Necessary to My Happiness
Daljit Nagra chooses Necessary to My Happiness about Byron's abandoned daughter. With Michael Symmons Roberts. From 2015.
Poet Daljit Nagra revisits the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ's poetry library and selects Necessary to My Happiness.
Poet Michael Symmons Roberts tells the story of Lord Byron's illegitimate daughter Allegra, who was only five when she died in an Italian convent.
Michael goes to Ravenna to find out how Byron came to abandon her, and how she came to haunt his imagination (and that of fellow Romantic Percy Bysshe Shelley).
Through visiting the Palazzo Guiccioli in Ravenna, where Byron lived for a time, and the convent at Bagnacavallo where Allegra died, Michael discovers evidence for her as a spirited little girl, who wrote heartbreaking letters to her father, pleading with him to visit her.
In this documentary, Allegra gets her own voice at last. . .
Music composed by Dr Sally Rodgers and Steve Jones (discrete machines)
Allegra was played by Alexandra Mathie
Producer: Faith Lawrence
First broadcast on Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 4 in 2015.
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Broadcasts
- Sun 28 Aug 2022 12:00Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 4 Extra
- Sun 28 Aug 2022 17:00Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 4 Extra
- Mon 29 Aug 2022 05:00Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 4 Extra