Showing results by narrator "Peggy Ashcroft" in All Categories

Three powerful radio productions from the BBC archives starring Ian McKellen, Ronald Pickup and Paul Scofield and a host of celebrated acting talent. These three legendary plays, performed by some of the best-known theatrical actors of the 20th century, are the perfect way to commemorate England's greatest dramatist.

This is the collected BBC radio productions of the internationally renowned playwright Tom Stoppard. One of the giants of British theatre, Sir Tom Stoppard has been writing for the stage and screen for over 50 years. Full of wit, verbal brilliance and big ideas, his plays appeal to critics and audiences alike and are among the most studied works of the last century.

This recording contains four of Katherine Mansfield's best stories. In The Daughters of the Late Colonel, two sisters are recently bereaved; while in Her First Ball a young girl attends her first dance. The Singing Lesson features Miss Meadows, a music teacher in turmoil; and in The Stranger, a middle-aged couple are reunited.

Hailed by Arthur Miller as ‘the mad inventor of modern theatre’, Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, poet and novelist whose groundbreaking works mingled naturalism and psychology and paved the way for Expressionist drama. A prolific writer – penning over 60 plays, 19 novels and nine autobiographies – his turbulent life was marked by emotional conflict. This wide-ranging collection brings together 13 of his most important dramas and a semi-autobiographical ‘occult diary’, enhanced through stunning soundscapes and music composed by Strindberg himself.

Judith Bliss is a famous actress who, after a string of successful roles, has retired to her country retreat. Missing the adulation of her public, she has has invited a fan over for a weekend of uninterrupted adoration - unaware that the rest of her family has company arriving too. Hoping for...

Alfred Lord Tennyson is one of Britain’s greatest and most popular poets. Even during his lifetime, he was considered a national institution: Queen Victoria appointed him Poet Laureate in 1850, a position he held for 42 years, and in 1884 he became the first writer to be granted a baronetcy. In a long and fruitful career, he penned numerous classic works, and this BBC Radio collection showcases some of the very best. We begin with two of his masterpieces, dramatised by award-winning poet Michael Symmons Roberts.

Award-winning author Dame Susan Hill is best known for her hit ghost story The Woman in Black and her popular ‘Simon Serailler’ detective series, but she has also written extensively for radio. This audio anthology includes full-cast adaptations of two of her early novels, plus an additional 12 BBC Radio plays, many of them available for the very first time since their original broadcasts.

A collection of the greatest poetry from the Romantic period, read by some of the 20th century’s most renowned actors. Love, romance and portrayals of nature are played out in these timeless readings of poetry written during the Romantic period. Performed by Richard Burton, Peter Orr, William Squire, Richard Marquand, Peggy Ashcroft, Margaretta Scott, Tony Church, Derek Godfrey, Patrick Garland, Gary Watson and Janette Richer. This collection includes poems from: William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Blake, Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats.

Richard III is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in approximately 1591, depicting the Machiavellian rise to power and subsequent short reign of Richard III of England. The play is grouped among the histories in the First Folio and is most often classified as...

The best known of Chaucer's Canterbury's Tales, read by Dame Peggy Ashcroft. After a prologue, in which the Wife of Bath mentions that she would welcome another husband - who would be her sixth - and that she pursues power over her husbands, she tells a tale about a knight who must marry....

The Rape of Lucrece follows a popular story from one of Shakespeare's favourite ancient writers, Ovid. Lucrece is the angelic wife of Collatine, an illustrious Roman general. She is coveted and eventually attacked by Prince Tarquin, Collatine's best friend.

King Leontes of Bohemia suspects his wife, Hermione, and his friend, Polixenes, of betraying him. When he forces Polixenes to flee for his life, Leontes sets in motion a chain of events that lead to death, a ferocious bear, an infant left in the snow, young love, and a statue coming to life. Sir John Gielgud and Dame Peggy Ashcroft lead a cast recording of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale.

Count Claudio falls in love with Hero, the daughter of his host. Hero's cousin Beatrice (a confirmed spinster) and Benedict (an eternal bachelor) are each duped into believing the other is in love with them. Claudio is deceived by a malicious plot and denounces Hero as unchaste before they marry. She faints and is believed dead but recovers to be proved innocent by a chance discovery. Benedict wins Beatrice’s love defending her cousin’s honour, and to his surprise, Claudio is reunited with Hero, who he believed dead.

Hear the finest actors who have performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company perform some of the Bard's most treasured speeches. This recording includes world-class actors John Gielgud, Vanessa Redgrave, Peggy Ashcroft, and Edith Evans in a collection of favourite Shakespearean scenes.

Dame Peggy Ashcroft reads poems by Wordsworth, Byron, Tennyson, Shakespeare and Chaucer.