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Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile
A compelling debut novel that heralds a bright new voice on the literary scene: shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize and Portico Prize for Literature.
Best known for her classic black comedy 'Rita, Sue and Bob Too', Andrea Dunbar wrote three plays before dying at a tragically young age. This new literary portrayal features a cast of real and imagined characters set against the backdrop of the infamous Buttershaw estate during the Thatcher era.
A bittersweet tale of the north/south divide, it reveals how a shy teenage girl defied the circumstances into which she was born and went on to become one of her generation's greatest dramatists. Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is a poignant piece of kitchen sink noir that tells Dunbar's compelling story in print for the very first time.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is Adelle Stripe's keenly anticipated debut novel.
Best known for her classic black comedy 'Rita, Sue and Bob Too', Andrea Dunbar wrote three plays before dying at a tragically young age. This new literary portrayal features a cast of real and imagined characters set against the backdrop of the infamous Buttershaw estate during the Thatcher era.
A bittersweet tale of the north/south divide, it reveals how a shy teenage girl defied the circumstances into which she was born and went on to become one of her generation's greatest dramatists. Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is a poignant piece of kitchen sink noir that tells Dunbar's compelling story in print for the very first time.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is Adelle Stripe's keenly anticipated debut novel.
256 pages, Paperback
Published November 2, 2017
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894 people want to read
About the author
Adelle Stripe
13 books103 followersAdelle Stripe's books include Base Notes, the Sunday Times bestselling Ten Thousand Apologies, and Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile, a fictionalised biography inspired by the playwright Andrea Dunbar. Her writing has been shortlisted for the Penderyn Music Book Prize, Gordon Burn Prize, and Portico Prize for Literature. She lives in Calderdale, West Yorkshire.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 86 reviews
April 26, 2023
“Cause it's a bittersweet symphony this life
Trying to make ends meet, you're a slave to the money then you die.”
This one matters.
This is a novel about the life of playwright Andrea Dunbar, fiction but with a strong basis of reality and using many of Dunbar’s own words. Dunbar was born within a year of me and I remember her name from the 1980s and particularly from the film version of her play “Rita, Sue and Bob Too”. Dunbar was born lived and died in Bradford, on the Buttershaw estate. It is one of the edge of town council estates so prevalent in the north of England: bleak, run-down, brutal, abandoned sinkholes so typical of Thatcher’s Britain. Ignored by successive governments (apart from a few weasel words), dominated by benefits culture, debt, poverty, violence and despair. There is a sense of community but it is under siege and very much against the world.
Dunbar began writing in her teens and wrote three plays, The Arbor, Rita Sue and Bob Too and Shirley. The first was written at the age of 15 whilst she was still at school as a CSE assignment; the story of a Bradford schoolgirl who gets pregnant to a Pakistani boyfriend on a racist estate. This mirrored Dunbar’s own life as she went on to have her first child in exactly these circumstances. Dunbar wrote what she heard and had a genius for dialogue. Her prose is straight from those around her. Dunbar died in 1990 from a brain haemorrhage, with three children from three different fathers. She found the world of the Arts, Theatre and Film entirely alien and unwelcoming and hated the publicity from her work. Dunbar had been pilloried in the tabloids for her bleak portrayal of working class life in Rita Sue and Bob too. She disowned the film version because it had been made too comedic and the end had been rewritten to make it a little less bleak.
The dialogue in this novel is brilliant, the characters are not there for likeability and Dunbar captures it all. The tabloids were not impressed and there was a lot of hostility. At the press conference for the first screening of Rita Sue and Bob Too (which Dunbar refused to go to) George Costigan, the actor who played Bob said: “How do you know what the realities are of life in the north”. Dunbar led a tough life, she was the victim of domestic violence on numerous occasions and Stripe documents some of these: they are difficult to read. Dunbar also spent time in a Women’s Aid refuge and it was while she was there that her work came to the attention of Max Stafford-Clarke at the Royal Court.
The men in this novel are pretty grim, drunkards and abusers on the estate. Towards the end of her life Dunbar did say that she no longer wanted to work with men after her experiences of them. Stripe comments about the young men on the estate in the novel “they already had the face of old men, drinkers and robbers”. This is depressingly true.
This isn’t hagiography, but you do get to know Dunbar well and this is a brilliant novel.
Trying to make ends meet, you're a slave to the money then you die.”
This one matters.
