Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive.

For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

The program was originally broadcast in 2001, and the presenter was Sue Lolly. My castaway this week is a writer and countryman. He was educated, he says, in the library, because it was as a reference librarian after he left school that he immersed himself in 17th and 18th century literature. He wrote short stories and

poetry and then more than 30 years ago the book which made his reputation.

It's called Aikenfield, an imaginary name, but a real enough place.

He interviewed people in the part of Suffolk in which he still lives, editing their memories

and observations to create a complete and beautifully observed picture of English rural life.

As Aikenfield has become a classic,

so its author has become this country's literary custodian

of its rural values.

The English year goes round, he says, marking our lives

and doing far more than politics to shape our national characteristics. He is Ronald

Blythe. Are we still so influenced are you saying Ronald even in this sort of urbanized technological 21st century by what you call the English year?

We would like to be, it's a longing to be influenced, and I think we are influenced to a great degree by the

pattern of the year, perhaps because of the seasons in England which are very defined.

The winter and springs and autumn is very distinctive.

But I think there is a hanging on, really, to the shape of life as it used to be.

People want the old village life and they do find it in certain

institutions, shall we say the church or a little church school or something like that or in certain societies,

particularly bellying societies and horticultural societies.

When these things occur, the old thing comes back with a rush.

Do you think people come to the countryside, they come and try and live in the countryside

...