Editing Kenneth Horne (section)

===A single career: 1958–1969===
The pilot episode of ''Beyond Our Ken'' was well received by the BBC, and they commissioned a series to start in April 1958.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=172}} On 27 February that year—his 51st birthday—Horne suffered a debilitating stroke and was totally paralysed down his left-hand side and lost the power of speech.{{sfn|Hackforth|1976|pp=103–105}} He underwent a course of intensive [[physiotherapy]] and was able to return home after two weeks. His voice returned when, during heavy massage on his left thigh, a sharp pain led to him shouting "You bugger!" at the physiotherapist.{{sfn|Hackforth|1976|p=105}} His doctor told him that the stroke was caused by the stress of combining a full-time business post with his broadcasting work. He also told Horne that when he had recovered he would never be fit enough to continue as before. Horne considered that it was not the physical problem of combining his two careers, but the mental strain of problems in his business life; accordingly he decided to give up commerce and concentrate on a career in entertainment.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|pp=179–180}} Because of the stroke, plans for ''Beyond Our Ken'' were suspended.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=175}}

In April 1958 Horne eased himself back into broadcasting as chairman of ''Twenty Questions''. This evidence of his recovery was sufficient for the BBC to begin recording ''Beyond Our Ken'' in June, in preparation for the broadcast of the first series between July and November.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|pp=177–178 & 181}} ''Beyond Our Ken'' was written around the imperturbable establishment figure of Horne, while the other performers played a "spectrum of characters never before heard on the radio",{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|p=213}} including the exaggeratedly upper class Rodney and Charles, the genteel pensioners Ambrose and Felicity, the cook Fanny Haddock—a parody of popular TV cook [[Fanny Cradock]]—and the gardener Arthur Fallowfield.{{sfn|Hackforth|1976|p=102}}{{sfn|Took|1981|p=138}} The first episode was not well received by a sample audience,{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=181}} but the BBC decided to back Horne and his team, and the initial six-week contract was extended to 21 weeks.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|pp=185–186}} Before the series came to an end, a second had been commissioned to run the following year.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=188}}{{efn|''Beyond Our Ken'' ran for seven series and two Christmas specials, with the final edition broadcast on 16 February 1964.{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|pp=211–216}}}} After the first series Moody was succeeded by [[Bill Pertwee]]; Took left after the second series, leaving Merriman to write the remaining programmes on his own.{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|pp=212–213}}

The second series of ''Beyond Our Ken'' followed in 1959; a third in 1960.{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|pp=212–213}} Horne also continued his work in television, hosting his own series, ''Trader Horne'', and appearing on a number of other programmes.{{sfn|Hackforth|1976|p=140}}{{efn|In 1960 Horne also appeared on ''Top Town'', ''Meet Yourself'', ''Laugh Line'', ''Live a Borrowed Life'' and ''Ace High''.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|pp=204–205}}}} In April 1961 he made his second appearance on ''Desert Island Discs'', this time unaccompanied by Murdoch.<ref name="DiD: KH" />{{efn|The programme was broadcast on 9 April 1961; Horne's choice was: [[Alexander Borodin]]'s "Vladimir's Aria" (from ''[[Prince Igor]]''), Soloist: [[Jussi Björling]]; [[Claude Debussy]]'s "[[Clair de lune (Debussy)|Clair de lune]]" (from ''Suite bergamasque''), Soloist: [[Walter Gieseking]]; [[Johannes Brahms]]'s [[String Quartet No. 3 (Brahms)|String Quartet No. 3]] in B flat major, the Amadeus String Quartet; [[Coleman Hawkins]] and his Orchestra, "[[Body and Soul (1930 song)#Coleman Hawkins|Body and Soul]]"; Terry Saunders, "Something Wonderful"; [[Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky]]'s ''[[1812 Overture]]'', the [[Philharmonia Orchestra]]; [[Bing Crosby]], "[[White Christmas (song)|White Christmas]]"; [[Giacomo Puccini]]'s "Si, mi chiamano Mimi" (from ''[[La bohème]]''), Soloist: [[Renata Tebaldi]], the [[Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia]], Rome, conducted by [[Tullio Serafin]]. His chosen book was an anthology of English verse, and his luxury item was a piece of crystal.<ref name="DiD: KH" />}} In October that year—three weeks after the fifth series of ''Beyond Our Ken'' began recording—Horne appeared as the anchorman on a new BBC television series, ''Let's Imagine'', a discussion programme which ran for 20 editions over 18 months.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=223}} He was the subject of ''[[This Is Your Life (British TV series)|This Is Your Life]]'' in February 1962, hosted by [[Eamonn Andrews]], in which guests included friends and colleagues from his connections in business and entertainment.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|pp=225–226}} In June 1963 he began ''Ken's Column'', a series of 15-minute one-man programmes for [[Anglia Television]].{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=233}}

