Opening Lines

• Pride and Prejudice - Episode One

  Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice has not only captured the hearts of generations of readers, it also helped change the way that novels are written. This most beloved tale of Regency romance, featuring the brilliantly quick-witted Elizabeth Bennett and the haughty figure of Fitzwilliam Darcy, allows us into its characters’ heads and hearts in newly sophisticated ways that set the template for so much of the fiction that followed. In this, the first of two parts focusing on Austen’s most popular novel, John Yorke examines how a book she described as ‘too light, and bright, and sparkling’ retains a special place and a special importance in the history of English literature. The programme features leading Austen expert John Mullan, professor of English Literature at UCL, and Dr Lucy Powell, lecturer in English at the University of Oxford. John Yorke has worked in television and radio for 30 years, and shares his experience with Radio 4 listeners as he unpacks the themes and impact of the books, plays and stories that are being dramatised in BBC Radio 4’s Sunday Drama series. As former Head of Channel Four Drama and Controller of BBC Drama Production he has worked on some of the most popular shows in Britain - from EastEnders to The Archers, Life on Mars to Shameless. As creator of the BBC Writers Academy he's trained a generation of screenwriters - now with over 70 green lights and thousands of hours of television to their names. He is the author of Into the Woods, the bestselling book on narrative, and he writes, teaches and consults on all forms of narrative, including many podcasts for Radio 4. Contributors: John Mullan, professor of English Literature at UCL and Dr Lucy Powell, University of Oxford Sound: Sean Kerwin Researcher: Henry Tydeman Production Hub Coordinator: Dawn Williams Producer: Geoff Bird Reader: Rhiannon Neads Executive Producer: Caroline Raphael A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

  --------  

  14:29

  --------

  14:29
• The Princess Bride

  According to its introduction, The Princess Bride is a long, sprawling book by the great Florinese writer S. Morgenstern that renowned screenwriter and novelist William Goldman has been obliged to abridge so that his son doesn’t have to struggle through all the boring bits. But as John Yorke reveals, all is not as it seems in this metafictional novel from 1973 that Goldman himself went on to adapt into a screenplay for a much-loved film. The Princess Bride may ostensibly be a fairy story, but there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface. John Yorke has worked in television and radio for 30 years and shares his experience as he unpacks the themes and impact of the books, plays and stories that are being dramatised in BBC Radio 4’s Sunday Drama series. As former Head of Channel Four Drama and Controller of BBC Drama Production he has worked on some of the most popular shows in Britain - from EastEnders to The Archers, Life on Mars to Shameless. As creator of the BBC Writers Academy, he's trained a generation of screenwriters - now with over 70 green lights and thousands of hours of television to their names. He is the author of Into the Woods, the bestselling book on narrative, and he writes, teaches and consults on all forms of narrative - including many podcasts for R4.Natalie Haynes is a classicist, broadcaster and author of books including A Thousand Ships and Stone Blind. Stephen Keyworth is a writer and director who has adapted two of William Goldman’s novels – The Princess Bride and Marathon Man – for Radio 4. Interview with William Goldman, BBC Radio 3 Third Ear, March 1988 Reader: Riley Neldam Music: Torquil MacLeod Researcher: Henry Tydeman Production Hub Coordinator: Dawn Williams Sound: Sean Kerwin Producer: Torquil MacLeod Executive Producer: Sara DaviesA Pier production for BBC Radio 4

  --------  

  14:03

  --------

  14:03
• The Wind in the Willows

  John Yorke takes a look at an enduring classic of children’s literature, The Wind In The Willows by Kenneth Grahame. Published in 1908, The Wind In The Willows is about nature – both human and animal. It is, on the face of it, a children’s book packed with beloved characters. But hidden beneath the bucolic adventures and Grahame’s beautiful evocation of the landscape, there is a desperate longing to escape the stresses of wide world into the peace and freedom of the natural world - a longing that ran through Kenneth Grahame’s life. His life was claustrophobic, the story – like the countryside - offers space to breathe. Kenneth Grahame said of his own writing, “You must please remember that a theme, a thesis, is in most cases little more than a sort of clothes line on which one pegs a string of ideas, quotations, allusions and so on, one’s mental undergarments of all shapes and sizes, some possibly fairly new but most rather old and patched; and they dance and sway in the breeze and flap and flutter, or hang limp and lifeless; and some are ordinary enough, and some are of a private and intimate shape, and rather give the owner away, and show up his or her peculiarities.”John Yorke has worked in television and radio for 30 years and shares his experience as he unpacks the themes and impact of the books, plays and stories that are being dramatised in BBC Radio 4’s Sunday Drama series. As former Head of Channel Four Drama and Controller of BBC Drama Production he has worked on some of the most popular shows in Britain - from EastEnders to The Archers, Life on Mars to Shameless.  As creator of the BBC Writers Academy, he's trained a generation of screenwriters - now with over 70 green lights and thousands of hours of television to their names.  He is the author of Into the Woods, the bestselling book on narrative, and he writes, teaches and consults on all forms of narrative - including many podcasts for R4.Producer: Laura Grimshaw Executive Producer: Caroline Raphael Reader: Toby Hadoke Guests: Elisabeth Galvin and David Gooderson Researcher: Henry Tydeman Programme Hub Co-ordinators: Nina Semple and Dawn Williams Sound: Sean Kerwin A Pier production for BBC Radio 4