This is a novel about the life of playwright Andrea Dunbar, fiction but with a strong basis of reality and using many of Dunbar’s own words. Dunbar was born within a year of me and I remember her name from the 1980s and particularly from the film version of her play “Rita, Sue and Bob Too”. Dunbar was born lived and died in Bradford, on the Buttershaw estate. It is one of the edge of town council estates so prevalent in the north of England: bleak, run-down, brutal, abandoned sinkholes so typical of Thatcher’s Britain. Ignored by successive governments (apart from a few weasel words), dominated by benefits culture, debt, poverty, violence and despair. There is a sense of community but it is under siege and very much against the world.
Dunbar began writing in her teens and wrote three plays, The Arbor, Rita Sue and Bob Too and Shirley. The first was written at the age of 15 whilst she was still at school as a CSE assignment; the story of a Bradford schoolgirl who gets pregnant to a Pakistani boyfriend on a racist estate. This mirrored Dunbar’s own life as she went on to have her first child in exactly these circumstances. Dunbar wrote what she heard and had a genius for dialogue. Her prose is straight from those around her. Dunbar died in 1990 from a brain haemorrhage, with three children from three different fathers. She found the world of the Arts, Theatre and Film entirely alien and unwelcoming and hated the publicity from her work. Dunbar had been pilloried in the tabloids for her bleak portrayal of working class life in Rita Sue and Bob too. She disowned the film version because it had been made too comedic and the end had been rewritten to make it a little less bleak.
The dialogue in this novel is brilliant, the characters are not there for likeability and Dunbar captures it all. The tabloids were not impressed and there was a lot of hostility. At the press conference for the first screening of Rita Sue and Bob Too (which Dunbar refused to go to) George Costigan, the actor who played Bob said: “How do you know what the realities are of life in the north”. Dunbar led a tough life, she was the victim of domestic violence on numerous occasions and Stripe documents some of these: they are difficult to read. Dunbar also spent time in a Women’s Aid refuge and it was while she was there that her work came to the attention of Max Stafford-Clarke at the Royal Court.
The men in this novel are pretty grim, drunkards and abusers on the estate. Towards the end of her life Dunbar did say that she no longer wanted to work with men after her experiences of them. Stripe comments about the young men on the estate in the novel “they already had the face of old men, drinkers and robbers”. This is depressingly true.
This isn’t hagiography, but you do get to know Dunbar well and this is a brilliant novel.
November 18, 2023
A brilliant, darkly humorous, tragic book about playwright Andrea Dunbar
I heard about this book via the always inspirational Backlisted podcast. It’s a novelised biography of Andrea Dunbar. Andrea was a British playwright who died aged 29 from a brain haemorrhage whilst drinking in her local pub, the Beacon, on the Buttershaw estate in Bradford. She is best known for her play Rita, Sue and Bob Too which was made into a film, and also for her first play The Arbor. All her work was autobiographical and, given her difficult personal circumstances, her achievements are nothing short of miraculous.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile would be an engrossing book if it were simply a portrait of Andrea's life on the Buttershaw estate in Bradford. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, when the book is set, Buttershaw was a deprived council on the edge of Bradford. Most people there seem to have few opportunities to escape the place.
What elevates Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is the incredible story of Andrea Dunbar, who got The Arbor, her first play, premiered at London's Royal Court Theatre in 1980.
Andrea was ill equipped for this meteoric rise from obscurity. The book perfectly chronicles her discomfort at being thrust into the middle class theatrical world of London. People on the Buttershaw estate treated her differently, and Andrea also felt under pressure to deliver more plays. Her disappointment with the cinematic adaptation of Rita, Sue and Bob Too, and the reaction of many of her neighbours, also seems to have had a detrimental effect. Her success almost certainly contributed to her early death as she spent more and more time seeking escape in alcohol.
Improbably Adelle Stripe has managed to make a page-turner out of this material, and that is a credit to both her writing skill, and also to the extraordinary Andrea Dunbar. All the dialogue rings true and the glimpses into Andrea's thoughts and feelings are also completely credible. It's a brilliant, concise (230 pages), darkly humorous, tragic, fascinating book which brings a talented, troubled, shy young woman to life whilst also unerringly evoking 1980s Britain. Wonderful.
