Denis Norden and the narrative secret

Denis Norden and the narrative secret

I grew up with BBC radio comedy: and Denis Norden and Frank Muir we among my favourite performers, in a very literary quiz called My Word. They were already – had I but known it – legendary as writers.
Late in his rather long life, DN took part in one of the 3-hour interview/compilation programmes that are the delight of Saturday morning on Radio 4 Extra, with his thoughts on radio comedy interspersed with examples, including an edition of My Word. Far more than most participants in the programmes, he talked about the thinking behind his humour.

Those older than me will remember the Glums… And that led to one of the gems of the piece, which I offer to you today. And that is that there is usually one unarticulated fact underlying a sitcom – and with the Glums, it was that Eth was ‘about as horny as it was possible to be’. Eth was the sensible fiancée of Ron, who never seemed to be playing with a full deck of cards: a predecessor of Frank Spencer in Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em.

Back in the days of the Glums, premarital sex was uncommon. To quote Norden, ‘[engaged couples didn’t do it. They knew they were going to do it, but they didn’t do it.’ If you listen to the recordings, these two facts power the whole of Ron and Eth’s relationship…

This may sound very intellectual for a writer of comedy: but, as Norden put it of the work he and Muir produced ‘we gave credit for intelligence’. And it makes me wonder if the same is true of a narrative photograph… Not just on Silly Sunday, but at any time when the image is consciously telling a story.
Answers on a postcard, please!

And I offer you a comedic treat from the programme (you may have gathered that I recorded it) – Florence Desmond was a respected and respectable music hall performer when World War Two came along, but The Deepest Shelter in Town is a remarkably risqué song that raised morale in early Forties Britain.