Why am I passionate about this?

John Mair is a former BBC Current Affairs Producer. He is the editor of 42 ‘hackademic’ books (mixing hacks and academics). Six of them are on the BBC. He frequently broadcasts on the topic. He is currently working on an updated collection on the privatisation of Channel Four, a tourist guide to The Inspector Morse Franchise and Oxford. My book titles are apocalyptic by design but that reflects the true state of possible existential crisis I perceive the BBC to be about to experience. I am gloomy but do not think I am wrong. Good reads if I say so myself. All are brimful of informed comments.


I wrote

The BBC at Nearly 100

By John Mair (editor),

Book cover of The BBC at Nearly 100

What is my book about?

The storm clouds gathering over the new Broadcasting House have got darker. The attacks on the Corporation grow from all…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of The War Against the BBC: How an Unprecedented Combination of Hostile Forces Is Destroying Britain’s Greatest Cultural Institution... And Why You Should Care

John Mair Why did I love this book?

The pairing of a kosher London Business School professor with a rock-solid broadcasting analysis track record and a style commentator with none. Nearly half the book is made up of footnotes and references. They build a powerful case against the right-wing (and not so right-wing) rag, tag, and bobtail who expend their intellectual effort on undermining the BBC, trying to destroy it or worse ‘defund it’. The trouble is that post-Brexit rational discussion in the UK is stilted and limited. The BBC has acquired an army of unexpected enemies. The usual suspects of friends are proving somewhat muted on this front in the Culture Wars. A hard but good read.

Much of the writing on the BBC is ill-formed opinion. Few facts. This book is partial but very solid academically. It should, but will not, put some arguments to bed. Will it ‘save’ the BBC. Watch this space.

By Patrick Barwise, Peter York,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The War Against the BBC as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

There's a war on against the BBC. It is under threat as never before. And if we lose it, we won't get it back.

The BBC is our most important cultural institution, our best-value entertainment provider, and the global face of Britain. It's our most trusted news source in a world of divisive disinformation. But it is facing relentless attacks by powerful commercial and political enemies, including deep funding cuts - much deeper than most people realise - with imminent further cuts threatened. This book busts the myths about the BBC and shows us how we can save it, before…


Book cover of Getting Out Alive: News, Sport and Politics at the BBC

John Mair Why did I love this book?

Life as a BBC Executive is like being a frog on a pond of lilies. You start off on a small lily leaf then you hop onto another get bigger ad infinitum until you either drown or become a prince. Mark Thompson is the latter. His last job was President of the New York Times, Roger Mosey is the former. He eventually ran out of BBC lilies to grace and is now head of a Cambridge College; firmly outside the tent ‘looking ‘in. His progress before had been large hops IRN Pennine Radio to BBC local radio to Network editing the World at One and Today. Then to the glamour bit TV-Editor of TV news then Head of Sport and the cherry on the cake-supremo of the 2012 London Olympics. That fortnight was the BBC at its’ supreme best. Roger was the pinnacle. From there the whole pond should have been his oyster. Not to be given a titular job as Editorial Director for the whole BBC. The frog was off the pond to the new rivers of Cambridge. This book is a good read. It was published some six years ago, Roger’s tongue has loosened since and he has become the go-to man for some of the press enemies of the BBC.

Roger provides a racy read as befits a Corporation frog. He learned the Corporation inside out by living on the pond. A friend of the BBC but a critical one.

By Roger Mosey,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Getting Out Alive as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Delinquent presenters, controversial executive pay-offs, the Jimmy Savile scandal...The BBC is one of the most successful broadcasters in the world, but its programme triumphs are often accompanied by management crises and high-profile resignations.One of the most respected figures in the broadcasting industry, Roger Mosey has taken senior roles at the BBC for more than twenty years, including as editor of Radio 4's Today programme, head of television news and director of the London 2012 Olympic coverage.Now, in Getting Out Alive, Mosey reveals the hidden underbelly of the BBC, lifting the lid on the angry tirades from politicians and spin doctors,…


Book cover of The Fun Factory: A Life In The BBC

John Mair Why did I love this book?

Will is the Kosygin of the BBC. He survived many changes of regime ending up close to the Britain Himalayan summit as Managing Director Television. Along the way, he made some good programmes and developed some innovations like using a small presentation studio to make the likes of The Old Grey Whistle Test. Later, his documentary features department in Kensington House was huge and productive. Will may have been the ace BBC politician but he was and still is very charming. I know he accosted me in the Waitrose oxford car park many years after I had left the BBC and that has led to a friendship of sorts. He is Oxford/Town Boy -through and through. A local lad whose headmaster in his Walton Manor primary school ‘helped’ him by hinting and more through the 11plus. It was up hills and career mountains from there. Will is ‘Old BBC’ I use him in my books when I want to celebrate the core values of the Corporation.

Will is a journalist at heart turned corporate politician. His book on growing up in Oxford is a cracking read.

