Joy and pain
The fiendish quiz can be unnerving but great fun, says stalwart team player Val McDermid
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- Radio Time Staff
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Back when the world was young, I used to have a 45-minute commute to work. On my way in, I’d play music and think about the book I was struggling to write, sometimes rehearsing scenes aloud as I drove. But in the evening came the reward; the 6.30pm slot on Radio 4. My favourite of those early evening shows was Round Britain Quiz.
I was a confirmed quizzer – it all began with Top of the Form on TV when I was 14 and selected to represent my school. I’ve been an ardent member of pub quiz teams; I once was barred from my local pub after complaining (correctly) that the answer given had been wrong. And for more than 20 years, I’ve conspired with my fellow crime writer Mark Billingham to write the quiz for the annual Theakston Old Peculier Crime Festival in Harrogate. But nothing – not even Only Connect – has ever challenged me like RBQ.
Back in 1947, the BBC Home Service (as it was then) launched what has become known as Britain’s most fiendish quiz, challenging teams from all corners of the British Isles. Its brain-bending questions still confound listeners and contestants alike. While others have fallen to the axe of BBC radio controllers, Round Britain Quiz remains a stalwart and beloved fixture of the Radio 4 schedule.
It requires a brain that thrives on handbrake turns
It’s gone through several changes over the years, but the basic format remains constant. Teams from various regions around the United Kingdom (currently England, Scotland – which I joined in 2014 – Wales and Northern Ireland) play head to head. We are served four exquisitely difficult multi-part cryptic questions, each worth up to six points, awarded by host Kirsty Lang and the voice of the producer in her ear! It’s not enough to fumble our way to the individual answers; we must apply lateral thinking to figure out the link to score maximum points. We can ask for clues, but the more help we solicit, the fewer points we score.
It’s not enough to have a vast reservoir of general (and specific) knowledge – it requires a brain that thrives on handbrake turns, arcane bits and bobs picked up along the way, and a willingness to get things spectacularly wrong. Here’s a typical question that had me and fellow Scot Alan McCredie stumped. We heard a short clip from a recent Batman film. Then came the question. “Why might an ancient Scottish province, King Duncan’s younger son, and Aconitum napellus (monkshood) be thought of as a cause of misery?”
That’s also an example of the devotion of RBQ listeners. In a sign that human knowledge hasn’t been wholly outsourced to AI, not only do they play along at home; they also rise to the challenge of compiling their own questions to confound the teams. I know I’m not the only player who groans at the words, “The next question comes from a listener in Port Stanley in the South Atlantic…”
I’m not making that last bit up. Our listeners are spread across oceans and continents. And at home, too – I’ve been stopped in the supermarket and on the bus by fans who have recognised my voice, asking if RBQ is as unnerving as it sounds.
The other question I’m asked most often is how far in advance we know the questions. The answer is – we’re handed the sheets of doom at the start of the show. The cold sweat starts to run when we realise we’re first up and have no idea which thread we should pull. To score the magical full house of 24/24 leads to a round of drinks at dinner.
And that’s the other joy of RBQ – the camaraderie that flows among us. We record the whole series over a few nights in a country house hotel. We’re a motley crew but what links us is that none of us is left behind in the dinner-table conversation. We laugh, we swap family gossip, we share stories – one of the key strands in my latest novel sprang from England player Stephen Maddock’s revelations about his (emphatically non-nefarious!) book club.
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I like to think our listeners feel part of that family. As we approach our 80th year, all suggestions for a suitable celebration will be considered! VAL McDERMID
Authors
Radio Time Staff
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