Tea or Books? – Page 11 – Stuck in a Book

I was SO excited that Jenny agreed to join me and Rachel on ‘Tea or Books?’ while she was visiting England – her podcast, Reading the End, was one of the two book podcasts that inspired me to start my own, so it seems like a perfect circle that she joins us as we’re nearing our second anniversary.

In this episode, inspired by her blog and podcast name, Jenny asked if we discuss whether or not we like hearing spoilers – and, in the second half, we debate Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery and Daddy Long-Legs by Jean Webster. Guys, this podcast was SO FUN to record.

We were crowded around one mic – the first time Rachel and I have ever recorded a podcast in person – so forgive any issues with the sound quality or variability.

Here’s our iTunes page, and here are the books and authors we mention in this episode:

The Pelicans by E.M. Delafield
Country Notes by Vita Sackville-West
Friends and Relations by Elizabeth Bowen
The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey
The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien
Miss Mole by E.H. Young
Chatterton Square by E.H. Young
Once a Week by A.A. Milne
The Red House Mystery by A.A. Milne
23 Things They Don’t Tell You About Capitalism by Ha-Joon Chang
Long Live Great Bardfield by Tirzah Garwood
Not So Quiet by Helen Zenna Smith
All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
Anything is Possible by Elizabeth Strout
Persuasion by Jane Austen
Emma by Jane Austen
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
Sunlight on the Lawn by Beverley Nichols
Threads: the Delicate Life of John Craske by Julia Blackburn
Sylvia Townsend Warner
A Footman for the Peacock by Rachel Ferguson
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler
We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
Muriel Spark
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Enid Blyton
Emily of New Moon by L.M. Montgomery
What Katy Did by Susan Coolidge
Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter
Anne of Avonlea by L.M. Montgomery
Anne of the Island by L.M. Montgomery
Dear Enemy by Jean Webster
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
The Children Who Lived in a Barn by Eleanor Graham

Tea or Books? #38: male characters by women vs female characters by men, and Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont vs At The Jerusalem

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? May 1, 2017BaileyP, podcast, Taylor 8 Comments

Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Bailey, and a bit of a debate about male and female characters. Here’s episode 38 – which is unusually short, but hopefully fun nonetheless. I’ve left in an amusing moment of drama…

Many thanks to Kaisha for suggesting men written by women vs women written by me – we had fun discussing it, and very much welcome everybody’s feedback. For the second half, we debate two books about old people’s homes – Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor and At The Jerusalem by Paul Bailey, which have a sort-of connection that readers of Virago Modern Classics introductions might have cottoned on to.

Do let us know any topics you’d like us to discuss – and which you’d pick from each category. Check out our iTunes page over here – ratings and reviews through iTunes or podcast apps always much appreciated. And hopefully we’ll back with a special guest next time…

Books and authors we mention in this episode are as follows…

The Sleeper Awakes by H.G. Wells
Ann Veronica by H.G. Wells
The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
Don’t Tell Alfred by Nancy Mitford
Love in a Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford
The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
Pamela by Samuel Richardson
Clarissa by Samuel Richardson
Ian McEwan
Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Mrs Harris series by Paul Gallico
Miss Hargreaves by Frank Baker
Jacob’s Room by Virginia Woolf
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Provincial Lady series by E.M. Delafield
Ian and Felicity by Denis Mackail
Charles Dickens
Can You Forgive Her? by Anthony Trollope
The Eustace Diamonds by Anthony Trollope
The Warden by Anthony Trollope
Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollope
Sybil by Benjamin Disraeli
Adam Bede by George Eliot
The Professor by Charlotte Bronte
Shirley by Charlotte Bronte
Elizabeth Gaskell
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
The Girl With Glass Feet by Ali Shaw
V.S. Naipaul
The Go-Between by L.P. Hartley
Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
At The Jerusalem by Paul Bailey
Ivy Compton-Burnett
Memento Mori by Muriel Spark
Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
Daddy Long-Legs by Jean Webster

Tea or Books? #37: does studying books ruin them? and A View From the Bridge vs Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? April 19, 2017Albee, MillerA, podcast 5 Comments

Arthur Miller, Edward Albee, and schooldays – we’ve got it all in episode 37 (depending on your definition of ‘all’).

