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BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

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15 Minute Drama

Drama

Classic and contemporary original drama and book dramatisations

Pippa Bennett-Warner

Guy Paul

Petra Letang

PJ Brennan

Sasha Pick

Adjoa Andoh

Marion Nancarrow

Janice Okoh

Kate Chopin

15 Minute Drama: The Awakening: Episode 1

The Awakening

Episode 1

BBC Radio 4 - 15 Minute Drama, The Awakening, Episode 1

The novel published in 1899 that ushered in the age of early American feminist literature.

4 Extra Debut. 1899. The attentions of dashing Robert Lebrun amuse Edna Pontellier. Novel which shocked America. Stars Pippa Bennett-Warner. From August 2014.

by Kate Chopin, dramatised by Janice Okoh

Holidaying on Grand Isle in 1899, Edna Pontellier feels she is living in a dream, so the attentions of the dashing young Robert Lebrun serve merely to amuse her.

Edna Pontellier ..... Pippa Bennett-Warner
Leonce Pontellier ..... Guy Paul
Celestine ..... Petra Letang
Robert Lebrun ..... PJ Brennan
Adele Ratignolle ..... Sasha Pick
Madame LeBrun ..... Adjoa Andoh
 
Produced and directed by Marion Nancarrow
 
When it was published in 1899, Kate Chopin's novel shocked society and divided critics. Respectable, married Edna Pontellier, 28, is away from her home in New Orleans, holidaying on Grand Isle in the Gulf of Mexico with her husband and children. Teaching her to swim is the debonair young Robert Lebrun, known for forming an attachment with a different woman every summer. Despite warnings from her more conventional friend, Adele, Edna falls incontrovertibly for Robert. When he leaves Louisana for Mexico, Edna realises she's been "awakened" and questions everything: her marriage, her position, the society she lives in. But what is left for her? The novel is regarded by many as the first in a new wave of modern American literature.

15 Minute Drama: The Awakening

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Steamy adaptation of the Kate Chopin novel that shocked America in 1899.

Steamy adaptation of the Kate Chopin novel that shocked America in 1899. Dramatised by Janice Okoh.

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The Awakening

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