Episode 2
Gemma Whelan reads Joanna Trollope’s 1991 best-seller. A quietly subversive story of a woman trapped in an unhappy marriage by convention and loyalty to her husband and his church.
Joanna Trollope died at the end of 2025, renowned both commercially and critically for novels that explored with wit and insight the complexities of contemporary family and social relationships. In the run-up to the first anniversary of her death we celebrate one of our best-known and best-loved novelists with this serialised reading of The Rector’s Wife.
Published in 1991, this was the book that shot her to the top of the best-seller lists and cemented her reputation. Far from the ‘aga saga’ label which she felt demeaned her work (an aga only appeared twice in her over 20 contemporary novels), her books explore challenging and sensitive subjects with warmth, psychological perception and page-turning skill.
The Rector’s Wife demonstrates all these qualities. As a priest’s wife Anna Bouverie has served God and the parish diligently for 20 years - she has baked for the Brownies, ironed her husband’s surplices, organised the flower rota for the church and clothed herself and her children in items left over from the parish jumble sale. But when her husband fails to gain promotion and retreats into isolation and bitterness, Anna takes matters into her own hands, earning his anger and the shocked disapproval of the parish. It’s a quietly subversive story that unfolds in the deceptively mild setting of a rural community where convention rules. When Anna steps out of line, her small rebellion will have huge consequences for the whole family.
Episode 2: When Peter fails to get the promotion he longed for, he retreats into a bruised bitterness and Anna feels increasingly isolated. In despair at his coldness, and chafing against the constraints of life as a dutiful helpmeet both to him and the parish at large, she decides she must do something to boost the family finances and give herself some kind of independence.
Reader: Gemma Whelan (The Tower, Upstart Crow, Game of Thrones)
Abridged and Produced by Sara Davies
Production Hub Co-ordinators: Dawn Williams and Nina Semple
Sound Design: Matt Bainbridge
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4
On radio
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Broadcast
- Tue 17 Nov 202622:45BBC Radio 4
