Early Radio: An Anthology of European Texts and Translations

• Brings into the public domain important texts on early radio, including a large number of translations previously unavailable in English
• Offers a new transnational perspective on radio’s rise as a medium of mass entertainment and as a tool for artistic expression
• Sheds light on the work of long-forgotten women and men to whom radio owes its longevity

Who were the pioneers who first thought of radio as an art form, who debated how to write and perform for radio, who discussed radio’s social and political dimensions? Spanning from 1924 to 1938, this anthology brings together long-forgotten texts on sound, listening and writing by radio enthusiasts, journalists, actors, radio producers and literary authors who conceptualised the new radio aesthetic between the two world wars and reflected on radio’s future, as a medium requiring the invention of a new literature, new modes of performance and new ways of listening. The texts included here, drawn from British, French, German and Italian radio cultures, are representative of important pan-European debates about radio’s potential at a critical moment in its history. Together, they shed light on ideas that shaped not only the emergence of radio drama, sound art and reportage, but radio as we know it today.