: The Life of Richard Burton (1988)
  • The Seventh Seal (Det Sjunde Inseglet) (1993)
  • King Lear in New York (1994)
  • On Giants' Shoulders (1998)
  • Two Thousand Years Part 1: The Birth of Christ to the Crusades (1999)
  • Two Thousand Years Part 2 (1999)
  • The Routes of English (2001)
  • The Adventure of English (2003)
  • 12 Books That Changed the World (2006)
  • In Our Time: A Companion to the Radio 4 series (editor) (2009)
  • The Book of Books (2011)
  • William Tyndale: A Very Brief History (2017)
  • In Our Time: Celebrating Twenty Years of Essential Conversation (2018)
  • Back In The Day. A Memoir (2022)

Children's books

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  • A Christmas Child (1977)
  • My Favourite Stories of Lakeland (editor) (1981)

Screenwriting

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References

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  1. ^ a b "Lord Bragg of Wigton FRS FRSL FRTS". British Academy. Archived from the original on 12 January 2012. Retrieved 4 October 2011. Public understanding of the arts, literature and sciences. Broadcaster, presenter, interviewer, commentator, novelist, scriptwriter.
  2. ^ Sherwin, Adam (25 March 2013). "Melvyn Bragg calls on new BBC boss to reverse 'shrinking arts coverage'". The Independent. London. Archived from the original on 12 May 2022. Retrieved 25 April 2013.
  3. ^ a b Bragg, Melvyn (2023). "In Our Time's 1000th episode: The presenter reveals why his favourite subjects are the ones he knows nothing about and says hosting the series is "nothing but a pleasure"". bbc.co.uk. "You can't learn everything at school
  4. ^ Hepworth, David (2 March 2013). "In Our Time: Melvyn Bragg's superior radio masterclass". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 25 April 2013.
  5. ^ "Lord Bragg of Wigton (born 1939)". leeds.ac.uk. University of Leeds. Retrieved 28 July 2023.
  6. ^ Gillen, Nancy. "Chancellor Melvyn Bragg to officially reopen Edward Boyle Library on 13 July". University of Leeds. Retrieved 28 July 2023.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Quicke, Andrew. "Melvyn Bragg". Encyclopedia of Television. Museum of Broadcast Communications. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
  8. ^ Bragg, Melvyn (2022). Back In The Day. A Memoir. London: Sceptre. ISBN 9781529394467.
  9. ^ a b Barratt, Nick (11 August 2007). "Family detective: Melvyn Bragg". The Telegraph. London. Archived from the original on 12 January 2022. Retrieved 8 April 2013.
  10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Melvyn Bragg: Wigton to Westminster, BBC Two, 18 July 2015
  11. ^ a b c d e f g The Guardian profile: Melvyn Bragg, The Guardian, Steven Morris, 17 September 2004
  12. ^ a b Article by Melvyn Bragg in British Mensa Magazine, January 2002, p. 7.
  13. ^ Bignell, Jonathan (2012). Beckett on Screen: The Television Plays. Manchester University Press. ISBN 978-0719064210.
  14. ^ "ITV Fact File on The South Bank Show". Itv.com. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
  15. ^ a b c d e Blackhurst, Chris (13 June 2014). "Melvyn Bragg: A Northern hero in our time". The Independent. London.
  16. ^ Simon Elmes, And Now on Radio 4: A Celebration of the World's Best Radio Station, London: Random House Books, 2007, pp. 72–73.
  17. ^ Dowell, Ben (6 May 2009). "Melvyn Bragg, last of the ITV grandees". The Guardian.
  18. ^ Dowell, Ben (25 March 2013). "Melvyn Bragg expected to stay with Sky Arts for two more years". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 25 April 2013.
  19. ^ "The Value of Culture". Folksonomy. 4 January 2013. Retrieved 4 January 2013.
  20. ^ "Melvyn Bragg on Class and Culture", bbc.co.uk. Retrieved 3 April 2014.
  21. ^ "Images for Melvyn Bragg's Cultural Exchange". BBC News. Retrieved 12 June 2013.
  22. ^ "Royal Television Society announces new appointments". rts.org.uk. 24 February 2016. Retrieved 6 April 2017.
  23. ^ Profile: A time to dance back to Cumbria?: Melvyn Bragg, cultural supremo in a crisis, The Independent, 27 November 1993
  24. ^ a b ""Luvvies" for Labour". BBC News. 30 August 1998.
  25. ^ Minutes and Order Paper – Minutes of Proceedings from the House of Lords, 28 October 1998.
  26. ^ "No. 55222". The London Gazette. 11 August 1998. p. 8731.
