Beryl Bainbridge's black comedy takes as its setting a noisy, argumentative working class family in Liverpool, getting ready to see a pantomime based on Peter Pan. The ever-youthful Peter Pan and Charlie - the father of the family, suffering from what appears to be indigestion - provide the basic ingredients for an unforgettable night out.

This 2009 version of the BritLit kit ‘Clap Hands, Here Comes Charlie’ has been significantly revised from the 2004 original and contains new material. Most of the original material which has been excluded from this version is available in the ‘supplementary materials' file.

Beryl Bainbridge is something of a doyenne of British letters. Born in Liverpool herself, and coming from a difficult and unhappy childhood, many of her stories and novels are based in or around Liverpool. She writes about one novel a year and has been nominated for the Booker Prize five times. In 2002 she was recognised in the Queen's Honours List and made a Dame.

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Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

The materials in this BritLit Kit are available to download in the Attachments box below. To download pdf files and audio, right click on the file and save to your computer.