In the first half of this episode, we meander around the topic of whether or not studying a book at school ruins them for us. The topic was suggested by Karen (thanks Karen!) and it was really fun to discuss from the perspective of student and teacher. We got a bit preoccupied by Shakespeare, but that’s true of all the best of people.

Rachel and I went to see an amazing production of Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Harold Pinter theatre – tickets here! – and it inspired us to compare it with Arthur Miller’s play from around the same time, A View From the Bridge.

Check out our iTunes page, listen above or via your podcast app of choice, rate and review if you so wish, and send us any suggestions you have for future episodes! Thanks for those who tweeted their responses to our school question.

The books and authors we mention in this episode are:

Idaho by Emily Ruskovich
Richard Yates
Wallace Stegner
William Maxwell
Alice Munro
Gossip From Thrush Green by Miss Read
Dorothy Whipple
Fairacres series by Miss Read
Richmal Crompton
Merry Hall by Beverley Nichols
E.F. Benson
A Case of Human Bondage by Beverley Nichols
Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham
The Three Sisters by May Sinclair
Pink Sugar by O. Douglas
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Emma by Jane Austen
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernieres
Hard Times by Charles Dickens
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane
Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson
The House of Sixty Fathers by Meindert DeJong
Cider With Rosie by Laurie Lee
Beloved by Toni Morrison
A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare
Molière
Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks
A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams
All My Sons by Arthur Miller
Noel Coward
Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
At The Jerusalem by Paul Bailey

Tea or Books? #36: audiobooks (yes or no?) and two Furrowed Middlebrow novels

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? April 3, 2017April 2, 2017Fair, Orange, podcast 35 Comments

Ursula Orange, Elizabeth Fair, and audiobooks – it’s fair to say that people probably won’t know that much about the authors today, but they are both among the Furrowed Middlebrow reprint series published by Dean Street Press. Any fan of middlebrow novels should certainly hunt out this series.

For the first half of the episode, we’re talking audiobooks – in a fairly uninformed way, it turns out, so do let us know if you have any suggestions for narrators or audiobooks that we should try. And suggestions for future topics, of course – we’ve had a few come in, and that’s exciting, and I keep meaning to write them all down in one place…

Head over to our iTunes page, should you so wish – we love the reviews we’ve been getting in (thanks!), which you can do through podcast apps or whatnot.

The books and authors we mention this episode (mostly in passing, as usual) are:

Arthur and Sherlock by Michael Sims
The Story of Charlotte’s Web by Michael Sims
Letters From England by Mollie Panter-Downes
London War Notes by Mollie Panter-Downes
The Pleasures of Reading: A Booklover’s Alphabet by Catherine Sheldrick Ross
Lives For Sale ed. by Mark Bostridge
Hillary Spurling
Ivy Compton-Burnett
Hermione Lee
Claire Tomalin
Ann Thwaite
School For Love by Olivia Manning
The Balkan Trilogy by Olivia Manning
Elizabeth Jane Howard
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Cogheart by Peter Bunzl
John Green
To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
Agatha Christie
The Return of Alfred by Herbert Jenkins
The Provincial Lady Goes Further by E.M. Delafield
The Egg and I by Betty Macdonald
Chelbury Abbey by Denis Mackail
The Majestic Mystery by Denis Mackail
Tom Tiddler’s Ground by Ursula Orange
A Winter Away by Elizabeth Fair
Miss Read
Richmal Crompton
Barbara Pym
Angela Thirkell
To The North by Elizabeth Bowen
Put Out More Flags by Evelyn Waugh
Dorothy Whipple
A Wreath For the Enemy by Pamela Frankau
Mr Fortune’s Maggot by Sylvia Townsend Warner
The Lark by E. Nesbit
Rachel Ferguson
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee

Tea or Books? #35: do we want to meet our favourite authors, and The Magnificent Spinster vs The Rector’s Daughter

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? March 14, 2017Mayor, podcast, Sarton 17 Comments

May Sarton and F.M. Mayor go up against each other, and we chat about whether or not we want to meet our favourite authors (living or dead!)

