Paul Allen was born in Kent and brought up in cold country vicarages; singing in church choirs came with the territory. He studied classics and philosophy and played cricket in Israel, Herod in a play by John Arden and trombone in Tchaikovsky and Gershwin before settling in Sheffield to train as a reporter.

In 1976 he was the first regional journalist to be named Critic of the Year in the British Press Awards, for television and radio reviewing. Soon afterwards he wrote dramatised case histories for a prize-winning documentary series on alcoholism for commercial radio.

In the 1980s he began a long association with the Radio 4 arts magazine Kaleidoscope. He wrote and presented the Kaleidoscope feature The Leaf and the Fig which won the last BP Arts Journalism Award for radio in 1993. Two dozen of his plays have been produced, on radio and theatres across the country. Most recently his adaptation of Brassed Off opened in Sheffield and subsequently transferred to the National Theatre.

A long association with the Arts Council drama panel in the 1990s generated far more abusive letters than ever broadcasting or criticism did. He was also a founder member of Yorkshire Arts Board and is currently vice-chairman of the board of Sheffield Theatres and a member of Sheffield Galleries and Museums Trust. He holds an Honorary Doctorate of Sheffield Hallam University, and teaches dramaturgy at the University of Sheffield. He has presented Night Waves since May 1998.

His biography of Alan Ayckbourn, GRINNING AT THE EDGE was published by Methuen in 2001. He has edited a collection of artists' diaries for the Gulbenkian Foundation, also published in 2001. A POCKET GUIDE TO ALAN AYCKBOURN'S PLAYS was published in 2004.

This concise guide to staging an Ayckbourn play includes information on plot breakdown, hints on production, details of female and male characters, where to apply for permissions and music, and much more.