Richard and Claire are joined by novelist David Nicholls to consider Sue Townsend’s 1982 novel The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 ¾.
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Richard and Claire are joined by novelist Sarah Hall to consider Flora Thompson’s memoir Lark Rise to Candleford.
The bus was empty but for one passenger who sat halfway down the seats on the lower deck. The woman was the man’s wife and the boy’s mother and she was leaving.
Buying a council house is supposed to give working-class people the rights and privileges of middle-class homeowners. But it doesn’t.
Georgia Poplett’s introduction to the plot, characters and historical background of Sue Townsend’s novel about a young working-class intellectual in 1980s Leicester.
Lark Rise to Candleford is a classic of English working-class literature, but is commonly thought of as a cosy, nostalgic memoir. Why?
Craig McLean joins us to consider the place of Irvine Welsh’s novel in our library.
Whatever you think about Trainspotting, 30 years after publications, it’s a book that deserves to be taken seriously.
**“So if you ask me what motivates me to write about buses, it’s that so little attention is paid to the significance they have for people who have no other means of getting around. The quality of their commute is their quality of life.”**
If you don’t understand why the Beckhams are working class heroes, maybe you don’t understand the working class.
Willy Vlautin has won the Joyce Carol Oates prize for his heartbreaking novel **The Horse.** The Bee met up with him to talk about his hard-living characters, Trump, and his worst-ever job.
Louise Doughty joins us to consider the place of Hilary Mantel’s memoir in our library.
Her working-class background was overlooked, but the double-Booker winner said it determined how she saw the world.
When you’re a child, your social class doesn’t determine how good you are at reading and writing. Yet half of our published writers are from middle-class backgrounds, and only 10 per cent are working class. Why?
How I revolutionised mascara at the age of seven in my mum’s car and how she didn’t understand.
Gissing expert Simon James joins us to consider how **New Grub Street** became so topical again, and to ask if it deserves a place in our fantasy library.
How the troubled George Gissing inspired Orwell, and foretold the influence of Amazon, BookTok and poverty porn.
**“Life was hard in the city over the river. The summer’s riots still smouldered. Then one day, a car crossed the river. A Merc, with windows tinted darker than the night.”**
**“From the top of the hilly field, he looked down to the factories where he used to work, dog treats, loose change and his phone jangling in his fleece pocket.”** Mie Murasa looks back on her friendship with her grandad in Noughties Sheffield.
How did it become so hard to get paid what you’re owed?
