Alan Bennett Reads Childhood Classics

Alan Bennett reads five much-loved stories by Kenneth Grahame, Lewis Carroll, and A.A. Milne. The Wind in the Willows is the classic story featuring Ratty, Mole, Badger and Toad (of Toad Hall). In Alice in Wonderland, when Alice follows a white rabbit down a hole she embarks on a series of adventures with some of the most weird and wonderful characters ever encountered. In Through the Looking Glass, Alice sees another world in the looking glass and wishes she could go there. In stories from Winnie-the-Pooh, Pooh goes visiting and gets into a tight place, Eeyore loses a tail, Piglet meets a Heffalump, Eeyore has a birthday, and an "expotition" to the North Pole is mounted. The House at Pooh Corner finds Pooh and Piglet building a house for Eeyore, while Tigger comes to the forest and has breakfast. Piglet nearly meets the Heffalump again, Pooh invents a new game, and Owl moves house. Portraying each character in his own inimitable fashion, Alan Bennett's distinctive readings of these much-loved stories have become classics in their own right.

Alan Bennett's television series Talking Heads has become a modern-day classic, as have many of his works for the stage, including Forty Years On, The Lady in the Van, The Madness of George III (together with the Oscar-nominated screenplay The Madness of King George), and an adaptation of The Wind in the Willows. The History Boys won the Evening Standard and Critics' Circle awards for Best Play, The Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play, and the South Bank Award.