Untold Stories

Front Cover
Faber & Faber, Sep 4, 2008 - Biography & Autobiography - 672 pages

Alan Bennett's first collection of prose since Writing Home takes in all his major writings over the last ten years. The title piece is a poignant family memoir with an account of the marriage of his parents, the lives and deaths of his aunts and the uncovering of a long-held family secret. Bennett, as always, is both amusing and poignant, whether he's discussing his modest childhood or his work with the likes of Maggie Smith, Thora Hird and John Gielgud. Also included are his much celebrated diaries for the years 1996 to 2004. At times heartrending and at others extremely funny, Untold Stories is a matchless and unforgettable anthology.

Since the success of Beyond the Fringe in the 1960s Alan Bennett has delighted audiences worldwide with his gentle humour and wry observations about life. His many works include Forty Years On, The Lady in the Van, Talking Heads, A Question of Attribution and The Madness of King George. The History Boys opened to great acclaim at the National in 2004, and is winner of the Evening Standard Award, the South Bank Award and the Critics' Circle Award for Best New Play.

'Perhaps the best loved of English writers alive today.' Sunday Telegraph

Untold Stories is published jointly with Profile Books.

 

Contents

List of Illustrations
The Ginnel
The Lady in the
The National Theatre
The History Boys
Hymn
Cheeky Chappies
The Last of the
Portrait or Bust
Making York Minster
County Arcade Leeds
Denton Welch
Philip Larkin
Staring out of the Window
A Common Assault
Arise

Going to the Pictures
Spoiled for Choice
An Average Rock
Acknowledgements

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About the author (2008)

Alan Bennett has been one of our leading dramatists since Beyond the Fringe in the 1960s. His television series Talking Heads has become a modern-day classic. The History Boys won numerous awards both at the National Theatre, London, and on Broadway. Also at the NT: The Habit of Art, People and Cocktail Sticks. He received an Academy Award nomination for his screenplay for The Madness of King George, and appeared with Dame Maggie Smith in a radio adaptation of his The Lady in the Van. His collection of prose Untold Stories won the PEN/Ackerley Prize for autobiography. Fiction includes The Uncommon Reader and Smut: Two Unseemly Stories. His most recent publication is Six Poets: Hardy to Larkin.

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