  --------  

  14:20

  --------

  14:20
• Northanger Abbey - Episode Two

  Jane Austen’s novel, Northanger Abbey, was the first full book she wrote. She was in her early 20s at the time and it was accepted by a publisher but the novel wasn’t published in her lifetime. In this second episode John Yorke looks at the story behind the genesis of Northanger Abbey - how a young woman with only three years of formal education came to write such an accomplished work, what prompted her to write a satire of Gothic fiction, and why the book is also a hymn of praise to the novel form itself.Jane may not have spent much time in school but her voracious love of reading, her prodigious memory and understanding of other writers’ techniques meant that she was entertaining the family with her own stories and plays from an early age. After leaving school at 11, her real education began - self-education. With the encouragement of her father, the availability of subscription libraries which made reading possible for all purses, and a lot of writing practice, she would develop into one of Britain’s finest writers.Sadly, her story is also one of disappointment and neglect. Despite the publisher’s promise, Jane’s novel, finished when she was 24, would have to languish for nearly 20 years before it finally saw the light of day, six months after her death.John Yorke has worked in television and radio for 30 years and shares his experience as he unpacks the themes and impact of the books, plays and stories that are being dramatised in BBC Radio 4’s Sunday Drama series. As former Head of Channel Four Drama and Controller of BBC Drama Production he has worked on some of the most popular shows in Britain - from EastEnders to The Archers, Life on Mars to Shameless. As creator of the BBC Writers Academy, he's trained a generation of screenwriters - now with over 70 green lights and thousands of hours of television to their names. He is the author of Into the Woods, the bestselling book on narrative, and he writes, teaches and consults on all forms of narrative - including many podcasts for R4.Contributors: Emma Clery, Literary Critic and Cultural Historian, Professor of English Literature at the Uppsala University, Sweden, and author of Jane Austen: The Banker’s Sister.Rebecca Romney, author of Jane Austen’s Bookshelf.Reader: Esme Scarborough Production Hub Coordinators: Nina Semple, Dawn Williams Researcher: Henry Tydeman Sound: Iain Hunter Producer: Kate McAll Executive Producer: Sara DaviesA Pier production for BBC Radio 4

  --------  

  14:12

  --------

  14:12
• Northanger Abbey - Episode One

  Northanger Abbey was Jane Austen’s first book, although it wasn’t published until after her death. It tells the story of Catherine Morland, an impressionable young woman who is introduced to fashionable society when she’s taken by a wealthy neighbour to Bath. There, Catherine’s imagination catches fire when she’s initiated into the thrills of Gothic fiction by new friend, Isabella Thorpe – a pretty, charming but devious gold digger.Another great reader of Gothic novels is ‘not quite handsome but very near it’ Henry Tilney, whom Catherine finds enchanting. When Henry invites Catherine to stay at Northanger Abbey, the home of his father, General Tilney, she imagines secret passages, haunted catacombs and an evil secret. Catherine does indeed find something wicked at the Abbey but not in the way she expects.In this first of two episodes John Yorke explores the dual nature of the book - part satire on Gothic fiction and part celebration of the novel form.John Yorke has worked in television and radio for 30 years and shares his experience as he unpacks the themes and impact of the books, plays and stories that are being dramatised in BBC Radio 4’s Sunday Drama series. As former Head of Channel Four Drama and Controller of BBC Drama Production he has worked on some of the most popular shows in Britain - from EastEnders to The Archers, Life on Mars to Shameless. As creator of the BBC Writers Academy, he's trained a generation of screenwriters - now with over 70 green lights and thousands of hours of television to their names. He is the author of Into the Woods, the bestselling book on narrative, and he writes, teaches and consults on all forms of narrative - including many podcasts for R4.Contributors: Emma Clery, Literary Critic and Cultural Historian, Professor of English Literature at the Uppsala University, Sweden, and author of Jane Austen: The Banker’s Sister.Rebecca Romney, author of Jane Austen’s Bookshelf.Reader: Esme Scarborough Production Hub Coordinators: Nina Semple and Dawn Williams Researcher: Henry Tydeman Sound: Iain Hunter Producer: Kate McAll Executive Producer: Sara DaviesA Pier production for BBC Radio 4

  --------  

  14:15

  --------

  14:15

More Arts podcasts

Trending Arts podcasts

About Opening Lines

Opening Lines: Podcasts in Family