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Episode 5: Revival

Gail, Hazel, Anna and Donna Coonan of Virago Modern Classics gather round the table to talk about giving new life to forgotten voices, and Helen Bourne heads for the Pyramids with a young Priscilla Napier.


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Show Notes

Please find links to books, articles, and further reading listed below. The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 33 minutes; 31 seconds)

Books Mentioned

– Slightly Foxed Issue 61 (2:02)

– Priscilla Napier, A Late Beginner (4:41)

– L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables (12:00)

– Noel Streatfeild’s Christmas Stories (12:47)

– The Slightly Foxed Edition Gail refers to is Sword of Bone, Anthony Rhodes’s memoir of his experiences of WWII and being evacuated from Dunkirk (15:28)

– Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It, is available through Little, Brown Book Group (16:00)

– Winifred Watson, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, is available from Persephone Books (18:40)

– Eric Newby, Love and War in the Apennines (23:26)

– Mary Hocking’s trilogy of titles, Good Daughters, Indifferent Heroes and Welcome Strangers, are out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second-hand copies. Please get in touch for details (29:03)

– Graham Swift, Mothering Sunday (29:37)

– Sigrid Nunez, The Friend (30:06)

– Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow (30:48)

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

– Rowena Macdonald’s article on Philip Hensher’s Kitchen Venom was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 61 (2:18)

– Extract from Priscilla Napier’s memoir, A Late Beginner, read by Helen Bourne (23:54)

– Penelope Lively’s preface to A Late Beginner was also published as an article in Slightly Foxed Issue 21

Other Links

– The second-hand bookshop in Canada is called Reasons to Live Books & Records. A full list of Slightly Foxed stockists can be found on our website: Stockists (0:40)

– The Slightly Foxed Subscribers’ Competition 2019 (3:20)

– The Slightly Foxed Spring 2019 Readers’ Catalogue is available to view and download (3:46)

– The Faber Stories series was launched as part of Faber’s 90th anniversary publishing programme (3:52)

– Virago Modern Classics (6:31)

– Virago Children’s Classics (11:35)

– Persephone Books (18:27)

Music and sound effects:

Reading: introductory music Elgar’s Salut D’Amour by James Langevin.
Incidental music and sound effects courtesy of www.freesound.org.
Thanks to Diegolar for footsteps in the desert, to kyles for desert sounds with crickets and grb1029e for Egyptian Discovery.

The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable


Comments & Reviews

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  1. Letitia Clark says:

    The Slightly Foxed podcast is a delight.

  2. Linda Cameron says:

    Just thought you would like to know that I have listened to the latest edition of the podcast while 6 children are having a Nerf gun battle over the entire area of my house. Thank you for giving me a glance into a civilised, bullet-free world for half an hour. Back into the fray now with my head full of pyramids and books to order… Although better check under my sofa for hidden eggs first. Thanks again for such sage advice.

  3. Grainne Colgan says:

    I have just finished listening to the most recent podcast and my only disappointment is that it is not three times as long. It is an absolute pleasure and I look forward to the 15th of every month now.

  4. Peter Francis says:

    The podcasts are wonderful and really interesting, including aspects about the publishing business. Only criticism of the latest one is that I missed the dogs barking in the background!

  5. Wendy Edmond says:

    Thank you very much indeed for the fifth Slightly Foxed podcast which I have enjoyed instead of doing some urgent admin . . . much more fun! I always listen to it several times, and seem to hear more each time.

  6. Cecily Mills says:

    Introduced to me by a friend this morning. The 2nd half was more interesting. Also took me back to Menai hotel. We’d arrived in the dark and my first activity at 7 a.m. was to don swimsuit and dive into the pool. Returned on my back and wondered what the ‘fog’ was hiding, then amazed that it was the Great Pyramid. I did get into the centre later and the steward pointed to a centre spot where I sat and chanted. Total magic. The steward helped me up and hugged me. Goodness knows what my 6 companions thought. I have a photograph at the foot of my bed and go back for some healing. When I wasn’t paralysed I would ‘take’ my my reflexology clients with me and found it helped them too. Wish I could write like the author, loved her perspicacity.

  7. Kristy says:

    I have fallen in love with your podcast and many of the books that you recommend. I need to stop listening however because my list of what I’d like to read only grows and grows! Thank you for being a treasure!

  8. Lesley R says:

    I’m a bit behind on the podcasts, which I love, and have just listened to No 5. The years rolled back for me when the topic turned to Virago books. I well remember hearing a radio discussion in the 1970s, (maybe on Woman’s Hour?) about this new publishing company and thinking to myself that it sounded new and exciting. I still have my first Virago purchase, Precious Bane by Mary Webb.

    I don’t understand how Virago can be more than forty years old when I’m sure I’m scarcely older now than I was then!

  9. Michelle Duncan says:

    I just subscribed and was delighted to find the podcast! I’m trying not to go through them too fast and savor them. Where did you get the recording of the reading of A Late Beginner?

  10. Frances Berkman says:

    I’m a new subscriber and enjoying the podcasts in order. I remember Virago Modern Classics as such a wonderful source of great reads in my youth – thrilled to hear they are still going strong. A Gentleman in Moscow was one of my favourite books a couple of years back – thank you for these engaging book chats.

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