Oliver Postgate
Desert Island Discs: Archive 2005-2010
BBC
4.4 • 804 Ratings
🗓️ 15 July 2007
⏱️ 39 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the animator Oliver Postgate. As the creator of Noggin the Nog, The Clangers and Bagpuss, Oliver holds a special place in many childhoods. So it may come as something of a surprise that he never thought about how his programmes would be received by children; instead he says he simply focussed on making the stories great - everything else was secondary. For 20 years he toiled in a converted pigsty in Kent, animating the characters Peter Firmin drew, churning out 120 seconds of film a day. He says a respectable average for an animation company now would be two seconds!
Oliver's own childhood was a lonely one; ignored by his busy parents and sent to an experimental school he hated. He says that to this day, he has no meaning unless he is doing something, and this is a direct legacy of his desperation to be noticed as a child.
[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]
Favourite track: When the Saints Come Marching In by Pete Fountain Book: Huge book of English Poetry Luxury: A comfortable bed.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're about to listen to a BBC podcast, but this is about something else you might enjoy. |
| 0:05.4 | My name's Katie Lecky and I'm an assistant commissioner for on demand music on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:10.7 | The BBC has an incredible musical heritage and culture and as a music lover, I love being part of that. |
| 0:17.4 | With music on sounds, we offer collections and mixes for everything, from workouts to helping |
| 0:22.7 | you nod off, boogie in your kitchen, or even just a moment of calm. And they're all put together |
| 0:28.7 | by people who know their stuff. So if you want some expertly curated music in your life, |
| 0:34.9 | check out BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Krista Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. |
| 0:41.8 | For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music. |
| 0:44.9 | The program was originally broadcast in 2007. |
| 1:09.5 | Music My castaway this week is one of Britain's best-loved animators, Oliver Postgate. |
| 1:12.0 | As the creator of Ivor the Engine, |
| 1:16.7 | Nog in the Nog and the Clangers, his films and voice have a special place at the heart of countless childhoods. Indeed, his TV series Bagpuss was only a few years ago nominated the |
| 1:22.6 | best BBC children's programme of all time. An achievement made all the more exceptional because only |
| 1:28.3 | 13 episodes were ever produced and they were made in a cow shed at a total cost of £700. |
| 1:35.1 | Yet the picture of Bagpuss conjures of a cosy sepia-tinted childhood is significantly at odds |
| 1:40.9 | with its creator's experience. Brought up largely by a series of neglectful housemaids and plonked in a progressive boarding school he hated. |
| 1:48.9 | He says, I came to regard myself as a nuisance. |
| 1:52.3 | As a result, I suffer from a basic assumption that I am wrong. |
| 1:56.5 | So this insecurity, this feeling of not quite being worthy or belonging, that began very early. |
| 2:03.2 | Oh, yes, it was almost like a sort of witch's gift. |
| 2:07.7 | I was led to believe right from the very root that somehow anything I thought of was inherently wrong. |
| 2:17.3 | Just because I thought of it. |
... |
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