Our episodes are getting a little more sporadic as we’re doing more reading specifically for them… depending on us managing to read the books. This is what happens when we run out of books we’ve both read and remembered!

In episode 35, we chat about authors we have met and authors we’d like to meet. In the second, we look at two novels about spinsters published at different ends of the 20th century – May Sarton’s The Magnificent Spinster and F.M. Mayor’s The Rector’s Daughter – and chat a bit about other spinster novels we’ve liked.

Btw, our plan for next episode is to read Tom Tiddler’s Ground by Ursula Orange and A Winter Away by Elizabeth Fair. (We don’t mention that on the podcast.)

You can check out our iTunes page, or listen through all the normal ways. Y’all know the drill. Reviews and ratings super welcome if you can battle with iTunes.

Let us know which you’d pick in each category, and any suggestions you have for future topics!

Books and authors we talk about in this episode…

A Child of the Jago by Arthur Morrison
Ian and Felicity by Denis Mackail
Greenery Street by Denis Mackail
Young Anne by Dorothy Whipple
Susan and Joanna by Elizabeth Cambridge
Arthur and Sherlock: Conan Doyle and the Creation of Holmes by Michael Sims
The Story of Charlotte’s Web by Michael Sims
Sarah Waters
Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner
Marilynne Robinson
Alan Hollinghurst
Angela Young
Fell by Jenn Ashworth
The Runaway by Claire Wong
Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
P.D. James
Hilary Mantel
A Curious Friendship by Anna Thomasson
Diary of a Provincial Lady by E.M. Delafield
A.A. Milne
Jane Austen
Virginia Woolf
The Rector’s Daughter by F.M. Mayor
The Magnificent Spinster by May Sarton
As We Are Now by May Sarton
The Love Child by Edith Olivier
‘The Daughters of the Late Colonel’ by Katherine Mansfield
Life and Death of Harriett Frean by May Sinclair
Alas, Poor Lady by Rachel Ferguson
Father by Elizabeth von Arnim
Emma by Jane Austen
Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead by Barbara Comyns
The Song of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
‘Paul Revere’s Ride’ by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The Third Miss Symons by F.M. Mayor
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

Tea or Books? #34: novels based on real life: yes or no?, and A Pin To See The Peepshow vs Messalina of the Suburbs

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? February 19, 2017Delafield, Jesse, podcast 8 Comments

E M Delafield, F Tennyson Jesse, and novels about real people – that’s what’s on the menu for episode 34.

It’s very nice to have Rachel back (hi Rachel!) and we’ve both been doing homework for this episode – reading these novels specially to discuss them. Which hopefully means we have some more details to hand than usual – but it can get confusing, so here is a handy guide to help you get through the slightly confusing interlinking of these two novels and real life. It’s the woman, the lover, and the husband in each case. (All will become clear when you listen.)

The people in real life: Edith / Frederick / Percy
A Pin To See The Peepshow: Julia / Leo / Herbert
Messalina of the Suburbs: Elsie / Leslie / Horace

Hope that helps! As always, let us know if you have any choices to make – and if you have any suggestions for future episodes. As long as it can be in an ‘X vs Y’ format, we’ll consider it! Our iTunes page is here, and you can rate/review through iTunes itself, should you so wish :)

Incidentally, I did some counting while editing this podcast episode, and it turns out this is the 23rd book I’ve read by E.M. Delafield!

