09.09.02
Peter
Barnard
Peter
Barnard, radio editor of Radio Times and one of the architects of
the modern RT, died at home in Salcombe, Devon, on Thursday 5 September
after a short, brave battle with cancer. He was 57. His wife of
33 years, Gill, and their three daughters were with him.
Peter
was from that now dwindling elite of journalists who rose from newsroom
messenger to hold senior posts on some of the world's most famous
newspapers and magazines including The Times, the Financial Times
and the Straits Times in Singapore. He was a brilliant wordsmith,
lightning quick and sure, equally comfortable knocking others' words
into shape and fashioning pages - or writing his own stories in
his own in a crisp, rich distinctive style.
Generations of editors called for "Barnard" when they
needed a tough job done, a rescue, a redesign or a relaunch that
needed steel and flair.
I called
for Peter in 1988 when I became editor of Radio Times. A moribund
but highly lucrative black-and-white journal, Radio Times was in
crisis with the expected onslaught of competition in the TV and
radio listings market. Peter and I had been friends and colleagues
at The Times and I asked him to help us transform RT into the modern
magazine it is today. "When do I start?" he said.
A shambling,
gangly man with a wry grin, West Country burr and a deceptively
laid-back manner, he was adored by a very young team whom he led,
coached and encouraged to do some of the best work of their careers.
The lure of The Times proved too strong and he returned there but
his love affair with RT and radio saw him "jump at the chance"
to rejoin us in spring last year as our radio editor until his death.
He
was a jumble of contradictions - hardboiled yet soft-centred, fiercely
independent politically but quick to speak out against social injustice,
loyal but restless, a team player and a loner, garrulous and gregarious
yet introspective in his passion for reading and speech radio. Radio
4 was "something British and special and worth dying for,"
he once said.
Nicholas
Brett
Deputy Managing Director
Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Magazines
This
obituary will be published in Radio Times.
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