5/5
I heard about this book via the always inspirational Backlisted podcast. It’s a novelised biography of Andrea Dunbar. Andrea was a British playwright who died aged 29 from a brain haemorrhage whilst drinking in her local pub, the Beacon, on the Buttershaw estate in Bradford. She is best known for her play Rita, Sue and Bob Too which was made into a film, and also for her first play The Arbor. All her work was autobiographical and, given her difficult personal circumstances, her achievements are nothing short of miraculous.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile would be an engrossing book if it were simply a portrait of Andrea's life on the Buttershaw estate in Bradford. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, when the book is set, Buttershaw was a deprived council on the edge of Bradford. Most people there seem to have few opportunities to escape the place.
What elevates Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is the incredible story of Andrea Dunbar, who got The Arbor, her first play, premiered at London's Royal Court Theatre in 1980.
Andrea was ill equipped for this meteoric rise from obscurity. The book perfectly chronicles her discomfort at being thrust into the middle class theatrical world of London. People on the Buttershaw estate treated her differently, and Andrea also felt under pressure to deliver more plays. Her disappointment with the cinematic adaptation of Rita, Sue and Bob Too, and the reaction of many of her neighbours, also seems to have had a detrimental effect. Her success almost certainly contributed to her early death as she spent more and more time seeking escape in alcohol.
Improbably Adelle Stripe has managed to make a page-turner out of this material, and that is a credit to both her writing skill, and also to the extraordinary Andrea Dunbar. All the dialogue rings true and the glimpses into Andrea's thoughts and feelings are also completely credible. It's a brilliant, concise (230 pages), darkly humorous, tragic, fascinating book which brings a talented, troubled, shy young woman to life whilst also unerringly evoking 1980s Britain. Wonderful.
5/5
February 6, 2020
Adelle Stripe’s Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile may not fit well for readers preoccupied with literary categories: is it a partially imagined biography of British working class playwright Andrea Dunbar?; a novel closely informed by Dunbar’s life?; or a totally fictional biography of Dunbar? Stripe provides the best guidance in her prefatory paragraph: ”This is a work of fiction and is an alternative version of historic events. . . It is not the truth and exists purely within the realm of speculation.” (p. 9)
As portrayed by Stripe, Dunbar, her family, and her mates all recognize the inevitability of their fate: ”the new landlady. . . could handle the drinkers, who had already lined up their places at the bar. Sitting in the same places their fathers had sat. And the same places their sons would sit, too.” (p. 15) At work, Andrea ”worked on her feet every day, lurching over the comb, feeding wool into buzzing jaws on the metal plate. She watched rollers eat the wool and fed it onto a leather apron before spooling it into a large barrel can. Thousands of yards rolled into cans. She stood in the same spot six days a week, with the clunk of machinery and clanking metal echoing around her. / Doing what her parents had done. / Doing what her grandparents had done. / Lifting, weaving, and combing as day turned into night.” (p. 41)
In her twenties, Stripe’s Dunbar recognizes that her teen success as a playwright is crashing: ”Should be writing, but can’t. Need to lock myself away. Lock the kids away, more like. Can’t concentrate. Even writing this is hard. Feels like I’ve run out of words. Supposed to be thinking about this script.” (p. 118) With her success, her dreams end: ”As a child she had always imagined she would appear on the television; that was her goal. Since she had been on the screen her dreams had dissolved. There was nothing left to hope for. From Buttershaw to Bowling Mill to London, the cinema and back to the factory floor. No words left to write. Just the grind and dimming light of rattling mill. Everything in the past. Her fame a distance memory.”<.i> (p. 157)
Adelle Stripe’s Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile mixes third person reportage with first person recollections and thoughts. It’s occasionally tedious but ultimately highly effective and affecting, telling a desperately sad story that implies troubling moral questions about the impact of pop stardom, cultural appropriation, and instant fame.