The books and authors we mention in this episode…

A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope
Daphne in Fitzroy Street by E Nesbit
The True Heart by Sylvia Townsend Warner
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
Virginia Woolf in Manhattan by Maggie Gee
Vanessa and Her Sister by Priya Parmar
Vanessa and Virginia by Susan Sellers
The Hours by Michael Cunningham
Josephine Tey Mysteries by Nicola Upson
The Oscar Wilde Murder Mysteries by Gyles Brandreth
The Three Sisters by May Sinclair
The Brontes Went To Woolworths by Rachel Ferguson
Regeneration by Pat Barker
The Blue Flower by Penelope Fitzgerald
At Freddie’s by Penelope Fitzgerald
Human Voices by Penelope Fitzgerald
The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald
Amadeus by Peter Shaffer
Virginia Woolf and the Servants by Alison Light
Travesties by Ed Stoppard
Hedda Gabler by Henrik Ibsen
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
Summer in February by Jonathan Smith
A Pin To See The Peepshow by F Tennyson Jesse
Messalina of the Suburbs by E M Delafield
The Suburban Young Man by E M Delafield
The Lacquer Lady by F Tennyson Jesse
The Rector’s Daughter by F M Mayor
The Magnificent Spinster by May Sarton

Tea or Books? #33: a Thomas twins crossover special!

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? January 30, 2017January 27, 2017Lewis, podcast 9 Comments

C.S. Lewis, Meryl Streep, and Alfred Hitchcock! What do they have in common? They all appear in this special crossover episode – where Tea or Books? meets my brother’s podcast The C of Z of Movies.

That’s right – Rachel agreed to sit this episode out, as did Col’s podcast partner Zijian, and we combined our two podcasts. In the first half, Colin talks about his reading tastes – and we look at The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis. Briefly. In the second half we pick our favourite and least favourite Meryl Streep films, and quiz each other on some Alfred Hitchcock films.

So, yes, this is all pretty shambolic. We had fun… hopefully you did too? Maybe? And Rachel and I will be back next time as normal – as Col will be on his podcast. His plot to steal all our listeners might just work. (Btw, if you want to join in our reading for next time, Messalina of the Suburbs by E.M. Delafield is very cheaply available on Kindle. A Pin to See the Peepshow by F. Tennyson Jesse is not.)

You can find the iTunes page for Tea or Books? over here – many thanks for the reviews that I found! I didn’t realise you could only see reviews for your country unless you went hunting.

Here are the books – and films! – we talk about in this episode. In an effort to avoid some confusion, I’ve put the films in non-italics.

How Not To Be Wrong by Jordan Ellenberg
The Grasshopper King (I guess??) by Jordan Ellenberg
But What If We’re Wrong? by Chuck Klosterman
The Death of Noble Godavary by Vita Sackville-West
Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit by P.G. Wodehouse
The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan
Tune In: The Beatles by Mark Lewisohn
Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
Agatha Christie
The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis
The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis
The Horse and His Boy by C.S. Lewis
The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
A Grief Observed by C.S. Lewis
Elena Ferrante
The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis
Prince Caspian by C.S. Lewis
Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
The Magic Faraway Tree by Enid Blyton
Mistress Masham’s Repose by T.H. White
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Hours
The Hours by Michael Cunningham
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Stepbrothers
The Secret Garden
It’s a Boy/Girl Thing
She’s The Man
Life in a Day
Iris
La-La Land
Bridget Jones’s Baby
Trainwreck
The Devil Wears Prada
The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger
A.I.: Artificial Intelligence
Sophie’s Choice
Sophie’s Choice by William Styron
The Iron Lady
Death Becomes Her
Mamma Mia!
Prime
Lions For Lambs
Suffragette
Evening
Evening by Susan Minot (not Anne anything)
The Deer-Hunter
Manhattan
Kramer vs Kramer
Florence Foster Jenkins
Postcards From the Edge
Into The Woods
Notorious
Vertigo
Psycho
Rear Window
The Birds
Strangers on a Train
Spellbound
Shadow of a Doubt
Rope
Rebecca
Gaslight by Patrick Hamilton
The Slaves of Solitude by Patrick Hamilton
Hacksaw Ridge
Marnie
Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith
The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
The Two Faces of January by Patricia Highsmith
Throw Momma From The Train
Lawrence of Arabia
The Grapes of Wrath
Going My Way
Lifeboat
The Lost Weekend
On the Waterfront
The Apartment
Messalina of the Suburbs by E.M. Delafield
A Pin to See the Peepshow by F. Tennyson Jesse

