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All my life I have read books. Starting from childhood where weekly or fortnightly visits to our local library were the norm. Both my parents were readers, as were my older Brother and Sister. Arriving at the library we would split up and go our seperate ways and follow our individual tastes.

Then my Mother would round us up and we would present our library cards and be responsible for our selections. Of course it was different when we left home for the library, scrambling around trying to find where I had put the previously borrowed books that had been discarded after reading. I was always in trouble for holding everyone up as I searched for the last missing title. Being threatened that I wouldn't be allowed to borrow any more books if I didn't organise myself better. Many was the time I found the missing book still under the covers of my bed because I had fallen asleep reading and then made my bed over the top of it the next morning. The book would have to be reborrowed so I could finish it. Yes, I was the kid who read by torchlight when a book was too good to be put down when the lights had to be turned off for my bedtime.

Perhaps it was the result of the mad rush to return the books, or more likely, having to return a book I really enjoyed, that moved me away from the library in later years to buying books and keeping them. Yes, I am a book addict and hoarder. Anybody who knows me and has been in my house, recognises that immediately. The most common furniture in many of the rooms are bookshelves and they are not empty. Nor am I the first. I have books that I have inherited from my Brother, Parents, Aunts, Grand Parents and Great Grandparents. My three children read books and my eldest daughter for some unknown reason, collects books and intends to continue my collection, though with her tastes.

My tastes are varied. I enjoy a good detective story, but scorn love stories. I laugh at comedy, but rarely indulge in Sci Fi. I soak up Australian history, particularly family histories, but ignore the histories of the rest of the world, loved by my Father. I enjoy Australian geography but rarely open up a book on other continents. I get bored by 'classics' of other cultures, but I do not ignore them entirely.

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Whilst my book tastes have broadened, they have always included the books I discovered and enjoyed in my youth, particularly those encouraged by television. Arthur Upfield and his books on Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte. Leslie Charteris and The Saint. John Creasy and The Toff, The Baron, Inspector West and Patrick Dawlish. Sapper and Bulldog Drummond. Carter Brown!! Louis L'Amour, Zane Grey, Biggles, JE MacDonnell, Charlie Chan, Dad and Dave and the list goes on and on and on.

One thing about that list. All those characters were on radio, along with tens of thousands of book adaptations, serials and series that brought those books alive. But nobody told me. Radio drama had largely finished when I was born and radio wasn't permanent like a book and couldn't be revisited, or could it?

When I first finally discovered Old Time Radio, it was like opening a box to MY past. I discovered a different way to enjoy old friends and it was like coming home because it was so familiar.

Listening to radio dramatisation is just like reading the book. The imagination is the same. Your mind provides the pictures and it provides the right ones to suit the words and the actions. Whilst the pictures will vary from one person to another as life experiences vary, your mind knows the right pictures for YOU.

For the uninitiated, who have stumbled on this website by accident or google found the titles listed above for you, I will explain how radio drama has survived.

In the early days of Australian Radio, it was a live broadcast and all that survived would have been the standard 78rpm records used to play the music of the day. Towards the end of the 1930's we started using pre recorded transcription discs. These were initially 16" discs, larger than an LP but worked the same way. The actors were recorded and the discs made and then sent to the stations to be broadcast. Later these discs became 12" and 10" and looked like standard LPs. Ads were even available on the smaller 45rpm records.

These discs were licenced to be played a set number of times and had to be returned or destroyed after broadcast. What has survived are the discs hoarded by stations or individuals and not returned or destroyed. Sadly, 95% or more were destroyed and can never be heard again more….

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On a good note, enough have survived to give us a taste of how things were. Some book dramatisations went on for hundreds of episodes, 104 was common, representing one episode a week for 2 years. So you can imagine the difficulty of complete dramatisations surviving, but it has happened.

It is my intention to introduce you to books that were dramatised for radio, particularly Australian Productions of books well-known to Australians. For non-Australians, we might be able to introduce you to authors and characters you have not yet discovered.

To kick off this series of articles, I have chosen Arthur Upfield and his Aboriginal Detective, Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte (Bony). Bony was popular beyond Australian shores and was/still is, a favourite of mine.

Ian Grieve

Hoarder