Brian Thompson - winner of 2006 Costa Biography Award

Brian Thompson, winner of the 2006 Costa Biography Award, talks about his book Keeping Mum.

The interview, commissioned by Costa, was shown at the Costa book of the Year awards ceremony in London on Wednesday 7th February 2007.

About the book:
Mum and Dad - Squibs and Bert were a complete mystery to Brian Thompson as he grew up in Cambridge and London during the 1940s. His mother danced with the Yanks all night and slept under a fake fur coat all day. When his father bothered to come home, he resolutely discouraged Brian in everything. Other children were evacuated out of the big cities, but Brian found himself travelling into the capital. He spent much of the Blitz with an eccentric swarm of relations whose geography was the street, the pub, the market and two or three useful tramlines. Brian was snatched from his working-class roots by the Butler Act of 1944 and given an education that would lead to Cambridge University, books, pipe-smoking and rose trellises.




About the author:
Brian Thompson was born in Lambeth, London in 1935. He undertook national service in Kenya and taught in secondary and adult education for 15 years. Since 1973 he has written for a living as a radio and television playwright and documentary film-maker. He is also the author of several acclaimed biographies and seven stage plays. He currently lives in Oxford.

For more info, see http://www.costabookawards.com

Category:

Film & Animation

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• book
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• brian
• thompson

[richpriceys]

Really enjoyed Brian Thompson's book 'Keeping Mum'. Resonated with my own childhood experiences with a wayward mum and absent dad in the context of wartime Britain, the video fleshes it all out showing that nostalgia is what it used to be. I'll read more.