Charles Explorer logo
🇬🇧

Important Jubilees and Radio Bedtime Story

Publication at Faculty of Humanities |
2018

Abstract

This paper deals with children's radio broadcasts and tries to point out the development of radio bedtime stories in the 1960s. The paper also discusses the history of Czechoslovak radio which was affected by the radio show Good Night, Children.

At the beginning of the 60s, the radio experienced a wave of liberalization which brought about the introduction of new programs and innovations in broadcasting. In 1960 a group of editors from the Children and Youth Editorial Board demonstrated an effort to introduce a new type of programme genre - a modern fairy tale.

As a result of this initiative, the new show called Good Night, Children was created in January 1961. It represented a hallmark of quality and modern style.

Its content comprised short fairy tales by known and emerging writers which were read by leading Czech actors and actresses. The popularity of fairy tale radio bedtime stories was exhibited both by high listener ratings, as well as large amount of letter responses from children and their parents.

The focus of this paper is analysis of socialist calendar and radio bedtime story, how the socialist calendar was reflected in the radio bedtime between 1963 and 1967. This part focuses on anthropological interpretation of the way how holidays, anniversaries and jubilees were reflected in the content of fairy tales in the monitored period.