Stella Gibbons: A BBC Radio Drama Collection

byStella Gibbons, Miriam Margolyes (Read by), John Westbrook (Read by), Patricia Gallimore (Read by), Jane Knowles (Read by), Victoria Hamilton (Read by), Adjoa Andoh (Read by)

Four Productions including Cold Comfort Farm

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A selection of dramatisations from the novelist and poet Stella Gibbons

Cold Comfort Farm - Patricia Gallimore and Miriam Margolyes star in this full-cast dramatisation of the classic comic novel. Strong of will and slender of ankle, 20-year-old orphan Flora Poste is blessed with every virtue save that of being able to earn her own living. Casting around for suitable relatives with whom she can make her home, Flora alights on the mysterious Starkadders and, ignoring the horrified shrieks of her friends, heads down to darkest Sussex.

There she is confronted by an exceptionally odd cast of characters: grief-stricken Judith, fervently religious Amos, the lusty smouldering Seth, wild and mysterious Elfine and, of course, the invisible tyrant Great Aunt Ada Doom who saw something nasty in the woodshed. Many would be overcome by the simmering passions of the Starkadder family, but not Flora. All they need is a little organising.

Nightingale Wood - Episode 1: On either side of Nightingale Wood through one idyllic year in the late 1930s, hearts beat and minds scheme, as the dowdy Wither family tries to compete with the glittering Springs. Bookish Tina Wither is in love with Saxon, her father's handsome and aloof chauffeur. Her shopgirl sister-in-law, Viola, has fallen for Victor Spring, the lord of the manor. And Madge is in love with a dog. With Stella Gibbons as an artful fairy godmother, might things just turn out for the best?

Episode 2: In this sparkling pre-war comedy of manners, the young, widowed and pretty Viola Wither finally has the chance to escape her stifling in-laws in Essex. Whilst they are spending a month in the Lakes, she and her sister-in-law Tina escape to Stanton on Sea. Viola is still pining for the dashing Victor Spring - who has kissed her - and Tina for the beautiful chauffeur, Saxon - likewise. But is it all hopeless?

Westwood - Margaret Steggles moves to London in 1943. Through a dropped ration book she meets the Challises who live at Westwood, an elegant house in Highgate. The charming Challis family soon take advantage of Margaret's slavish admiration.

About Stella Gibbons

Stella Gibbons was born in London in 1902. She went to the North London Collegiate School and studied journalism at University College, London. She then worked for ten years on various papers, including the Evening Standard. Stella Gibbons is the author of twenty-five novels, three volumes of short stories, and four volumes of poetry. Her first novel Cold Comfort Farm (1932) was an immediate success and won the Femina Vie Heureuse Prize for 1933. Among her works are Nightingale Wood (1938), The Bachelor (1944), Westwood (1946), and Starlight (1967). She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1950. Stella Gibbons died in 1989.

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