The Headmaster has been at Albion House for fifty years, man and boy. Now he is retiring and takes part in the end-of-year entertainment for the last time. Entitled Speak For England, Arthur, it weaves together a multi-generational story of the glorious era at the turn of the century, when the summers were always golden; the fast-living inter-war years peopled by the Bloomsbury Group; and the growing cynicism of a country going to war twice in so many decades. Tongue-in-cheek, the play-within-a-play prompts an outraged response from the Headmaster, who can only see his beloved standards being mocked. Yet within the parody lies an almost-painful nostalgia for a more peaceful age and the timeless misunderstanding of one generation by another. Clever, funny and poignant, Alan Bennett's masterful play is rightly regarded as a modern classic. It was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on 28 August 2000. 2 CDs. 1 hr 44 mins.
Author
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. Alan Bennett is an English author and Tony Award-winning playwright. Bennett's first stage play, Forty Years On, was produced in 1968. Many television, stage and radio plays followed, along with screenplays, short stories, novellas, a large body of non-fictional prose and broadcasting, and many appearances as an actor. Bennett's lugubrious yet expressive voice (which still bears a slight Leeds accent) and the sharp humour and evident humanity of his writing have made his readings of his own work (especially his autobiographical writing) very popular. His readings of the Winnie the Pooh stories are also widely enjoyed.
