This interview was originally published in Radio Times magazine<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Like so many other people, Kirsty Young\u2019s feelings of isolation during the pandemic were somewhat diluted by the joy she took from the discovery of podcasts in all their variety. \u201cI found it a very good way to walk into other worlds otherwise excluded to us,\u201d she remembers now, affirming, \u201cI\u2019m a podcast nut, absolutely addicted to them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Which is just as well, because she\u2019s about to begin her own, with an interview series cleverly called Young Again that begins this week on Radio 4 and BBC Sounds. The host probes her subjects, gently yet forensically, for those pivotal moments that have marked their interesting lives, plus the advice they would impart to their younger selves if they could. It sounds as though it could be called Desert Island Discs \u2013 Without the Discs and will no doubt fly to the top of the audio charts.<\/p>\n

After all, unlike pretty much every other aspiring podcaster sitting at a table in their shed and shouting into their phone, Young comes with the pedigree of hosting the most prized show on British radio, where she was celebrated for eliciting defining moments of contemplation and revelation from hundreds of subjects, from David Dimbleby to Barry Manilow (I urge you to listen to the episode with war surgeon David Nott).<\/p>\n

Her interviewing skills are unequalled, yet it seems even Young was chomping at the constraints of such an established format: \u201cThe great beauty of Desert Island Discs is its format, it\u2019s why it\u2019s so good and enduring. But it is a format \u2013 you have to hit the moments, it runs for a precise time, and the discs take up a certain amount of time.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a kind of a dance, with its rules, and there were many moments when I was doing it that I thought, \u2018I want to keep talking to you, this could last for an hour.\u2019 Or, \u2018That wasn\u2019t so good, let\u2019s make it shorter.\u2019 Or, \u2018Let\u2019s just get rid of the music.\u2019 I\u2019m a communicator, I love to talk.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the great thing about broadcasting conversation \u2013 there\u2019s an intimacy to it. I love to listen to two or more interesting and interested people. It\u2019s a joyous thing. So Young Again is more of the thing I like, more free-ranging, less prescriptive, and even more like a conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n