Tea or Books? #32: jobs in books, and Atonement vs On Chesil Beach

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? January 17, 2017McEwan, podcast 8 Comments

Ian McEwan helps us get dangerously modern in our latest ‘Tea or Books?’ episode, as we chat about Atonement and On Chesil Beach (along with a whole bunch of his other books) – while, in the first half, we discuss whether or not we want to read novels in which one or more characters do our jobs. You can see why I have opted for something briefer in our subject line.

As announced, there’s a crossover episode next time – I will be joined by my brother Colin, doing half-books and half-movies. Check out his podcast (especially if you want some clues as to what the format might be). Sorry that Rachel will be absent for an episode – but she’ll be back for glorious episode 34, in which we’ll be discussing E.M. Delafield’s Messalina of the Suburbs and F Tennyson Jesse’s A Pin to See The Peepshow. You’ve got a whole month to prepare!

As usual, our iTunes page is over yonder. Rate and review if you can work out the internal mazes of iTunes!

Here are the (many!) books and authors we natter about in this episode:

Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens
Reuben Sachs by Amy Levy
My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
Matilda by Roald Dahl
Stoner by John Williams
Goodbye Mr Chips by James Hilton
Hard Times by Charles Dickens
Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens
Then We Came To An End by Joshua Ferris
Tepper Isn’t Going Out by Calvin Trillin
A Far Cry From Kensington by Muriel Spark
Greengates by R.C. Sherriff
London Belongs To Me by Norman Collins
Faster! Faster! by E.M. Delafield
High Wages by Dorothy Whipple
The Home-Maker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald
The Vicar of Wakefield by Oliver Goldsmith
The Chronicles of Barsetshire by Anthony Trollope
Dr Thorne by Anthony Trollope
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
Hearts and Minds by Rosy Thornton
The Sandcastle by Iris Murdoch
The Professor’s House by Willa Cather
Seasoned Timber by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
Observatory Mansions by Edward Carey
Alva and Irva by Edward Carey
Untouchable by Mulk Raj Anand (actually published in 1935, not 1910, sorry!)
Atonement by Ian McEwan
On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan
Enduring Love by Ian McEwan
Black Dogs by Ian McEwan
Saturday by Ian McEwan
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Ulysses by James Joyce
Nutshell by Ian McEwan
Virginia by Jens Christian Grøndahl
A Kind of Intimacy by Jenn Ashworth
Wish Her Safe at Home by Stephen Benatar
Solar by Ian McEwan
Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan
Amsterdam by Ian McEwan
The Child in Time by Ian McEwan
Messalina of the Suburbs by E.M. Delafield
A Pin to See The Peepshow by F. Tennyson Jesse
The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

Tea or Books? #31: lists, yes or no? and The Fortnight in September vs Greengates

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? January 2, 2017podcast, Sherriff 13 Comments

Happy new year! Rachel and I are back from a bit of a podcast break, and raring to go for the New Year.

In this episode, we look at two novels by R.C. Sherriff, both published by Persephone, and we also look back over 2016 and debate whether or not we make and read Best Books of the Year lists. Look, it’s just a way for us to shoe-horn in an overview of our favourite reads from 2016.

As always, we’d love to know what you’d choose from each category, and any ideas you have for future episodes. We’re always so grateful for those – though sometimes we haven’t yet read the authors people mention. We’ll work on it!

Listen to us above, via iTunes, or your podcast app of choice. I’ve been asking people to leave a review at the iTunes site, but it turns out you can only do that through the iTunes app or programme, maybe?

