The Archers has gone all green on us. The world’s longest-running soap, celebrating almost 60 years on air, is known for reacting quickly to changing world events, and even managed to incorporate a bird flu storyline into its regular narrative a couple of weeks back, when the disease cropped up at a Bernard Matthews farm in Suffolk.
Now, in the wake of the UN report on climate change, the characters are starting to take the changes in our weather more seriously.
For non-UK readers, the series started out as a short run of drama programmes for farmers, designed to help them improve their land- and animal-working skills, but proved to be so popular that it soon went national, and has run ever since. It has an audience of millions, most of which have nothing to do with farming at all.
Each 12-minute episode is largely fiction-based, but it has been known to dip into ethical and slightly preachy tones from time to time, so it’s perhaps no surprise that it is not talking seriously about the effect of wasteful consumption, and the small changes we can all make to green up our lives.
The BBC sends out a summary of every episode the following day. This excerpt from last Thursday’s edition, gives you an idea of the tack it is taking:
Caroline comes across Nigel in Underwoods. He’s musing on the shirts in the shop, all of which have come from abroad. Caroline is puzzled but later Elizabeth explains about how shocked Nigel was when he found out about the impact of climate change on the beech trees. Nigel makes a decision. He tells Elizabeth he wants to give up his car and get back on his bike. She is furious, but Nigel sticks to his guns. He’s going to do it. He’ll sell the car, and they’ll cope. He’s got to start somewhere.
The Archers is broadcast every weekday at 2pm and 7pm. The 2pm episodes are repeats of the previous day’s 7pm editions, which are considered the premiers of each programme. It is also broadcast on Sunday evenings at 7pm, while for those who have missed any episodes, an omnibus of all six editions from the previous week can be heard between 10 and 11.15am on a Sunday.
Readers outside of the UK can listen to The Archers through its pages on the BBC site.
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