Old School with Shilo Brooks The Secret Lives of Ordinary People
Feb 12, 2026
David Aaronovitch, award-winning journalist and author, reflects on Dylan Thomas’s Under Milk Wood and its impact on his life. He recalls hearing the radio original, explains why the medium matters, and celebrates Thomas’s musical language. They explore the play’s tender view of ordinary people, the narrator’s godlike voice, and how the work deepened his compassion.
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Childhood Bond With The Radio Recording
- David Aaronovitch grew up listening to the 1954 Richard Burton radio recording of Under Milk Wood on a family radiogram.
- The recording and his mother's Welsh connections made the play part of his internal language from childhood.
A Day That Reveals Inner Lives
- Under Milk Wood is essentially a single day in a small Welsh town, revealing characters' dreams and daytime lives.
- The play's poetic language invites readers to eavesdrop on inner lives and see universal human longings.
Ordinary People, Not Objects Of Contempt
- Aaronovitch rejects reading Thomas as mocking small-town people; instead he sees universal humanity in their flaws and longings.
- Reverend Eli Jenkins's lines frame the villagers as ordinary folk whose sins and nobility mirror the reader.
