Through archive recordings of the The Canterbury Tales and interviews with Terry Jones ,
Martin Starkie , Jean "Binta" Breeze and others, Barrie Ruttertraces the special relationship between Chaucer and the BBC from 1946 to the present day and discovers why the Tales keep surfacing in British culture. If it hadn't been for a BBC commission, the stories might never have become well known to the general reader. In 1946, Nevill Coghill , adon at Exeter College, Oxford, was commissioned to translate and adapt them forthe Third Programme. The Ta/es were broadcast the same year and two million people listened. In 1949, more of them were broadcast and, in 1951, the translations were published by Penguin. The book has never been out of print and has sold millions of copies around the world. Producer Erin Riley