By Will Wyatt,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Fun Factory as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A natural and indispensable second in command at the BBC for 35 years, Will Wyatt has none of the public profile or flamboyance of some media household names whose memoirs have appeared in recent years. None the less we should know about him because he had a shaping influence on BBC programmes throughout the 1990s - first as managing director of television and later as chief executive, broadcast. And he played a crucial backroom role in implementing the controversial reforms of that most revolutionary of BBC directors general, John Birt. From night shifts in the radio newsroom to pitching a…


Book cover of This New Noise

John Mair Why did I love this book?

Charlotte is a Guardian arts/feature writer whom Alan Rusbridger at the Guardian set off on a social anthropological expedition to New Broadcasting House in 2015. She was openly embraced by the then Director-General Tony Hall. It shows. What emerges is a bit too hagiographic for my liking. A Radio four listener’s view of the Corporation.

It is a snapshot of the upper reaches of the BBC with some history thrown in. Not sure she got close to the shop floor though.

By Charlotte Higgins,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked This New Noise as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A brilliantly researched and gripping history of the BBC, from its origins to the present day.

'The book could scarcely be better or better timed. It is elegantly written, closely argued, balanced, pulls no punches.'
MELVYN BRAGG, GUARDIAN

Charlotte Higgins, the Guardian's chief culture writer, steps behind the polished doors of Broadcasting House and investigates the BBC. Based on her hugely popular essay series, this personal journey answers the questions that rage around this vulnerable, maddening and uniquely British institution. Questions such as: what does the BBC mean to us now? What are the threats to its continued existence? Is…


Book cover of 1984

John Mair Why did I love this book?

Think of the book 1984, think of Room 101, and that gives you the measure of Orwell’s view of his two years on the payroll of the Corporation. Not entirely positive yet the BBC has put a statue of him outside New Broadcasting House.

By George Orwell,

Why should I read it?

51 authors picked 1984 as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU . . .

1984 is the year in which it happens. The world is divided into three superstates. In Oceania, the Party's power is absolute. Every action, word, gesture and thought is monitored under the watchful eye of Big Brother and the Thought Police. In the Ministry of Truth, the Party's department for propaganda, Winston Smith's job is to edit the past. Over time, the impulse to escape the machine and live independently takes hold of him and he embarks on a secret and forbidden love affair. As he writes the words 'DOWN WITH BIG…


Explore my book 😀

The BBC at Nearly 100

By John Mair (editor),

Book cover of The BBC at Nearly 100

What is my book about?

The storm clouds gathering over the new Broadcasting House have got darker. The attacks on the Corporation grow from all sides day by day. One of our great British cultural inventions may be in existential danger. It needs an ‘NHS moment; the Johnson government bears it ill. The question is will the BBC survive? Will the new Director-General, Tim Davie, be able to save the Corporation?

This book attempts to answer these and other questions about the BBC at 100 from a wide range of perspectives.It doesn’t duck the serious scandals that have engulfed the BBC, not least the Dianagate affair and the treatment of Cliff Richard, but it also looks at the strengths and other weaknesses of the BBC today.

Book cover of The War Against the BBC: How an Unprecedented Combination of Hostile Forces Is Destroying Britain’s Greatest Cultural Institution... And Why You Should Care
Book cover of Getting Out Alive: News, Sport and Politics at the BBC
Book cover of The Fun Factory: A Life In The BBC

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Elephant Safari

By Peter Riva,

Book cover of Elephant Safari

Peter Riva Author Of Kidnapped on Safari

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been to, and loved, North, Central, and especially East Africa for over fifty years. Only six times have I been to Africa on holiday; more often, perhaps twenty or more times, as a television producer. Working in Africa gains a perspective of reality that the glories of vacation do not. Each has its place, each its pitfalls like stalled plane rides with emergency landings in the bush or attacks by wildlife. But, in the end, the magic of the “otherness,” what an old friend called “primitava” captures one’s soul and changes your life.

Peter's book list on the otherness that few get to experience

What is my book about?

Keen to rekindle their love of East African wildlife adventures after years of filming, extreme dangers, and rescues, producer Pero Baltazar, safari guide Mbuno Waliangulu, and Nancy Breiton, camerawoman, undertake a filming walking adventure north of Lake Rudolf, crossing from Kenya into Ethiopia along the Omo River, following a herd of elephant making their annual migration.

Stumbling onto an elephant poaching, the team become embroiled in true financing of terrorism for al Shabaab –ivory sales–and are determined to stop the slaughter at any cost. Ivory trade financing terrorism involves UN refugee camps with two hundred thousand displaced Somali persons, powerful…

Elephant Safari

By Peter Riva,

What is this book about?

A documentary team hiking through East Africa collides with a gang of deadly poachers, in this gripping adventure by the author of Kidnapped on Safari.

Years of filming, extreme dangers, and daring rescues have taken their toll on documentary producer Pero Baltazar and his team. To relax and reconnect with the East African wildlife they love, Pero organizes a walking safari for him, his camerawoman Nancy Breiton, and their elite guide Mbuno Waliangulu. Still, Pero has trouble truly disconnecting from work. When the team comes across a herd of elephants making their annual migration north of Lake Rudolf, Pero decides…


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