Meet David Sedaris

Are you laughing at Radio 4 comedy? A week in radio

The stock thing to say is that Radio 4 comedy is a bit of an oxymoron. It's not really true, though, is it? Without Radio 4 there'd be no Alan Partridge, no Mighty Boosh, no League Of Gentlemen. Not that the highlights (or lowlights for that matter) should be what the station should be judged on. To listen in to the 6.30pm comedy slot on Radio 4 this last week is to see its comedic strengths and failings.

From the B-word to the Q-word: an alphabet of offence

When the unsayable is constantly evolving, it makes language a minefield.

David Sedaris is one of the funniest writers alive, and a new series of his essays started last week on Radio 4. The shows are simple - Sedaris just reads out his essays and some of his diary in front of a live audience - but they are guaranteed to cheer you up in these fun-free, panicky days. Episode 1, Father Time, is partly about Sedaris's 95-year-old dad, and is hilarious and touching, as ever. (Nerdy fact: Sedaris's sister, Amy, is an actor, and played Audrey Temple in Gimlet Media's Homecoming podcast.)

David Sedaris: 'The audience thinks I'm monstrous'

The US writer and humorist talks about his sister's suicide, how he gets shocked by his own writing, and why he hates Moby-Dick.

David Sedaris: If I come across a man my size I squeak

Elfin, diminutive, bonsai-size - the 5ft 5in author has heard it all. What's the big deal?

Radio Times review

I like to laugh. I just don't get enough opportunities listening to the radio. This is where the humourist and writer David Sedaris takes on a heroic status. There was not a single sentence that did not raise a smile, and most of them led to full-on, unadulterated laughter.

Sedaris writes about what he knows: in the case of these three short readings that's a terrifying babysitter called Mrs Peacock, an altercation with a giant human poo in someone else's toilet and a trick that he played upon his partner involving two artificial pistols. He makes the mundane extraordinary and his acute observational powers add a whole new dimension to the everyday experience.

There will be nothing as funny as this on radio this week -- or possibly this year.

What I'm looking for is... David Sedaris: The Santaland Diaries. Half an hour of Christmas perfection: festive but wry, a teensy bit sentimental and very, very funny. These diaries, written in 1992, describe the time when Sedaris worked in Macy's as a Christmas elf (as a side effect, they made me yearn to be in New York). If you didn't hear the programme, I'm not going to spoil it, but his reminiscences include real-life lines such as, "You're an elf, and you're gonna wear panties like an elf!", "Step on the magic star and you can see... Cher" and "Goddam it Rachel, get back on that man's lap and smile!"

His writing is beautiful, his observation is on-point and his delivery is a delight. Download and save for those days when you feel Christmas spirit leaving your life like air from a balloon.

David Sedaris is an upbeat listen too, his readings making me laugh along with his very enthusiastic audience. (This series is a repeat, but still worth checking out.) His writing always seems like such airy, inconsequential stuff, and yet it's perfectly timed, wonderfully written. There are some great lines and neatly observed scenes, especially about his family, and his light-voiced delivery is lovely - you feel he wants you to enjoy yourself as much as he does. If you listened to the end, this week, you got a couple of extracts from his diary, and the last ones - about women removing their bras as soon as they can after work - had me howling.