Broadcasting Joan Bakewell began her career as a studio manager for
BBC Radio, before moving into television. Bakewell left after a year to try supply teaching. She then became an advertising copywriter with McCann Erickson, then with Hobson Bates, and later David Williams Ltd. In the early 60s Bakewell was TV presenter for ATV's
Sunday Break, Southern Television's
Home at 4.30, BBC's
Meeting Point and the BBC series
The Second Sex. She first became known as one of the presenters of the
BBC2 programme
Late Night Line-Up (1965–72 and 2008).
Frank Muir dubbed her "the
thinking man's crumpet" during this period and the moniker stuck; Bakewell herself was not insulted by the epithet. In 1968, she took the role of narrator of the BBC TV production of
Cold Comfort Farm, a three-part serial, and played a TV interviewer in the 1960s film
The Touchables. Bakewell co-presented
Reports Action, a Sunday teatime programme which encouraged the public to donate their services to various good causes, for
Granada Television in 1976–78. In the 1970s Bakewell worked for both the BBC: "Where is Your God?", "Who Cares" "The Affirmative Way" and many Holiday Programmes between 1974 and 1978. Bakewell starred in 4 series of Granada's pioneering Reports Action, a series that first encouraged the public to contribute goods and services to good causes. Subsequently, she returned to the BBC, and co-presented a short-lived late-night television arts programme, briefly worked on the
BBC Radio 4 PM programme, and was
Newsnights arts correspondent (1986–88). Arts coverage was then dropped from news programmes in the era of
John Birt's changes to the BBC. Bakewell switched to being the main presenter of the ethics documentary series
Heart of the Matter, which she presented for 12 years. In 2001, Bakewell wrote and presented a four-part series for BBC Two called
Taboo, a personal exploration of the concepts of
taste,
decency and censorship. The programme dealt frankly with sex and nudity and in some cases pushed the boundaries of what is permissible on mainstream television. Bakewell used frank language and "four-letter words" to describe pornography and sex toys. She watched a couple having sex while they were making a pornographic film and read out an "obscene" extract from the novel
Tropic of Cancer by
Henry Miller.
Taboo was referred to the
Director of Public Prosecutions by the
National Viewers' and Listeners' Association, then headed by John Beyer. Following the complaint, Bakewell faced the nominal prospect of being charged with
blasphemous libel after she recited part of an erotic poem by
James Kirkup concerning a Roman centurion's affection for Jesus, "
The Love that Dares to Speak its Name".
After its first publication in 1976, Denis Lemon, the editor of
Gay News, had been given a nine-month suspended jail sentence. Bakewell later wrote that in the programme she "read this poem with extreme distaste and I hope that showed on my face." The Broadcasting Standards Commission rejected complaints from viewers. On
Sky Arts, Bakewell co-hosted
Portrait Artist of the Year and
Landscape Artist of the Year, initially alongside
Frank Skinner and later
Stephen Mangan.
Writing Bakewell writes for the British newspaper
The Independent in the "Editorial and Opinion" section. Typically, her articles concern aspects of social life and culture but sometimes she writes more political articles, often focusing on aspects relevant to life in the United Kingdom. Formerly, from 2003, she wrote the "Just Seventy" column for
The Guardian newspaper. In September 2008, she began a fortnightly column in the Times2 section of
The Times. Her first novel was published in March 2009 by
Virago Press.
All the Nice Girls drew on her experiences in war-time Merseyside to tell the story of a school "adopting" a ship. ==Public roles==