Humphrys: ‘I should have left Today years ago’
● Presenter tells of his love for show and obsession with the news
John Humphrys has said he fears life after the Today programme but feels he “should have gone years ago”.
The veteran BBC broadcaster has worked on the Radio 4 current affairs show for 32 years and despite his love for Today believes he should have quit earlier in his career.
Humphrys, 75, said the show has dominated his life and his obsession with the news left little room for other ambitions.
In an interview on Radio 4’s The World At One, the presenter admitted being apprehensive about leaving behind such an important part of his life.
Speaking to his former Today colleague Sarah Montague, he said: “I love doing the programme, I have always enjoyed it, always loved it. And I still [do], that’s the problem.
“I should have gone years ago, obviously I should have gone years ago, but I love doing the programme.
“As you know, when you do this programme it dominates your life, not just because you have to get up in the morning so many days a week, but all the time, you have to be obsessed – I think that is the right word – with what’s going on out there.”
“You have to read everything and listen to everything and all the rest of it. There are
0 John Humphrys says he worries about missing the programme after 32 years in the morning show hotseat
so many things you think ‘oh I could have done this, I could have done that’ and I’m never going to do them if I stay on this programme.”
Despite feeling he needed to leave to regain some of his time from the obsession with current affairs and the rigorous programming schedule, he added that he fears what will come next.
I’m not sure the young John Humphrys would have let the veteran John Humphrys get away with it, had he been interviewing him on the Today programme this morning, rather than speaking to the Daily Mail and World at One respectively about his plans for retirement.
There’s a report in the Daily Mail that you are quitting this year. Is this true, Mr Humphrys? “I’m assuming it’ll be this year.” So, true or not? When will you be leaving? “I haven’t fixed a date... it’s not easy to leave a job you’ve been doing for 32 years.” So, I ask you, Mr Humphrys, did you jump or were you pushed? “It’s not like I’m an ambitious youngster with many, many more challenges ahead of me, or something like that. There are other things I want to do with my life, and one has to make the decision sooner or later.”
He said: “I worry about missing the programme, and I do now. I genuinely worry about what it is going to be like not doing the Today programme – 32 years is a very long time.”
Humphrys will end his time on the Today programme, but will continue with other BBC work, and remain on Mastermind.
He said it was a “huge privilege”
John Humphrys, thank you very much. And now, it’s time for Thought for the Day.
He is 75 years old, and after more than three decades of getting up at 3.30am, I think we can all empathise with Humphrys’ desire to spend more time at his Greek island retreat, making his excellent olive oil. But it does mark the closure of a chapter in radio journalism.
The late politician Robin Cook once said that he would have a sleepless night if he had to face ordeal-byhumphrys in the morning, and while dear old Robin, a match for anyone as far as verbal disputatiousness was concerned, might have been exaggerating, it is certainly true that no one, not even Paxman, has the same combination of indomitability, nervelessness and inquisitorial rigour that was capable of reducing ministers of the crown to jibbering wrecks.
to have a bond with millions of listeners during his long service on Today.
Fran Unsworth, BBC director of news and current affairs, said: “For more than 30 years John Humphrys has been a stalwart of Today. It’s hardly an exaggeration to say that anyone who’s played a key role in the political events of the last three decades has been
Humphrys has some typically male characteristics – in particular, his early-morning irascibility – and while a female editor and a greater number of female presenters have undoubtedly smoothed the hard edges that made the Today programme a hard listen so early in the day, the loss of an old geezer, with an old geezer’s view of the world, should not be dismissed lightly.
Humphrys represents a sizeable chunk of the Radio 4 constituency, and there is noone who can easily replace him, or replicate his tone of voice.
The reaction to that, if you took a cursory look at Twitter yesterday, is: about time, too. It’s fair to say that Humphrys divided opinion, but the man himself must take pleasure in the fact that he’s been criticised for being too left-wing, too right-wing, a Remainer and a Brexit apologist, too aggressive with some subjects,
interviewed by John. But most importantly, he has always been a champion of his listeners, holding the powerful to account on their behalf. John will be sorely missed by audiences and his colleagues when he leaves the programme this year – if perhaps less so by the politicians he interviews.” and soft-soaping others. I had a few encounters on the airwaves with Humphrys, and found him to be hard but fair. He never put me at ease, and the experience made me realise that, as an interviewee, it’s much easier when you know you’re in for a confrontation, and your synapses are prepared accordingly.
I remember being questioned by Eddie Mair once. Off air, Eddie was friendliness itself, and we were mutually appreciative of each other’s work. As soon as we went on air, he couldn’t have been more tricky, asking all the questions I didn’t expect, making me sound criminally negligent at best, a blithering idiot at worst.
Mair and Humphrys are very different beasts, but beasts they are, and, as Humphrys prepares to ride off towards the Aegean sunset, I do hope the age of beastliness isn’t quite over.