As portrayed by Stripe, Dunbar, her family, and her mates all recognize the inevitability of their fate: ”the new landlady. . . could handle the drinkers, who had already lined up their places at the bar. Sitting in the same places their fathers had sat. And the same places their sons would sit, too.” (p. 15) At work, Andrea ”worked on her feet every day, lurching over the comb, feeding wool into buzzing jaws on the metal plate. She watched rollers eat the wool and fed it onto a leather apron before spooling it into a large barrel can. Thousands of yards rolled into cans. She stood in the same spot six days a week, with the clunk of machinery and clanking metal echoing around her. / Doing what her parents had done. / Doing what her grandparents had done. / Lifting, weaving, and combing as day turned into night.” (p. 41)
In her twenties, Stripe’s Dunbar recognizes that her teen success as a playwright is crashing: ”Should be writing, but can’t. Need to lock myself away. Lock the kids away, more like. Can’t concentrate. Even writing this is hard. Feels like I’ve run out of words. Supposed to be thinking about this script.” (p. 118) With her success, her dreams end: ”As a child she had always imagined she would appear on the television; that was her goal. Since she had been on the screen her dreams had dissolved. There was nothing left to hope for. From Buttershaw to Bowling Mill to London, the cinema and back to the factory floor. No words left to write. Just the grind and dimming light of rattling mill. Everything in the past. Her fame a distance memory.”<.i> (p. 157)
Adelle Stripe’s Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile mixes third person reportage with first person recollections and thoughts. It’s occasionally tedious but ultimately highly effective and affecting, telling a desperately sad story that implies troubling moral questions about the impact of pop stardom, cultural appropriation, and instant fame.
February 3, 2020
Andrea Dunbar was a playwright and eventually a screenwriter. She came from a working class background and had a tough life, eventually passing away in 1990 at the age of 29. She is also the subject of Adelle Stripe’s book Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile.
Reading a fiction/non-fiction account of a person I’ve heard of is good but reading about someone who I’ve never heard of is better, especially when the book is a great read.
Stripe goes into the details of Dunbar’s life, from her talent to capture dialogue in a precise way to her failed relationships and her frustrations with the film world. I also liked the fact that the book’s prologue is about Dunbar’s death, while the rest of the book leads up to it.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is more than a straightforward biography with a fictional dressing. It is a portrait of working class families and attitudes, the manipulation of media, sexism in the arts and the psychological breakdown of a character who has lived in the shadow of domestic abuse. Stripes writing is to the point thus helping the reader understand how Dunbar used to approach and philosophy to life.
Sometimes shocking, sometimes funny Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is an excellent look at a misunderstood character and doubles up as an entertaining read in the process.
Reading a fiction/non-fiction account of a person I’ve heard of is good but reading about someone who I’ve never heard of is better, especially when the book is a great read.
Stripe goes into the details of Dunbar’s life, from her talent to capture dialogue in a precise way to her failed relationships and her frustrations with the film world. I also liked the fact that the book’s prologue is about Dunbar’s death, while the rest of the book leads up to it.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is more than a straightforward biography with a fictional dressing. It is a portrait of working class families and attitudes, the manipulation of media, sexism in the arts and the psychological breakdown of a character who has lived in the shadow of domestic abuse. Stripes writing is to the point thus helping the reader understand how Dunbar used to approach and philosophy to life.
Sometimes shocking, sometimes funny Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is an excellent look at a misunderstood character and doubles up as an entertaining read in the process.
May 8, 2018
This book tells the story of Andrea Dunbar, the young playwright from a very poor housing estate outside Bradford, who died at 29 of a brain haemorrhage during a drinking bout in her local pub. It does so by splicing together a fictionalised interior monologue from Dunbar's point of view with a straightforward account of what happened to her told chronologically, informed by newspaper cuttings and books about her. It shouldn't work, it should be awkward, but the author has done a fine job of integrating her material to make it a page turner and you read breathlessly as the whole unbelievable story unfolds. It is the funniest and saddest book I've read in a long time. Dunbar is captured in all her glory-her exuberance and talent and her burnout and alcoholism.
Her three kids by different fathers are resented and loved. The first father a Pakistani who beats her and ties her up when he goes out so she can't talk to other men - she escapes with her notebooks to a woman's refuge where by chance a theatre worker is volunteering and reads her play written at school and other material. Eventually her play portraying life on her estate is produced at the Royal Court Theatre and her name is in lights and she stays with Max (Stafford-Clark) who helps her develop her writing. The culture clash between the two is very funny, Andrea's not used to mange tout and Chateauneuf de pape or the effusiveness of theatre types and the middle class. Her second play 'Rita, Sue and Bob Too' is a success and made into a film by the legendary Alan Clarke. Dunbar's not impressed - 'I don't like films' - and is incensed bythe way he changes her script. Meanwhile on the estate there's ructions as locals resent the 'lurid' portrayal of their area, fanned by reporters who call it obscene and offer them money for stories about Dunbar and her family.
