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Bettie's Books

A Stuga On the Cusp of the Orust Riviera, tucked away next to a hobbit hole in the woods.

Lost Empires by J.B. Priestley

Lost Empires - J.B. Priestley

bookshelves: radio-4x, autumn-2012, play-dramatisation, britain-england, published-1965, families, music, art-forms, mystery-thriller, wwi

Recommended for: BBC listeners
Read from November 03 to 08, 2012




starts 5,11,2012

Listen here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/...



The story sofa...

...faux memoir. This kicks off on tour with a variety show, 1913, in the reign of George V

 

This account of life in the Empire Theatres of English Variety The cast is a travelling troupe of "artistes" - dancers, comedians, jugglers, magicians - which include a murderer, a depraved beauty, a brilliant comedian in decay, and the greatest conjurer on the English stage. He is knows as Ganga Dun to his enormous audience, and as Uncle Nick to the narrator of the story.
Young Herncastle is a good-looking Yorkshire boy, ambitious as a painter, whom his uncle sweeps away from a dreary office job into the nomadic, boozy, evanescently amorous life of Variety performers on tour. With them he learns the exacting craft of the stage and avidly explores the first yearnings and triumphs of both sex and love.