Desert Island Discs

''Desert Island Discs'' is a radio programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was first broadcast on the BBC Forces Programme on 29 January 1942.

Each week a guest, called a " castaway" during the programme, is asked to choose eight recordings (usually, but not always, music), a book and a luxury item that they would take if they were to be cast away on a desert island, whilst discussing their life and the reasons for their choices. It was devised and originally presented by Roy Plomley. Since 2018 the programme has been presented by Lauren Laverne.

More than 3,000 episodes have been recorded, with some guests having appeared more than once and some episodes featuring more than one guest. An example of a guest who falls into both categories is Bob Monkhouse, who appeared with his co-writer Denis Goodwin on 12 December 1955 and in his own right on 20 December 1998.

When ''Desert Island Discs'' marked its 75th year in 2017, ''The Guardian'' called the show a radio classic. In February 2019 a panel of broadcasting industry experts named it the greatest radio programme of all time.

Format

Guests are invited to imagine themselves cast away on a desert island, and choose eight recordings, originally gramophone records, to take with them; discussion of their choices permits a review of their life. Excerpts from their choices are played or, in the case of short pieces, the whole work. At the end of the programme they choose the one piece they regard most highly. Guests are also automatically given the '' Complete Works of Shakespeare'' and either the Bible or another appropriate religious or philosophical work. They are then prompted to select a third book to accompany them. Popular choices include Charles Dickens and Jane Austen. Actress Judi Dench, who has macular degeneration, was permitted to take an audiobook in place of a printed manuscript.

Guests also choose one luxury, which must be inanimate and of no use in escaping the island or allowing communication from outside. Roy Plomley enforced these rules strictly. He did, however, grant a special dispensation to Princess Michael of Kent, who chose her pet cat. The rules are, however, less strictly enforced today; for instance, John Cleese was allowed to take Michael Palin with him, on the condition that he was dead and stuffed. Examples of luxuries have included champagne and a piano, the latter of which is one of the most requested luxuries.

After Plomley's death in 1985, the programme was presented first by Michael Parkinson, then from 1988 to 2006 by Sue Lawley and from 2006 to 2018 by Kirsty Young. Young was replaced by 6 Music presenter Lauren Laverne, who interviewed Olympic diver Tom Daley for her first show, broadcast on 30 September 2018. Laverne was initially drafted in as an interim presenter while Young was suffering from fibromyalgia; she was appointed permanently in July 2019 when Young announced her decision not to return.

Notable guests

The first castaway was Vic Oliver, and several castaways, including Celia Johnson, Arthur Askey, Trevor Nunn, John Schlesinger, Kenneth Williams, Terry Wogan, Brian Rix, David Attenborough, John Mortimer, Adele Leigh and Stephen Fry have been cast away more than once. The most requested piece of music over the first 60 years was "Ode to Joy", the last movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. One of the most remarked broadcasts was Elisabeth Schwarzkopf's 1958 selection of seven of her own recordings. This record was subsequently beaten by British pianist Dame Moura Lympany on her second appearance on the programme on 28 July 1979 when all eight of her selections were of her own recordings. In the early 1970s, Roy Plomley attempted to interview Alistair MacLean, but mistakenly interviewed a member of the Ontario Tourist Bureau with the same name − who had never written a book. The programme was never broadcast. In January 1981, Princess Margaret appeared as a castaway on the show.

Opening theme

Plomley originally wanted the sounds of "surf breaking on a shore and the cries of sea birds" to open and close each programme. However, Leslie Prowne, the head of popular record programmes at the BBC
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