This is a strong contender for my favourite audiobook, as in read by a single reader, of all time. It probably helps that I'm fond of the story. I was familiar with the story before finding out that there had been a Kenneth Williams reading on Radio 4. For years I hoped that Radio 7/4X would air it. This they did in 2016. No further repeats since then.
I even prefer this to the 4 hour Radio 4 play from 1981.
http://www.mediafire.com/folder/qu1ezos77kg9y/Kenneth_Williams_Reads_CCF_BBCR4_1974-75
Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
read by Kenneth Williams
BBC Radio 4 1974-75
abridged in six parts and produced by Pamela Howe
9 December 1974 19.30 - 20.00
1: Child, child, if you come to this doomed house, what is to save you?
In 1932 this book was acclaimed as a wickedly funny send-up of a certain kind of heavy-breathing novel about the doom-laden everyday life of country folk. Since then it has become a classic of comedy in its own right.
16 December 1974 19.30 - 20.00
2: There's a curse on us, Robert Poste's child.
Flora meets more cousins and offers suggestions to try and improve the lives of those on the farm.
23 December 1974 19.30 - 20.00
3: I saw something nasty in the woodshed....
Flora opts to help those she meets, including Elfine and Big Business the Bull.
30 December 1974 19.30 - 20.00
4: When the sukebind opens, all the trouble begins.
Will Flora's marriage plans for Elfine triumph, and will she finally meet her Aunt Ada Doom?
6 January 1975 19.30 - 20.00
5: Curses, like rookses, flies home to rest in bosomses and barnses.
Flora's plan for Amos and Seth Starkadder takes off. Judith is next on the list.
13 January 1975 19.30 - 20.00
6: Come rue, come snow. So maidies mun go.
Plans for Elfine's wedding day tests Flora's organisational skills.
Replies
Thank you so much, Jake, for this excellent reading of a well loved story.