Why a Booktrail?
1974 – 1989: The remarkable true story of a lady who lived in a van in Alan Bennett’s driveway
The Lady in the Van
What you need to know before your trail
They say that there is no stranger truth than fiction… yet sometimes truth has the power to go one better and this is that story that even Alan Bennett, might have found hard to invent.
In 1974, Miss Shepherd homeless and with barely a possession to cal her own apart from a broken down van moved her portable home into the drive way of a certain Alan Bennett’s garden. He had noticed her and invited her in for a while but what he did not expect was for her to stay there for some fifteen years.
Travel Guide
This true story takes us deep in the heart of the 1970s with its innocent and easy going times. Of a time when a man could allow a homeless woman to live in a van in his garden without being chased by the council or health and safety.
There are many moments of comedy – from when she is deemed mad at saying there is a snake in the garden only for them to find that there is indeed an escapee from the local pet shop.
But the real story here is how the lady came to be in the van in the first place. How someone so talented can be labelled as mad by others who don’t understand how someone can end up like this and what kind of help they need. What kind of help our elderly people need and the stories of the past they could tell.
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