  27. ^ "Bragg battles for hunting reprieve". BBC News. 11 January 2001. Retrieved 17 July 2015.
  28. ^ "Celebrities' open letter to Scotland – full text and list of signatories". The Guardian. London. 7 August 2014. Retrieved 26 August 2014.
  29. ^ Melvyn Bragg (11 June 2011). "Melvyn Bragg: My first steps back on the road to faith". The Daily Telegraph. London. Archived from the original on 12 January 2022.
  30. ^ Ward, Victoria (14 March 2012). "Melvyn Bragg attacks Richard Dawkins' 'atheist fundamentalism'". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 16 March 2012. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  31. ^ Press Association (30 August 2016). "Melvyn Bragg accuses National Trust of bullying in farm row". The Guardian. Retrieved 1 September 2016.
  32. ^ "Lord Bragg attacks 'mafia style' National Trust over Lake District land purchase". The Telegraph. 30 August 2016. ISSN 0307-1235. Archived from the original on 12 January 2022. Retrieved 16 September 2020.
  33. ^ Guinness, Daphne (14 July 2008). "Melvyn in the Middle". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 14 July 2008. ...my first wife was an aristocrat. I didn't know that for a year.
  34. ^ a b c "Melvyn Bragg leaves wife to move in with woman 16 years his junior'". The Daily Telegraph. 20 June 2016. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  35. ^ Burkeman, Oliver (6 June 2005). "Plato or Nietzsche? You choose". The Guardian. Manchester. Archived from the original on 9 November 2012.
  36. ^ Billen, Andrew (13 July 2024). "Interview with Melvyn Bragg: my suicidal thoughts, infidelity and regrets". www.thetimes.com. Retrieved 13 July 2024.
  37. ^ a b c "Bragg, Baron, (Melvyn Bragg) (born 6 Oct. 1939)". WHO'S WHO & WHO WAS WHO. 2007. doi:10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.u8507. ISBN 978-0-19-954088-4. Retrieved 5 May 2021.
  38. ^ "Cate Haste, writer and TV producer whose projects explored among other subjects the role of women in the 20th century – obituary". The Telegraph. 6 May 2021. ISSN 0307-1235. Archived from the original on 12 January 2022. Retrieved 19 May 2021.
  39. ^ Pick, Hella (7 May 2021). "Cate Haste obituary". The Guardian. Retrieved 19 May 2021.
  40. ^ Lytollis, Roger (21 September 2019). "Melvyn Bragg gets married at Bassenthwaite". News and Star. Retrieved 5 May 2021.
  41. ^ Guinness, Daphne (14 June 2008). "Melvyn in the middle". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
  42. ^ "Melvyn Bragg: 'I Remember'". Reader's Digest.
  43. ^ Bragg, Melvyn (17 May 2009). "Melvyn Bragg on becoming a fan – Arsenal, 1989". The Guardian. London.
  44. ^ "LONDON BRANCH: Hit The Bar issue 300 out this weekend". Carlisle United F.C. Official Site. 26 April 2018.
  45. ^ Garner, Louise (2 March 2017). "Bragg on the Braggs". www.leeds.ac.uk. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  46. ^ "BBC Radio 4 – Bragg on the Braggs". BBC. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  47. ^ "Cumbria's Modern-Day Authors". Sally's Cottages. Retrieved 13 March 2020.
  48. ^ "Honorary Fellows of the Royal Society". Royalsociety.org. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
  49. ^ "2010 | University of Cumbria". www.cumbria.ac.uk. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  50. ^ "UCL Honorary Graduands and Fellows 2014". UCL News. 11 September 2014. Retrieved 16 November 2019.
  51. ^ "Friends of the British Library Annual Report 2006/07" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 April 2010. Retrieved 7 September 2009.
  52. ^ "No. 62150". The London Gazette (Supplement). 30 December 2017. p. N26.
  53. ^ "Crossing the Lines | The Booker Prizes". thebookerprizes.com. 9 June 2003. Retrieved 6 August 2024.
  54. ^ "Melvyn Bragg to receive BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award". BBC News. 1 June 2010.
  55. ^ "Bragg opens namesake drama suite". BBC News. 17 October 2005. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
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Academic offices
Preceded by Chancellor of the University of Leeds
1999–2017 		Succeeded by
Orders of precedence in the United Kingdom
Preceded by Gentlemen
Baron Bragg 		Followed by
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