Long Form

You might not be surprised to learn that a lot of the things I do getting ready for this programme I don't think about. I just do them automatically.

One of those unconscious habits is doing interviews differently when they're recorded than if they're live.

It's very tempting when I know an interview is being recorded to keep pushing the interviewee to think further and respond more completely.

In the past I have been guilty of making a guest sit in a studio for 25 minutes so I can get just the right quote for a  piece I'm putting together.

I once got into trouble this way with the late Robin Cook, former Foreign Secretary.

In the days he was in opposition, it was reported that he had told a friend off the record something about the Kurdish area in Iraq that fitted exactly the story I was pursuing.

I asked him the same question as politely (and in as different words) as I could for about ten minutes. Eventually, he said simply "I'm not going to say what I know you want me to say, so please stop!"

Live interviews can be exciting, and if you get the questions right can get the information you want to hear within the alloted three minutes.

But it's more satisfying to get there more carefully.

And if you take your time, you can avoid the other trap, which is only asking questions you already know the answer to.

A long interview can reach uncharted territory. Sometimes.

Comments

[Hors Sujet]

This raises a lot of points. We often expect the reporter carrying out the interview to be a neutral relayer of the interviewee's point of view, however, by carefully choosing his questions the reporter has a lot of power to put things in the other's mouth or pushing an agenda.

One of the key weakneses I see in your programme, wchich I listen to regularly, is the fact that we are often given very little background information on the people interviewed. Only today, a Palestinian official was interviewed. The listeners were told what organization he belongs to, but that doesn't really tell us a lot about him. Does he speak for a large and influencial body? Is it some kind of fringe group? An NGO of little importance? Is he representative of the opinions of a larger group of people? An influencial intelectual?

I appreciate that you do make an effort to bring us quality information, but the format of a radio programme unfortunately has certain limitations.