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  • Published: 3 November 2016
  • ISBN: 9781785295218
  • Imprint: BBC DL
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 5 hr 0 min
  • Narrators: Stephen Fry, Emma Fielding
  • RRP: $16.99

Vanity Fair




Stephen Fry narrates this full-cast dramatisation of the famous Victorian comic novel

Stephen Fry narrates this BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of the famous Victorian comic novel.

Orphan Becky Sharp and wealthy Amelia Sedley are best friends at Miss Pinkerton's Academy for Young Ladies. On leaving school, ambitious, social-climbing Becky looks for a rich man to support her, while the sweet-natured Amelia meets her old friend Dobbin, who is instantly captivated.

Becky takes a job in the service of Sir Pitt Crawley, and uses her charm to hook his dashing son. However, marriage to Captain Rawdon of the Guards does not provide the fortune she seeks. Meanwhile, Amelia rejects the faithful Dobbin and becomes engaged to the handsome George Osborne – but destiny has some shocks in store for her, too.

As time goes by, the girls' fortunes rise and fall. War, financial disaster and the ruin of her reputation leave the resourceful Beckyundaunted, but Amelia finds it harder to bear fate's blows. It will be many years before their story is played out, and their futures finally decided...

William Makepeace Thackeray's classic satire of passion and ambition, first published in 1847 and 1848, is a deliciously ironic portrait of English society and its mores. This engaging 2004 radio production, published for the first time on audio, features a distinguished cast including Emma Fielding as Becky Sharp, Katy Cavanagh as Amelia and Toby Jones as Jos Sedley.

Duration: 5 hours approx

  • Published: 3 November 2016
  • ISBN: 9781785295218
  • Imprint: BBC DL
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 5 hr 0 min
  • Narrators: Stephen Fry, Emma Fielding
  • RRP: $16.99

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About the author

William Makepeace Thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray was born on 18 July 1811 in Calcutta in India. After studying at Trinity College Cambridge he worked as a journalist and studied Art in London and Paris. In 1836 he married Isabella Shawe and they went on to have three daughters, one of whom died in infancy. He first found literary success with The Yellowplush Papers in 1837 and went on to write other works such asThe FitzBoodle Papers, Catherine, The Luck of Barry Lyndon and The Snobs of England before he published his masterpiece, Vanity Fair, in 1847. William Makepeace Thackeray died on Christmas Eve in 1863.