There's much about her writing, how she collects material (Rita and Sue were two women - called Rita and Sue - who she overheard chatting at the sink in a public toilet, Dunbar - in the stall - writes it all down and uses it verbatim in the play), how she is forced by Max and others to work on her stuff and how eventually she can do no more, collapsing into burnout.
I can't praise this superb account of a tragic life, both amazing and super-ordinary enough. A tale that rips open life on estates as lived then (the 80s), its comedy and sex and kindness and also middle class hypocrisy and the hard work of acting and writing. Like the film of Rita, Sue and Bob Too this book is eyes-behind-hands excruciating, hilarious, blunt, devil-may-care, alive and pulsing.
Her three kids by different fathers are resented and loved. The first father a Pakistani who beats her and ties her up when he goes out so she can't talk to other men - she escapes with her notebooks to a woman's refuge where by chance a theatre worker is volunteering and reads her play written at school and other material. Eventually her play portraying life on her estate is produced at the Royal Court Theatre and her name is in lights and she stays with Max (Stafford-Clark) who helps her develop her writing. The culture clash between the two is very funny, Andrea's not used to mange tout and Chateauneuf de pape or the effusiveness of theatre types and the middle class. Her second play 'Rita, Sue and Bob Too' is a success and made into a film by the legendary Alan Clarke. Dunbar's not impressed - 'I don't like films' - and is incensed bythe way he changes her script. Meanwhile on the estate there's ructions as locals resent the 'lurid' portrayal of their area, fanned by reporters who call it obscene and offer them money for stories about Dunbar and her family.
There's much about her writing, how she collects material (Rita and Sue were two women - called Rita and Sue - who she overheard chatting at the sink in a public toilet, Dunbar - in the stall - writes it all down and uses it verbatim in the play), how she is forced by Max and others to work on her stuff and how eventually she can do no more, collapsing into burnout.
I can't praise this superb account of a tragic life, both amazing and super-ordinary enough. A tale that rips open life on estates as lived then (the 80s), its comedy and sex and kindness and also middle class hypocrisy and the hard work of acting and writing. Like the film of Rita, Sue and Bob Too this book is eyes-behind-hands excruciating, hilarious, blunt, devil-may-care, alive and pulsing.
February 15, 2020
BLACK TEETH AND A BEAUTIFUL SMILE.
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A Portico Short List Read ~ shall I start by saying that this book blew me away and because of that I have found it very hard to review. I want to tell you everything but that would A/ - spoil the story and B/ take up too many words for these little squares to cope with. So bear with me, what do I say,what do I leave out...
.
Right I’ll start ~ it’s about Andrea Dunbar. Do you know anything about Andrea Dunbar? I didn’t,in fact I knew nothing about her at all. I do now,and I’m really intrigued by her and her life,that’s what this book has done to me.
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Andrea Dunbar grew up on the Buttershaw council estate in Bradford. It was the Margaret Thatcher era,times were hard for some sections of society and the Buttershaw estate saw some terrible deprivation and living conditions. Andrea struggled at school getting bottom grades,except for in English where she got A’s because Andrea’s talent was with words and she became the youngest playwright to have a play preformed at the Royal Court Theatre in London.
.
She was precociously clever with words,however her home life was chaotic. Her first pregnancy at the age of 15 ended in a stillbirth and she went on to have three children all with different fathers. Reading between the lines these children did not have stable upbringings as Andrea struggled with an abusive relationship,drink problems and poverty. She lived in a women’s refuge for 18 months. Life was hard.
.
Andrea’s talent was discovered and she wrote three plays, The Arbor, Rita,Sue and Bob Too, and Shirley. The plays caused quite a bit of trouble as they depicted a very truthful version of life on the Buttershaw Estate. The residents were inflamed and Andrea was vilified by the press.
Andrea died tragically at the young age of 29.
.
MY THOUGHTS.
I was absolutely caught up with this story, I even took it to work and read it on my break,it was easy to read but every sentence had an impact,amazing really.
This was a debut book by Adelle Stripe and that is amazing too. The research that has gone into this book must have been immense and Stripe writes in a way that captures the very essence of the time and the character of Andrea.
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It is a sad tale but a gripping one too. It made me feel. If you want a read that makes you think then I would wholeheartedly recommend this one. Gritty but good.