$\"Kirsty$ \n<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n<\/div>
BBC \/ Steve Bright<\/i> <\/span>\n<\/div>\n
Will people who listen to Young Again hear the same person who once hosted Desert Island Discs? She laughs. \u201cI hope not. I very deliberately decided it was a podcast I wanted to make, not a radio show. I think the \u2018undoneness\u2019 of it, that feeling of taking your shoes off, is much closer to life.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2018, after a stellar run of 12 years, Young walked away from Desert Island Discs, a decision brought on by a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia, a chronic condition causing pain, fatigue and other symptoms. What was initially described as a temporary absence from the show became permanent and the presenter says now that making the break was a wrench.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor anybody, when you\u2019re unwell, everything else recedes. But it was very difficult, I had a lovely team I worked with, and there was a part of me that thought, \u2018If I don\u2019t do that job, do I even exist?\u2019 And I immediately realised, \u2018Of course you do, don\u2019t be such a ninny.\u2019\u201d She shrugs. \u201cIt was one of those things. It wasn\u2019t really a choice \u2013 it was what I\u2019d been told I needed to do. It didn\u2019t feel great, but the thing I was dealing with at the time felt bigger.\u201d<\/p>\n
Young is quick to say she knows she\u2019s not alone in dealing with illness and that many people have much worse to bear. There\u2019s no doubt that being married to Soho House founder Nick Jones and having two daughters and two stepdaughters, she was extremely fortunate in terms of both resources and support, but it\u2019s clear she\u2019s had her hands full, with her husband also being treated for prostate cancer in 2022. Jones recovered well but stepped down from his CEO position with Soho House, and it\u2019s plain that the pair of them are making decisions as much to do with personal fulfilment as with professional success.<\/p>\n
\u201cLife sharpens,\u201d reflects Young, now 54. \u201cIt actually gets sharper: the people I want to spend time with, how I want to spend my time\u2026 if I do work, what do I want to do? Getting older, having a period of ill health, it adds a piquancy to your decisions.\u201d<\/p>
One of the easiest decisions, it transpires, was to make a podcast. \u201cI was listening to so much stuff, I realised how much I enjoyed it. I thought, \u2018This is a new frontier, a different temperature, a different way of listening.\u2019 I don\u2019t think the world needs another podcast. I just thought I\u2019d love to be part of that. It\u2019s a bit like the Wild West right now in podcasting, and I wanted to be part of the metaphorical gold rush.\u201d<\/p>\n
Young demurs when asked who\u2019s on her wish list for guests (\u201cIf I say it and then we don\u2019t get them\u2026\u201d) but, when pressed, will admit to hoping for JK Rowling. \u201cObviously, everyone has their opinions, but a more remarkably articulate human being I think you\u2019d be hard pushed to find.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her golden rule, though, isn\u2019t to focus on the starriness of her guests, but rather their ability to communicate: \u201cSome people have had remarkable lives and experiences, but they\u2019re not so good at communicating them. It\u2019s the people who can vocalise small experiences brilliantly that can be illuminating and life-affirming.\u201d<\/p>\n
The common threads uniting the best, most moving encounters are, it seems, vulnerability and personal trial. \u201cPeople have to be willing to open up to you,\u201d says Young. \u201cYou shouldn\u2019t try to make people go where they don\u2019t want to go, not in my area of radio. But there\u2019s a point at which people allow you to go to places they wouldn\u2019t necessarily have expected. That\u2019s about them feeling you\u2019re not going to be exploitative, but you are going to try to get them to reveal something about themselves. It\u2019s a fine line.\u201d<\/p>\n
$\"Kirsty$ \n<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n<\/div>\n
As for dealing with life\u2019s trials, Young quotes Leonard Cohen\u2019s song, Anthem: \u201cThere is a crack, a crack in everything. That\u2019s how the light gets in.\u201d Adversity is, she says, \u201cwhat cracks us open and makes us grow, when we come through the really crappy bits of our life and understand a bit more about the world and about ourselves\u201d. Asking her guests about such times \u201cisn\u2019t just to get them to emote, and squeeze a tear out. It\u2019s about, \u2018Where did that take you?\u2019 It\u2019s those moments where people reveal their vulnerability. That\u2019s what makes great artists\u201d.<\/p>\n
She cites Tom Hanks on Desert Island Discs in 2016 when he was remembering listening to a track as a troubled young boy. \u201cHe talked about being in his bedroom, he chose a piece of music and I could see the rim of his eye welling up. He was back there, a lonely little guy in his room. The common thread of great interviews is when people reveal a bit of themselves, and it\u2019s usually their vulnerability.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of Young\u2019s gifts as a conversationalist is in her silences, knowing when to speak and when to keep everything zipped \u2013 is that when something special and quite revelatory comes out?<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes there is that moment. I hope it\u2019s not a glib trick, but I use it when I think, there\u2019s more. If I just sit, maybe you\u2019ll go there. Sometimes people don\u2019t, they just look right back at you. Which, I have to say, I think is totally fair. I\u2019m comfortable with silence as a person, I\u2019m comfortable with reflecting. The more people I interview, I give people a bit of space.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like an artist being confident using less paint? She nods emphatically. \u201cI remember that from doing my art A-level. My teacher told me, \u2018It\u2019s as important what\u2019s not there, as what\u2019s there.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
$\"Kirsty$ \n<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n<\/div>
Rowben Lantion\/BAFTA via Getty Images<\/i> <\/span>\n<\/div>\n
In the same way that it\u2019s significant for when big-screen stars like Nicole Kidman and Meryl Streep decide to star in television series, so Young\u2019s move to podcasting seems to signify another big radio name embracing more flexible platforms. This is something that she seems conflicted by.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis both makes me happy and sad. On the one hand, as a listener, I love programming my day and cherry-picking my favourites from the Radio 4 schedule. But I worry that those common threads when people come together are becoming fewer and further between, those moments when you can say to somebody, \u2018What about\u2026?\u2019 because they won\u2019t know what you\u2019re talking about, or they\u2019ll say, \u2018Don\u2019t tell me\u2019 because they haven\u2019t listened yet. So I think it\u2019s a shame, but I also love it. I think both of those things which is, I fear, slightly hypocritical.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her appreciation for the big, shared experience made her a natural choice to front the TV broadcast of the final hours of Queen Elizabeth II\u2019s funeral in September last year. Young\u2019s words were powerful and personal in summing up how the millions tuning in felt that day. When did she realise that she had tapped very pertinently into the collective mood?<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had all been watching so much of it,\u201d she remembers. \u201cI was up at five in the morning the day before and I thought, \u2018What is this? Why do we all care? What\u2019s happening? I\u2019ve got to say this from the heart.\u2019 I\u2019ve never watched it, I think I couldn\u2019t, but the job of a live broadcaster at that moment is to call it.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe executive in charge came out and told me, \u2018Everyone in the gallery is in tears.\u2019 And I thought, \u2018Well, I nearly was.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
With Young Again promising to revisit her guests\u2019 pivotal moments and reflect together on the difference they made to everything that followed, it seems only dutiful to ask the host for her own. Without appearing to have prepared for such a question, Young is game and replies, \u201cThe obvious one is giving birth. I probably changed everything I thought about how I would be a mother. I brought my latent perfectionism to that one, being a young mum. I would go back and tell myself, \u2018Relax, it will be fine, it will shake down, enjoy it a bit more, don\u2019t worry so much.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I\u2019d tell my younger self, \u2018Have more confidence.\u2019 When you do the sort of job I do, people think you\u2019re very confident, but I was a nervous little girl. I always had a facility to stand up and talk, but inside I was nervous and insecure. I\u2019d go back and talk to myself about that.\u201d<\/p>\n
I wonder if her recent experiences have made her more confident of knowing her own strengths, and she agrees. Looking back on her defining speech at the end of Queen Elizabeth\u2019s funeral, she says now, \u201cI thought, \u2018Why am I here doing this job? People trust me to call it.\u2019 I wouldn\u2019t have had the balls to do that before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Young Again with Kirsty Young airs on BBC Radio 4 and is available on BBC Sounds<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n
Visit our TV Guide<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0 Streaming Guide<\/a>\u00a0to find out what\u2019s on.<\/strong><\/p>\n
Try Radio Times magazine today and get 10 issues for only \u00a310, PLUS a \u00a310 John Lewis and Partners voucher delivered to your home \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>subscribe now<\/strong><\/a>. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to\u00a0<\/strong>The Radio Times Podcast<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n
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