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Series 1: 3. The Day of the Sardine
The Read is a series of four creative performance readings of iconic British novels. Each episode is directed by exciting, emerging talent from BBC Arts’ and Art Council England's successful New Creatives scheme. The Read gives audiences the chance to discover or reconnect with the novels through some outstanding British performances, the best of literature brought to life on screen. \n\nSet in a working-class community in Newcastle upon Tyne at the very beginning of the 1960s, The Day of the Sardine is a powerful novel of disaffection, which charts a young man's uneasy passage into adulthood. Harsh, and at times comic, the story of its protagonist, Arthur Haggerston, takes place against the background of a young workforce absorbed into tedious, repressive employment where the only outlet comes from street violence and gang warfare.\n\nAs Arthur reflects on his search for a moral framework within the anarchy of modern society, he speaks for all of us, poetically and passionately, in a way that feels as true today as the period in which the tale is set.
Source: BBC 4
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Most popular episodes of The Read
The Read
Series 2: Frankenstein
Alex Kingston breathes life into Mary Shelley’s timeless gothic horror story.\n\nYoung, gifted scientist Victor Frankenstein unwittingly creates a monster. Written more th ...
03-03-2024
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The Read
Series 1: 1. The Lonely Londoners
The Lonely Londoners portrays the experiences of a group of Caribbean immigrants, known as the Windrush Generation, who arrived in London in the late 1940s and 50s searching for ...
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The Read
Series 1: 4. A Vision Of Loveliness
Bafta-nominated actor Liv Hill (Three Girls, Jellyfish, The Great, The Serpent Queen) performs A Vision of Loveliness from the novel by Louise Levene, a darkly comic work that r ...
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Christopher Eccleston narrates Barry Hines’s heartbreaking coming-of-age tale in this fresh take on a classic British novel. It’s the story of teenager Billy Casper, ...
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The Read is a series of four creative performance readings of iconic British novels. Each episode is directed by exciting, emerging talent from BBC Arts’ and Art Council E ...
06-11-2022
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Based on the novel published in 1982 by Bruce Chatwin, On the Black Hill is about identical twin brothers who grow up on a farm in rural Wales and never leave home. They till th ...
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