Radio Dramas

Nell Leyshon's play, The Colour of Milk, adapted from her novel, was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in May 2013 Set in 1830. A farmer's young daughter is asked to care for the vicar's sick wife, and live in. The invalid gradually deteriorates and dies, ...

As part of the series Writing the Century, The Iron Curtain is a five-part series broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2011 Nell Leyshon's "The Iron Curtain"  is inspired by the diaries of Paula Kirby, who went to teach English in East Germany in the ...

The pressure on teenagers to succeed in school exams is greater now than ever before — especially for girls. Nell Leyshon created her drama Jess' Story for Children in Need with young people facing mental health challenges who attend a School which has special facilities ...

Nell Leyshon's play Sons was the Afternoon Drama on BBC Radio 4 in 2009. Synopsis The play focuses on the uneasy relationship between teacher Elizabeth and stay-at-home mum Jane who have just one thing in common: they each have a son. Gabriel and Ryan met ...

War Bride was first broadcast as the Afternoon Drama on BBC Radio 4 in 2006 Synopsis The Second World War is over and Eleanor and Clarence are on a ship, emigrating to Canada. Young Eleanor is running away from the farm she grew up on ...

Adapted from Nell Leyshon's novel, the radio drama Black Dirt was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in 2006 Synopsis Frank Lovell lies ill in bed, attended by his mentally handicapped son and his daughter and son-in-law. As the morphine enters his bloodstream, suppressed memories of ...

Soldier Boy was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in August 2005 Synopsis John returns a day early from Iraq on leave to his pregnant wife, young son and their home in army barracks. Claire soon realises that something is wrong. As their two worlds, ...

The House In The Trees was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in December 2004 Synopsis Mary lives alone with her father in a house with an eccentric garden he has made, which is open to the public. Teased at school for being "the garden girl", ...

Michael,  a radio version of the William Wordsworth poem, with new dramatised scenes by Nell Leyshon was broadcast in 2004 by BBC Radio 4.  Michael tells the story of Cumbrian sheep farmer Michael and his only son, Luke, who is forced to leave the family ...

Glass Eels, adapted from Nell Leyshon's stage play, was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2003. Synopsis During a heady, hot summer, a young girl's sexual awakening is coloured by shadows of her early childhood. Sixteen-year-old Lily lives on the Somerset levels. Lonely, harbouring ...

The Home Field, a drama documentary using poetry and prose to examine the current state of farming in Somerset was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in July 2003 Synopsis Compton Dundon, a village on the edge of the Somerset Levels, was steeped in dairy farming ...

Adapted from her stage play, Nell Leyshon's The Farm was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2002. Synopsis In a farmhouse kitchen, Rose is trying to hold things together in a changing uncertain world. Her father-in-law Edmond is in the early stages of Alzheimer's, her ...

Milk, by Nell Leyshon, was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2002 as part of Double Acts, a series of plays by writers new to radio. Synopsis Mary and David have had to leave the dairy farm where they brought up their two boys ...