bakewell's walk-on part in bbc history

The centre of the bed by joan bakewell(hodder & stoughton, (pounds) 20)

IT was Frank Muir who dubbed Joan Bakewell "the thinking man's crumpet", unwittingly summing up the war between men and women which came to a head in the 1960s. In those days, writes Bakewell, it was still common for a woman to have to fight off men who, in Louis MacNeice's words, were determined to have "a bit of skirt in a taxi". Douglas Jay, then a member of Harold Wilson's Cabinet, had to be repelled by her, as did Sir Mortimer Wheeler, a notable scientist. On another occasion an unnamed film director told her he was in the market for a mistress. Was she interested?

Bakewell was not. Not because she was morally repelled by the idea. Quite the contrary, for as she relates here she already was in an extra-marital relationship with Harold Pinter. At the time they were both married, she to Michael Bakewell, a BBC drama producer.

The affair between Joan Bakewell and Pinter was clandestine but while her husband knew about it, Pinter's wife, Vivien, did not. Moreover, Pinter did not know that Michael Bakewell knew. When he found out seven years later he summoned Michael who told him that he, too, had been having an affair throughout the same period. Both he and Joan had decided to continue with their marriage while simultaneously seeing other people. Pinter's response was to write a play called Betrayal.

Without the story of this unconventional relationship, Bakewell's autobiography would be pretty standard fare. Born in Stockport in 1933 to parents from working-class backgrounds, her relationship with her mother was difficult. She would like, she says, to write lovingly of her mother but cannot. Her mother was a melancholic, given to long, uninterruptible silences. Bakewell grew up in her shadow, tiptoeing around her, as if in anticipation of the next expression of disapproval. Her mother demanded perfection and nothing Bakewell did was ever good enough. When she was at Cambridge her parents visited her once a term but pride and delight soon gave way to disapproval and the fear that she might bring disgrace on a family "that had fought so hard to improve its place in the world."

It is a familiar scenario, that of the child from humble origins stumbling out of the shadows. Bakewell's generation had it more difficult than most, for it had to cope with the trauma of war, the advent of the sexual revolution and the disintegration of the class system. Determined to be different, Bakewell nevertheless found herself married with a family. The BBC saved her from humdrum domesticity. Late Night Line Up, which put television under the microscope, made her name. Everyone who was anyone was interviewed by her, especially in the arts, from Stockhausen to Streisand and Simenon. It is shocking to learn that many of these historic films ended up in a skip.

Bakewell was never on the staff of the BBC; she was always freelance. This had its advantages but it also to led to a precarious existence. While she was young one commission followed another but as she got older they dried up and her programmes went out later and later.

She is especially disparaging of the Birt era, when the BBC appeared to lose sight of its purpose and chased viewing figures. Gradually the serious commitment to the arts was eroded, culminating in Bakewell's sacking as Newsnight's arts reporter. It is a situation from which the BBC has never recovered. No wonder so many broadcasters of Bakewell's era sound so disenchanted. Back then, the BBC stood for something.

Bakewell has had several decades in which to analyse her "thinking man's crumpet" label. She has come to an accommodation with herself. In the beginning it was undoubtedly sexist. Now, she says, young women ask: "What was all the fuss about?" For Bakewell, this an indication of how far women have come - "in language, attitude and behaviour" - since the 1960s. In that respect she played her part.

These days any boor after a bit of skirt in a taxi is liable to find himself pilloried in the tabloids or facing a charge of sexual harassment. Such, it seems, is progress.

Copyright 2003 SMG Sunday Newspapers Ltd.
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