Poetry Extra: Stories In Verse

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BBC Radio 4 Extra

Poetry Extra

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Weekly opportunity for listeners to revisit the riches of the BBC radio poetry archive

A brand new poetry slot on Radio 4 Extra gives listeners a weekly opportunity to revisit the riches of the BBC radio poetry archive

Poetry Extra: Stories In Verse - The Arthurian Legend

Stories In Verse - The Arthurian Legend

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Poetry Extra, Stories In Verse - The Arthurian Legend

Daljit Nagra selects a poetry programme from the BBC's archives with Dame Judi Dench.

Daljit Nagra selects Stories in Verse - The Arthurian Legend with Judi Dench reading poems by Alfred Lord Tennyson.

Daljit Nagra signs off 2023 with a special treat.

He's uncovered a recording of Dame Judi Dench reading two of Alfred Lord Tennyson's most well-known poems

'Stories in Verse - The Arthurian Legend'. features:    

The Lady of Shalott 
Morte d’Arthur

Tennyson was fascinated by the stories of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table - charismatic figures who galloped around the country challenging the King's enemies and helping ladies in distress.   Arthur probably lived in the 5th/6th century, but little else is known for certain.  

Tennyson published the Lady of Shalott in 1832 - when he was just 23 years old.  

He spent many years studying the stories and eventually retold them in a collection of long poems - The Idylls of the King.  The first edition proved a block-buster selling 10,000 copies in 6 weeks!

The collection incorporated an account of the death of Arthur which Tennyson had written years before following the death of his close friend Arthur Hallam.

King Arthur returns from a war in France to face a rebellion by his nephew.   A bitter battle takes place and Tennyson takes up the story in Morte d'Arthur.

Dame Judi Dench is one of Britain's most eminent actors.  

Her Oscar winning career began with a stage debut of Hamlet in 1957 and has gone on to include film and television - M in the Bond films and starring with Geoffrey Palmer in As Time Goes By.  In 1988 Judi Dench became a Dame and in 1998 won an Academy Award for her role in Shakespeare in Love.  Most recently she has appeared in the films Belfast (as Kenneth Branagh's grandmother) and Spirited Away.  

Presenter: Joy Boatman

First broadcast on the BBC World Service in March 1994.

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