No celebration for radio's star writer Tom Stoppard Here's a mystery. Sir Tom Stoppard is 75 today. Where is the season celebrating his work? Radio is the medium that recognised him first back in the 1950s, fostered his talent for the quizzical and surreal through the 1960s and "70s, saw him through a "dry" period in the 1980s that eventually produced In the Native State (1991, later becoming the stage play Indian Ink). Here's a writer whose work, artistically, politically and philosophically, has reflected the world in words over the past five decades better than any other and remains vividly, internationally popular. I remember asking the boss of BBC Transcription Services (the old worldwide radio syndication service) who was their top seller? Stoppard, emphatically. Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter had anniversary seasons. Stoppard (who was at school in India during the war) is featured in a Radio 4 documentary on Indian English on Friday July 13. The British Library National Sound Archive this week releases four Stoppard BBC radio plays, including Albert's Bridge (winner of the Italia Prize in 1967). These days we don't expect the BBC to remember Stoppard's half century of work for television, stage and film since its corporate memory nowadays doesn't seem to stretch back much further than the last re-generation of Bruce Forsyth. But surely radio can't have forgotten its most visible and enduring star writer? Radio 2 helps boost the national memory by investing in documentaries. This is a good idea because, when times are hard and budgets grow smaller, you can freshen up an old documentary faster than the boss can say digital edit. The evidence is there in Radio 2"s current Best of British season, a pre-Olympic boost to national pride, remembering comedy writers such as Galton & Simpson, rock bands (The Rolling Stones), performers (Stanley Baxter). But Radio 2 also puts energy and funds into new documentaries, for instance its new Monday night series The Ballads of the Games. This is bold. The radio ballad form is, by nature and tradition, a story told by ordinary people, speaking anonymously, revealing complex truths about who they are, how they live, often exposing hardship and injustice. Applying this form to the Olympic Games is, therefore, something of a paradox, the Games being more usually thought to be about success, achievement, records, national pride, the sort of thing that would have curled the lip of the original radio ballad makers, Ewan MacColl, Peggy Seeger and Charles Parker. In last night's first Ballad (of six) the fit of form to content was distinctly uncomfortable Radio ballads don't have narrators. With this subject I felt the need of one. When historians are telling you how the Games began, when athletes talk about how it was, I want to know who they are, how they know. Instead of pulling the subject together this Ballad pushed its words and music apart. It was full of good stuff but, overall, didn't feel whole or confident. But I have, by the magic of preview, heard next week's Ballad. It is much stronger in tone, style and content. The stories it tells of the 1936 Berlin Games are brilliantly researched, unforgettable once heard. If you couldn't get to grips with last night's ballad, don't lose patience. Try next week's. Is It Worth It? (Radio 2, Monday June 25) was a daring original, about Shipbuilding, a song from 1982, tune by Clive Langer, words by Elvis Costello, first recorded by Robert Wyatt. It sprang from the Falklands War, when yards worked against the clock to fit out ships that would take troops to war. So, was it worth it? In the first part we heard how the song came to be written, its socio-political context of unemployment, its reflection of angry questionings. In the second part came voices of people personally caught up in the war: ship builders on the Tyne; the wife whose Fleet Air Arm husband was killed at San Carlos Bay; the young serviceman who saw action. In the short coda at the end came a reflection on why the song still haunts. You could feel the programme's tug between message and balance. The song asked a big question, answering it with no. Those personally involved said yes. Annie Nightingale, presenting, did well to maintain a balance. Blowing My Own Trumpet (Radio 2, Thursday) was Kenny Ball talking to Clare Teal about his band, his hits, his tours. The music went chugga chugga chugga, in the same Kenny Ball way his Jazzmen have played since 1958. If you like that style you'll have enjoyed this. Teal gave every impression of loving it. I didn't really believe her. But by the time it finished I'd have said anything, too, just to make that chugga chugga stop.