Category Archives: Everyone

26/01/2026 · 12:21

“Oidhche Bhlas Burns”

Or if you’re an inveterate sassenach ‘Happy Burns Night’. So, if you had a good one last night that’s great, because I spent my Burns night fighting a series of ‘server errors’ which is why I’m 24 hours behind – and NO WHISKY!

Yesterday we were celebrating the life of Robert Burns, also known as Rabbie Burns, poet and lyricist, widely regarded as Scotland’s national poet and a key figure in Romanticism. Born 25 January in 1759 in Alloway, Ayrshire, Burns came from a farming life to compose enduring works in Scots and English.

Burns was a rebel against the social order and a bitter satirist of all forms of political and religious ideas. Despite his upbringing he was by no means an illiterate peasant. He was a craftsman. Around age 26 his poetry output expanded as he sought to express more of his emotions and comment on the social scene. He has been described as someone of great intellectual energy and force of character.

Burns’ first significant recognition came in 1786 with the publication of his debut poetry collection, Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect. It was an instant success, earning him fame as the ‘ploughman poet’. Burns produced some fine poetry, the first of which nearly everyone has heard on numerous occasions: AuldLangSyne but others regularly crop up: To a Mouse, AMan’saManfor A’ That, Scots Wha Hae and Tam O’Shanter.

The latter was the only poem he wrote after his time in Edinburgh that showed a hidden side of his poetic genius. Written in 1790, it’s a narrative poem in eight-syllable couplets based on a folk legend. It paints a picture of the drinking classes in the old town of Ayr in the late 18th century, populated by several unforgettable characters including Tam, Souter (Cobbler) Johnnie and his own long-suffering wife, Kate. The tale includes humour, pathos, horror, social comment and some truly exquisite lines. Try and read it in the original before succumbing to the translation – it’s not that difficult.

Burns worked as an excise man and felt it his duty to serve as a private in the Royal Dumfries Volunteers, a local militia formed to defend Britain during the French Revolutionary Wars. He joined the unit in 1795, serving until 1796. Burns produced so much fine poetry that he has become the Scottish national poet. He died in Dumfries, Scotland, in 1796 aged only 37.

No doubt last night there was plenty of Scotch broth, haggis, bagpipes, whisky and, of course, poetry. A life well worth the celebrating.

Happy Birthday Jane!

Today (16 December) is the birthday of one of our most famous and best loved novelist, Jane Austen, and marks her 250th anniversary.

Celebrations have been going on for weeks with book promotions, film, TV series, audio dramatisations, podcasts and online discussions, so it would be very hard to have not heard about her, or her work.

Jane Austen was born in 1775 in Steventon, Hampshire. From as early as 11 years old she wrote stories and poems for herself and to amuse her family. Although she wrote novels before she was 22 none of her work was published until she was 35 and even then they were anonymous. These were Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), and Emma (1816). All had moderate successes, but didn’t bring her fame in her lifetime.

She wrote two other novels — Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, published posthumously in 1817. She began another, Sanditon, unfinished on her death. There were three manuscript volumes of juvenile writings, the short epistolary novel Lady Susan, and the unfinished novel The Watsons. Since her death Austen’s novels have rarely been out of print.

In the months after her death in July 1817, Cassandra Austen, Henry Austen and Murray arranged for the publication of Persuasion and Northanger Abbey as a set. Henry Austen contributed a Biographical Note dated December 1817, in which he identified his sister as the author of the novels. Sales were good for a year.

So check the list below. What have you read – not seen on TV/film or listen to, but actually read!

Mansfield Park (1983)
Northanger Abbey (1987)
Pride & Prejudice (1995) a wonderful series with Colin Firth & Jennifer Ehle
Sense & Sensibility (2008)
Emma (2009)

All available on BBC iPlayer. BBC 4Extra have been serialising Lady Susan, written in 1794, as a series of letters from the widowed Lady Susan Vernon as she schemes her way through high society looking for a suitable (and profitable) husband. This novella wasn’t published until 1871.

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15/11/2025 · 17:13

A week with Dylan Thomas

Last Sunday (November 9) marked the passing of Welsh poet and writer, Dylan Marlais Thomas in 1953, aged just 39. Thomas, famous for such poems as ‘Do not go gentle into that good night’, ‘And death shall have no dominion’, as well as the one we probably most remember his ‘play for voices’ Under Milk Wood. He also wrote stories and radio broadcasts such as A Child’s Christmas in Wales and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog. He was hugely popular, somewhat erratic and readily encouraged the image of a drunken poet. Over his lifetime he managed an extensive and varied creative output.

It’s through Under Milk Wood that many will be most familiar with his work. This last week has seen broadcast of the original recording which is thoroughly enjoyable. For my part, I dug out my Folio Society copy (pictured) and spent a pleasant time re-reading it, though the audio version steals the show. Maybe I’ll listen to my the Decca Records vinyl boxed set. Can’t have too much of a good thing!

From its famous opening words, “To begin at the beginning…”, spoken by the young Richard Burton, Under Milk Wood became a milestone of BBC radio broadcasting, revealing the hidden lives and proclivities of the residents of Llareggub, a small Welsh village, in language describes as exciting, fresh and revelatory. Thomas had spent nearly 20 years working on-and-off creating the play. He found the process draining, creating characters — all influenced by his upbringing in Wales. In May 1953, after a stage run-through in New York, he wrote to his wife Caitlin ‘I’ve finished that infernally eternally unfinished “Play” and have done it in New York with actors.’

Sadly Thomas never got to hear the BBC Radio premiere with its Welsh cast, and his friend Richard Burton as the omniscient narrator, nor its subsequent adaptations for stage and screen. Thomas was a heavy drinker and his worsening erratic behaviour finally caught up with him during his time in New York. He fell into a coma and died on 9 November 1953.

Under Milk Wood was broadcast on 9 November this year, in tribute, on BBC Radio 4 Extra. It was first broadcast on the BBC Third Programme in January 1954. The distinctive tones of Richard Burton’s voice which was famously deep, resonant, and unmistakably Welsh — often described as gravelly yet, carrying both authority and poetic warmth. It was the perfect narration for the play.

From those opening lines we are treated to a wonderful cast of characters as the tale unfolds: Captain Cat, Organ Morgan, Willy Nilly, Mrs Dai Bread One, Polly Garter, Mary Rose Cottage, Gossamer Beynon plus a host of equally memorable names (33 in total).

A literary profile of Thomas is both varied and extensive: he acted in productions while at Swansea Grammar School – he continued with acting and producing throughout his life. He made films for the Ministry of Information during the war, wrote poetry, scripts for the BBC and did radio broadcasts, poetry readings, various UK tours and poetry tours in the USA. He spent time in Italy and Czechoslovakia.

Under Milk Wood is available on BBC 4 Extra. It’s a classic and worth 95 mins your time.

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