Kirsty Young - ‘The great benefit of age? You give less of a f**k.’

How To Fail With Elizabeth Day

Sony Music

Society & Culture

4.8 • 9.4K Ratings

🗓️ 11 December 2024

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When I started How To Fail, I had a list of dream guests. Kirsty Young was on it. Not only because she’s one of the greatest interviewers of all time but also because her style of broadcasting (especially during her time on Desert Island Discs) is the standard I aspire to every week on this podcast. Her intelligence, warmth and ability to listen - both to what is being said and what isn’t - are what mark her apart. It was an honour to be allowed to ask her the questions for a change and a delight to spend time in her company because she’s FUNNY too. Truly, the ideal woman. We talk about her self-stated failure ‘to excite her birth father enough for him to stick around’, her failure as a quiz-show host and her failure to meditate. Along the way, we touch on her experiences interviewing the great and the good…and some who were neither. We talk about her anchoring of the late Queen’s funeral and Kirsty’s ability to sum up the mood of a nation. We discuss step-parenting, the liberation of age, clickbait, living with a chronic illness and why she wishes she’d run off with a Guatemalan tribesman (but settled for love at first sight with her husband, Nick Jones, instead). HOW TO FAIL PRESENTED BY HAYU LIVE TOUR tickets: www.fane.co.uk/how-to-fail Have something to share of your own? I'd love to hear from you! Click here to get in touch: howtofailpod.com Production & Post Production Coordinator: Eric Ryan Studio and Mix Engineer: Matias Torres Sole and John Scott Senior Producer: Selina Ream Executive Producer: Carly Maile Head of Marketing: Kieran Lancini How to Fail is an Elizabeth Day and Sony Music Entertainment Production. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts To bring your brand to life in this podcast, email [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Do you want your Christmas shopping experience to be enjoyable, stress-free and all in one place?
0:05.4	Of course you do. Well, allow me to remind you about one of my favourite shopping destinations,
0:10.9	the one and only Bista Village. Not only do they offer amazing savings in their leading fashion
0:16.1	and lifestyle boutiques, but they've added new brands such as Charlotte Tilbury, Bayreido and a Nina Bing.
0:22.4	Bista Village is in a tranquil setting in the Oxfordshire countryside with free parking if you
0:26.9	want to drive, or it's just an hour on the train from London. To get you into the holiday spirit,
0:32.2	there's also live festive music, Lynts' first chocolate bar, yum, a scent experience and festive menus at the Cotswold Guy,
0:40.6	Viro Latte and Oliphants, plus five-star services such as hands-free shopping, reserved parking,
0:47.7	and restaurants such as farm shop or Latua pasta. And until the 26th of January 2025,
0:53.3	you can enjoy up to 60% of the original price on
0:57.3	selected boutiques in the extraordinary sale. So get along to Bista Village for beautiful gifts
1:02.5	and a magical experience. T's and C's apply. Welcome to How to Fail, the podcast that treats all failure as data acquisition.
1:22.0	Before we get to our guest, I wanted to mention our subscriber podcast Failing with Friends,
1:26.5	where my guest and I answer your questions and we offer advice on some of your failures too.
1:32.1	Here's a bit of Kirsty Young.
1:34.3	Things will happen. They have their natural momentum.
1:37.8	And actually stepping back is not doing a disservice. It's actually accepting the reality of life.
1:43.5	Do join in by following the link
1:44.9	in the podcast notes and you can send me an email or look out for my callouts once a month on
1:49.4	Instagram for quickfire questions. Thank you so so much. Okay, deep breath. I'm about to interview one of the greatest interviewers of our time and a personal heroine. So, here goes.
2:09.8	Kirsty Young was nicknamed Old Man River at Sterling High School for her deep voice. Little could she have known back then that this voice
2:18.6	would become the making of her. She skipped university and took on various jobs, including
	...

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