Now, more than seventy years after its release, Poldark has yet another incarnation with the BBC re-launching the series for a new generation and with it has come a resurgence of interest in the original series of novels.
The romantic saga became so popular that at its peak it had more than 14 million viewers, with newspapers reporting that even church services were rescheduled to avoid clashing with the Sunday evening broadcast slot. Despite their long-standing popularity, the series really came to public consciousness with the first BBC adaptation, serialised between 19. The first Poldark novel, Ross Poldark, was published in 1945 and the whole series encompasses twelve novels, written throughout Graham’s life over a fifty-seven year period. Seen through the eyes of a cast of vividly realised characters, the novels centre on the ongoing love-triangle between headstrong, flawed romantic hero Ross Poldark, his lost former-fiancée, heiress Elizabeth and fiery, passionate miner’s daughter Demelza (modelled on Graham’s own wife, Jeann). Set in the late 18 th and early 19 th centuries in a small mining community living in and around Perranporth (Graham’s own home-town for more than 40 years), Graham’s hit series Poldark encapsulates the social and political changes of the industrial revolution. Graham continued to write thrillers throughout his lifetime, particularly in the 1950’s and 60’s when he also adapted many of his work for film and television, most famously for the unnerving psychological drama Marnie, directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1964.
Although undoubtedly best-known for his phenomenally successful Poldark series, Winston Graham was one of the most prolific writers of the Twentieth Century writing more than fifty works in his lifetime, from his first published novel in 1934 until his last in 2002.īorn in Manchester in 1908, the Graham family moved to Cornwall when Winston was a child and the area, with its striking scenery and rich cultural tradition, inspired many of his novels, providing a backdrop steeped in local folklore and a landscape indelibly shaped by its industrial heritage.Īlthough he is now known as a historical novelist, Graham’s first books were suspense-driven page-turners such as his 1941 novel Night Journey, set in Nazi-occupied Europe which captured the fears of a generation anticipating a future if the allies lost the war.
0 kommentar(er)