Anyway, we’ll loving being back – apologies for a bit of poor sound quality at times – and here are the books and authors we mention in this episode:

Witness for the Prosecution by R.C. Sherriff
4.50 From Paddington by Agatha Christie
Magnificent Obsession by Helen Rappaport
Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens
Third Girl by Agatha Christie
Curiosity by Alberto Manguel
Over the Footlights and Other Fancies by Stephen Leacock
The Lark by E. Nesbit
Patricia Brent, Spinster by Herbert Jenkins
The Lost Europeans by Emanuel Litvinoff
Cider With Rosie by Laurie Lee
The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry
The Cazalet Chronicles by Elizabeth Jane Howard
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
Complete Works by William Shakespeare
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
Mapp and Lucia by E.F. Benson
Messalina of the Suburbs by E.M. Delafield
A Pin to See The Peepshow by F. Tennyson Jesse
To The Bright Edge of the World by Eowyn Ivey
Margaret Atwood
Possession by A.S. Byatt
Terms and Conditions by Ysenda Maxtone Graham
Daisy’s Aunt by E.F. Benson
Compton Mackenzie
A Far Cry From Kensington by Muriel Spark
Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner
The Museum of Cheats by Sylvia Townsend Warner
The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
The Fortnight in September by R.C. Sherriff
Greengates by R.C. Sherriff
The Hopkins Manuscript by R.C. Sherriff
Bricks and Mortar by Helen Ashton
Journey’s End by R.C. Sherriff
(The Cataclysm turns out to be The Hopkins Manuscript under the same name!)

Tea or Books? #30: artists vs musicians, and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie vs A Far Cry From Kensington

StuckinaBook Tea or Books? December 12, 2016December 10, 2016podcast, Spark 10 Comments

Muriel Spark, artists, and musicians in our final episode of 2016 – it was a fun one to record.

We wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy new year, and fingers crossed for a wonderful 2017 for us all. Recording these episodes has certainly been a highlight in 2016, and we love hearing from you.

In the first half of the episode, we talk about artists and musicians in books – whether real or fictional – and which we prefer. Turning to our second section, we discuss an author I’ve been wanting to chat about the podcast for ages – Muriel Spark, more particularly The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and A Far Cry From Kensington.

Listen above, via a podcast app, or at our iTunes page. Rate, review, etc.! We’ve now had five ratings, which is exciting, as it means they’re displayed and we’re on 5 stars – THANKS GUYS.

Here are the books and authors we discuss in this episode:

Round the Christmas Fire by Nancy Mitford, Laurie Lee, Truman Capote et al
Dickens at Christmas
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
The Santa Klaus Murder by Mavis Doriel Hay
Mystery in White by J.J. Farjeon
Curiosity by Alberto Manguel
A Reader on Reading by Alberto Manguel
The Library at Night by Alberto Manguel
Stevenson under the Palm Trees by Alberto Manguel
Goosebumps series by R.L. Stine
To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
The Fountain Overflows by Rebecca West
Emma by Jane Austen
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Illyrian Spring by Ann Bridge (apologies for my terrible geography!)
Guard Your Daughters by Diana Tutton
Mapp and Lucia series by E.F. Benson
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell (see the sculpture in my review)
House of Silence by Linda Gillard
Cazalet Chronciles by Elizabeth Jane Howard
Girl With a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier
Lydia Cassatt Reading the Morning Paper by Harriet Chessman
Summer in February by Jonathan Smith
Winnie and Wolf by A.N. Wilson
Evenfield by Rachel Ferguson
A Far Cry From Kensington by Muriel Spark
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
Child of Light by Muriel Spark
John Masefield by Muriel Spark
Barbara Pym
The Only Problem by Muriel Spark
The Girls of Slender Means by Muriel Spark
Loitering With Intent by Muriel Spark
Memento Mori by Muriel Spark
The Driver’s Seat by Muriel Spark
The Takeover by Muriel Spark
R.C. Sherriff