- Imprint: BBC Digital Audio
- ISBN: 9781529992458
- Length: 168 minutes
- Price: £14.00
Yeartides: Beltane, Samhain, Imbolc, Lughnasadh
Four Pagan Celtic BBC Radio Dramas
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Soulful dramas weaving folk lore, pagan rituals and love stories
Soulful drama series infused with fact, lore and song, exploring nature and the climate via contemporary Paganism and its festive calendar. Modern Pagans have eight major festivals marking the turning of the seasons, collectively known as The Wheel of the Year. The Summer and Winter Solstices and the Autumn and Spring Equinoxes are each marked, cutting the year into quarters. Sitting at the midpoint of these quarters are the Celtic four: Beltane, Samhain, Imbolc and Lughnasadh.
These interlinking plays explores our relationship with nature and seasonal folk ritual through standalone dramas linked by Claire - our down-to-earth Scottish Professor of Phenology. Whilst also telling human stories about a middle-aged woman’s perspective on love, loss, aging and change.
Beltane - Soulful drama full of wit and wisdom about love, loss and new beginnings. Woven together with an exploration of the seasons and Pagan perspective on the wonders of nature.
Samhain - People complain that Hallowe'en is a modern invention, an American import. But a celebration has been held at this time of year around the British Isles for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. All Hallows Eve. All Souls Eve. Samhain. It marks the threshold into winter, the dark half of the year.
Claire and her husband David are staying in an isolated old house on the remote Scottish island of Jura. It’s the end of October. Of all the nights of the year, this is the one when the veil between this world and the next is said to be at its thinnest. Claire’s past is about to reach out into her present...
Imbolc - A festival of light marking the end of the darkest days of winter and the first stirrings of the coming spring. This is the point in the Celtic myth cycle when the Cailleach (crone of winter who arrived at Samhain) is transformed into a symbol of fertility and hope.
Soulful drama series infused with fact, lore and song, exploring nature and the climate via contemporary Paganism and its festive calendar. Modern Pagans have eight major festivals marking the turning of the seasons, collectively known as The Wheel of the Year. The Summer and Winter Solstices and the Autumn and Spring Equinoxes are each marked, cutting the year into quarters. Sitting at the midpoint of these quarters are the Celtic four: Beltane, Samhain, Imbolc and Lughnasadh.
These interlinking plays explores our relationship with nature and seasonal folk ritual through standalone dramas linked by Claire - our down-to-earth Scottish Professor of Phenology. Whilst also telling human stories about a middle-aged woman’s perspective on love, loss, aging and change.
Beltane - Soulful drama full of wit and wisdom about love, loss and new beginnings. Woven together with an exploration of the seasons and Pagan perspective on the wonders of nature.
Samhain - People complain that Hallowe'en is a modern invention, an American import. But a celebration has been held at this time of year around the British Isles for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. All Hallows Eve. All Souls Eve. Samhain. It marks the threshold into winter, the dark half of the year.
Claire and her husband David are staying in an isolated old house on the remote Scottish island of Jura. It’s the end of October. Of all the nights of the year, this is the one when the veil between this world and the next is said to be at its thinnest. Claire’s past is about to reach out into her present...
Imbolc - A festival of light marking the end of the darkest days of winter and the first stirrings of the coming spring. This is the point in the Celtic myth cycle when the Cailleach (crone of winter who arrived at Samhain) is transformed into a symbol of fertility and hope.
Returning to life at Edinburgh University, Claire joins a group of guerrilla gardeners battling bureaucracy, corporate resistance and the threat of arrest to regenerate a lifeless urban area. She finds herself gently nurturing a romance between two unlikely young souls – one recovering from a recent breakdown, the other determined to push their non-violent resistance to its legal limits.
Lughnasadh - This is the festival marking the start of harvest season and celebrating earth’s bounty and the coming work to transform it into food. The Earth goddess is at the heart of Lughnasadh. She sacrificed her life - working herself to exhaustion - transforming land into a space ready for crop agriculture.
Claire visits her father-in-law’s farm for his 80th birthday party, but the festivities unravel as his family argue over the future of the land that’s been theirs for generations. Is anyone prepared to take it on? Can they ensure it goes to someone who will use it ethically? Or do they just sell to the highest bidder and reap the rewards? And, as long simmering family resentments drunkenly bubble over, can Claire resist stirring the pot?