The seventh series of ''Beyond Our Ken'' finished in February 1964, with an average audience of ten million listeners per programme.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=235}} In September that year Horne returned from holiday and was scheduled to appear in a number of programmes; Eric Merriman objected to Horne's activities, saying that Horne had been made into a star by the writer, and that "no other comedy series should be allowed to use him". When the BBC refused to withdraw Horne from the second programme, ''Down with Women'', Merriman resigned from writing ''Beyond Our Ken'' and the show came to an end.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=238}} After some pressure from Horne to keep the remainder of the team together, the BBC commissioned a replacement series, ''[[Round the Horne]]'', on similar lines. They turned to one of the original writers of ''Beyond Our Ken'', Barry Took and his new writing partner, [[Marty Feldman]]. Horne remained the genial and unflappable focal figure, and the writers invented several new and eccentric characters to revolve round him. They included J. Peasemold Gruntfuttock, the walking slum; the [[Noël Coward]] parodies Charles and Fiona; the incompetent villain Dr. Chou En Ginsberg; the folk singer [[Rambling Syd Rumpo]]{{sfn|Hackforth|1976|pp=121–123}} and the "outrageously camp" [[Julian and Sandy]].{{sfn|Senelick|1992|p=44}} The resulting programme was described by radio historians Andy Foster and Steve Furst as "one of the seminal comedies to come out of the BBC",{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|p=211}} while ''[[The Spectator]]'' described it as "one of the great radio successes".<ref name="Spec: RtH" /> The first series of ''Round the Horne'', consisting of 16 episodes, ran from March to June 1965.{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|p=259}} Horne's role was to provide "the perfect foil to the inspired lunacy happening all around him":<ref name="DTel: Took Obit" />

{| cellpadding="2" width="75%" style="margin: 1em auto 1em auto;"
|- valign="top"
| '''Horne''' || My name is Lord Tantamount Horseposture. Whilst on a world cruise with my young, incredibly beautiful daughter, Wisteria, played incredibly by Betty Marsden, and her fiancé, the Reverend Isambard Mousepractice—played by tiny, agile Hugh Paddick—we were shipwrecked. Only timely intervention by my butler, exquisitely portrayed by Bolivian Sex Goddess Kenneth Williams, saved us from disaster&nbsp;... And see there—dominating the island, the sacred volcano of Gonga—played by Douglas Smith with a hole in his head and steam coming out of his ears.
|- valign="top"
| '''Paddick''' || What an awesome sight—snow mantling his mighty summit and lava oozing down his sides.
|- valign="top"
| '''Smith''' || That's porridge, actually. I had a hurried breakfast this morning.
|- valign="top"
| '''Horne''' || Shut up, Smith, you're a volcano. You just loom over us and rumble ominously.
|- valign="top"
| '''Smith''' || Yes, I told you. I had a hurried breakfast.
|- valign="top"
| '''Horne''' || Shut up, Smith.
|- valign="top"
| '''Smith''' || Rumble rumble
|- valign="top"
| '''Horne''' || That's better{{sfn|Took|1981|pp=149–150}}
|}

On 7 October 1966, at the age of 59, Horne suffered a major heart attack.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=268}}{{efn|There was a problem with heart weakness in the Horne family: his father had been 49, his eldest brother had been 51 and his eldest sister had been 65 when they had all died from heart attacks. Two of Horne's nephews needed bypass surgery.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=268}}}} He was much weakened, and was unfit to work for three months. As a result, he did not appear in the ''Round the Horne'' Christmas special.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|pp=268–271}} He returned to work in January 1967 to record the third series.{{sfn|Johnston|2006|p=272}}

''Round the Horne'' ran to four series, broadcast in successive years, and finished in June 1968.{{sfn|Foster|Furst|1996|pp=259–261}} Three weeks after the fourth series finished, the first episode of ''Horne A'Plenty'' was broadcast on ITV. In a sketch show format, and with Barry Took as script editor (and later producer), this was an attempt to translate the spirit of ''Round the Horne'' to television, although with different actors supporting Horne: [[Graham Stark]], for example, substituted for Kenneth Williams and [[Sheila Steafel]] for Betty Marsden. The first six-part series ran from 22 June to 27 July 1968, the second (by which time ABC had become [[Thames Television]]) from 27 November to 1 January 1969.{{sfn|Lewisohn|1998|p=331}}