Telling Tales

Overview

Following on from the phenomenal success of Writing Home, Alan Bennett reminisces about his early years from his schooldays to undergraduate life at Oxford University. It was an ordinary childhood—growing up in Leeds taught Alan early on that "life is generally something that happens elsewhere." Yet the children who long for German bombs to lend their city some wartime glamor; the working class mother who reads Ideal Home and dreams of coffee mornings and cocktail parties; and 18-year-old Alan—a practicing Anglican who is deeply distrustful of God—strike a chord within all of us. In fact, it is their very ordinariness that makes these tales so special—combined, of course, with the wry observation and tender understatement that have earned Alan Bennett his place at the forefront of contemporary writing. The stories on this volume are: A Strip of Blue, Proper Names, Our War, Eating Out, An Ideal Home, Aunt Eveline, A Shy Butcher, Unsaid Prayers, Days Out, and No Mean City.2 CDs. 2 hrs 10 mins.

Reviews

"Poignant detail dancing between tragedy and comedy is Bennett's art." —Rachel Redford, Observer

Author Biography

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.