Powerful prose

To the British Academy last week for a heartening prizewinning ceremony. No gongs, no red carpet, no dangerous stilettos on this occasion — not even a fabulous cheque to dole out to the winners. But instead tributes (and modest money) to the work of two writers — Adam Beeson and Stephen Wyatt — who have crafted original work for radio. The prizes are given each year in memory of two great radio men, the comic writer Peter Tinniswood, who made his name on TV but transferred, and the script editor and drama guru Richard Imison, who brought so many great writers over to the listening medium including Samuel Beckett, Ludmilla Petrushevskaya, Tom Stoppard and Harold Pinter. The modesty of the annual event belies the significance of these prizes, one of the few to promote and praise the skills involved in developing scripts for broadcast. Without visual props, writers have to work doubly hard to think up an imagined scenario and then make it real.