OK, a post with little or no Moz content, but i had a ? that maybe some Brits could help me with.

All I know about Shelagh Delaney is that she had a brilliant debut play (Taste of honey) that was made into a movie, and then she wrote at least 3 or 4 more plays. I also believe that she had maybe written a couple of movie scripts in the 80's or 90's.

In any case, I was just curious if anyone had more info on her. I've read two of her plays and they're great. I just wondered how she could have such a well-recieved first play, and then not hear much more about her. Did she piss people off? Did she get writer's block? Did she become a hermit? I dunno, I haven't got much from web searches.

Just curious. Any info would be appreciated

> OK, a post with little or no Moz content, but i had a ? that maybe some
> Brits could help me with.

> All I know about Shelagh Delaney is that she had a brilliant debut play
> (Taste of honey) that was made into a movie, and then she wrote at least 3
> or 4 more plays. I also believe that she had maybe written a couple of
> movie scripts in the 80's or 90's.

> In any case, I was just curious if anyone had more info on her. I've read
> two of her plays and they're great. I just wondered how she could have
> such a well-recieved first play, and then not hear much more about her.
> Did she piss people off? Did she get writer's block? Did she become a
> hermit? I dunno, I haven't got much from web searches.

If it's Shelagh Delaney, then it's very much Moz content! She appeared on the sleeves of both Louder Than Bombs and Girlfriend In A Coma, and the sleeve of the Sandie Shaw version of Hand In Glove features a still from the film of A Taste of Honey, which Moz swiped plenty of lines from for early Smiths songs and even as late as Alma Matters ("It's my life to ruin my own way")She also a fellow Mancunian, having been born in Salford.

As well as the script for A Taste of Honey, Shelagh Delaney also wrote for the following movies: The White Bus ('67), Charlie Bubbles ('67) (which featured on the sleeve of the reissue of 'William...'), Dance With A Stranger ('85), and The Railway Station Man ('92). There was also a TV documentary entitled 'Shelagh Delaney's Salford' directed by Ken Russell and shown in 1960, but propably impossible to find now.

As far as I know, she published another play called The Lion In Love, and a book entitled Sweetly Sings The Donkey, which I am not sure, but may be a short story collection. Both are sadly out of print and hard to find.

Hope this helps!

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/0802131859.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg




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I just wanted to tell you that I looooove your screen name. Funny stuff! LOL

Thanks Duncan. I have read 'Taste of Honey' and 'Lion in love' and now that you mentioned it, I have read her collection of short stories 'Sweetly sings the Donkey'. I have also read the article in Life from which the Louder than Bombs picture was taken.

She just was such a great writer, and I'm guessing a fairly interesting, introverted person. I just wanted to know a bit more. I've looked around for the past few years, and just now realized I could probably get some info from the board.

Once again, thanks for the list of movies and info.

> Once again, thanks for the list of movies and info.

Some more biographical info here:

http://www.ambassadorproject.homestead.com/Shelagh_Delaney.html

This may be of interest to you (& other aficionados of all things kitchen sink) - "A Taste of Honey" (plus "Saturday Night and Sunday Morning" and "the Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner") are being rereleased on the big screen. They're currently showing at the Barbican in London and may be showing at cinemas in other parts of the country.

The following is the text of a brief article which appeared in The Saturday Evening Post dated October 21, 1961, accompanied by Arnold Newman's now-famous picture used on the cover of Louder Than Bombs:

Shelagh Delaney
Angry Playwright

In the dismal back yards of her native Salford, England's working-class dramatist Shelagh Delaney, 22, finds rich material for plays like the one that made her famous at 19: A Taste Of Honey, winner last spring of a New York Drama Critics' Award. Tall (six feet), low-voiced Shelagh quit school at 16, took a job as an opera-house usher, [and] later became a photographer's assistant while writing her first drama.

Her new, play-born wealth has changed her very little; she still lives with her widowed mother and young brother in a small, government-subsidized house. But she does admit delight in being able to afford taxis. "Now that I have money", she says, "why should I travel on buses?" Shelagh believes plays should be for and about the ordinary man. They need not crusade. "Crusading is condescending," she says. Her characters are people she has seen around her; her theme-- the need for human dignity. Contemptuous of complaints that she writes as an "angry young woman", Shelagh believes "anger is the sinew of the soul; without it, a man would be lame." Now on her third drama, Shelagh can't say what it's about. "I just start with people and see what comes out of them," she says.