TV, FILM & RADIO

The Pursuit of Love / BBC One, coming soon

First published in 1945, Nancy Mitford’s The Pursuit of Love, a story of the English upper classes set primarily in the years between the World Wars, was an immediate bestseller. Even more than 70 years later, it’s easy to see why. Mitford (1904›73), the eldest of the famous sisters who both fascinated and, on occasion, outraged society, was an acute and witty observer of those around her. More than this, the semi-autobiographical novel, that plays out as a romcom but has tragic undertones that give Mitford’s narrative necessary grit, is built around one of the author’s strongest characters, romantic Linda Radlett, a fearless young woman who makes choices considered shocking by the standards of her time.