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Short stories or abridged books, often from new writers

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Afternoon Reading: Malachi Whitaker - The Crystal Fountain

Malachi Whitaker

Moira Quirk

Martin Jarvis

Afternoon Reading: Malachi Whitaker - The Crystal Fountain: Episode 2: Strange Music

The Crystal Fountain

Episode 2

Episode 2: Strange Music

Malachi Whitaker - The Crystal Fountain

Strange Music

BBC Radio 4 - Afternoon Reading, Malachi Whitaker - The Crystal Fountain, Strange MusicSearch BBC

The story of a young girl's visit to a northern dance hall. Why doesn't she want to dance?

Written in 1934, the strange story of a young girl's visit to a northern dance hall. Why doesn't she want to dance? And why is she nervous? Read by Moira Quirk.

Martin Jarvis directs Moira Quirk in Malachi Whitaker's moving short story of a young girl's visit to a dance hall on a rainy night with her friend. But why does Cora send Joyce though to the dance-floor alone. Why does she remain outside? Is she waiting for someone? Then the young man she's come to see is standing in front of her. 

It's Danny Dunne, the band leader. He tells her she shouldn't have come. She tells him urgently that she wants to see him again. 'I want us to be alone again together,' she says. 'You know what I want.' He nervous, telling her he's got to be careful. But what is the real story between these two? Does Cora have a hidden agenda? And is there more to diffident Danny than there seems?

Malachi Whitaker was prolific in the 1920s and '30, writing with compassion and perception about ordinary folk, invariably setting the stories in her native Yorkshire. She became known as 'the Chekhov of the north' because of her sympathetic observation of the minutiae of human beings and their (often comic) behaviour.

Producer/Director: Martin Jarvis 
A Jarvis & Ayres Production for BBC Radio 4.

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A selection of short stories by Malachi Whitaker

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Afternoon Reading

Malachi Whitaker - The Crystal Fountain

Episode 2: Strange Music

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