February 19, 2018
Adelles portrayal of Andrea Dunbar is written in a way that offers no apology for who Andrea was, and the way she lived her short life. I LOVED this book! Gritty, poignant with an honesty that stays with the reader. A must read for all the Rita, Sue and Bob too fans, now I can’t wait to see ‘The Arbor! I give it 4.5 stars
August 31, 2022
Stripe's fact based and fast moving novel brings alive to a new audience the troubled and talented English working class playwright, Andrea Dunbar. Both imprisoned and liberated by her harsh environment, Dunbar, who suffered a tragically early death, remains an authentic voice of socially disadvantaged women, their lives, and indomitable spirit.
December 3, 2019
How do you know what the realities are of life in the north? George said. Now, I recently played a bouncer who works at a club where girls get older men to buy them bottles of champagne for £200 and get sex as part of the deal. If I told that story to people in Bradford they’d never believe it. And it’s the same for you. You blatantly know nothing of Bradford, so what makes you think we aren’t telling the truth?’
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is the novelisation of Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar’s short life. By the time she tragically passed away aged 29, she had written three plays: The Arbor; Rita, Sue and Bob Too (for which she is best known) and Shirley. Dunbar experienced almost extreme poverty, classism, physically and mentally abusive relationships and what can now be assumed as manic depressive episodes, as well as an unhealthy relationship with alcohol. She had three children by three different men, and when she wrote her first play aged 18, she had never even been in a theatre. I didn’t know that much about Dunbar before reading this book, but it is a testament to both her life and to Stripe’s writing that this has easily become one of my favourite reads of the year. Black Teeth is a no-holds-barred kitchen sink noir look at Thatcher’s Britain, as well as an evocative portrait of an equally evocative woman. What I liked is that Stripe does not aim for “likeability” - she does not shy away from things like racism and violence in Buttershaw, Dunbar’s estate. The father of her first child was a Pakistani man, and the racist treatment of both him and the child by Dunbar and others is portrayed in as much detail as the abuse she suffered from him is. A horribly beautiful novel.
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is the novelisation of Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar’s short life. By the time she tragically passed away aged 29, she had written three plays: The Arbor; Rita, Sue and Bob Too (for which she is best known) and Shirley. Dunbar experienced almost extreme poverty, classism, physically and mentally abusive relationships and what can now be assumed as manic depressive episodes, as well as an unhealthy relationship with alcohol. She had three children by three different men, and when she wrote her first play aged 18, she had never even been in a theatre. I didn’t know that much about Dunbar before reading this book, but it is a testament to both her life and to Stripe’s writing that this has easily become one of my favourite reads of the year. Black Teeth is a no-holds-barred kitchen sink noir look at Thatcher’s Britain, as well as an evocative portrait of an equally evocative woman. What I liked is that Stripe does not aim for “likeability” - she does not shy away from things like racism and violence in Buttershaw, Dunbar’s estate. The father of her first child was a Pakistani man, and the racist treatment of both him and the child by Dunbar and others is portrayed in as much detail as the abuse she suffered from him is. A horribly beautiful novel.
March 12, 2023
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile is the fictional telling of the very short life of Bradford based playwright Andrea Dunbar. Scrupulously researched and referenced I can’t help but feel it errs more on the side of fact than fiction.
Finished in a few short reads and invested myself so heavily in it after the first few chapters that I drove the 20 minute drive to Buttershaw to get a real feel for who Andrea Dunbar actually was and the sort of places that she wrote about.
Truly gritty but hilarious. Heartbreaking whilst still being entertaining. An absolutely addictive read I would recommend to anyone. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ couldn’t put it down.
Finished in a few short reads and invested myself so heavily in it after the first few chapters that I drove the 20 minute drive to Buttershaw to get a real feel for who Andrea Dunbar actually was and the sort of places that she wrote about.
Truly gritty but hilarious. Heartbreaking whilst still being entertaining. An absolutely addictive read I would recommend to anyone. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ couldn’t put it down.
August 26, 2017
Wow. Greedily read this in a couple of sittings... fascinating dramatised biography of Andrea Dunbar in a faithful true-grit style. Being familiar with Buttershaw estate (I taught at the upper school 1998-2000) and the surrounding areas means that I can truly appreciate the authenticity of the razor sharp writing; coarsely beautiful in its cracked mirror to Northern council estate life. I just wish that I'd seen 'Rita Sue and Bob Too' on stage, not just the film; this has spurred me on to now read the play and seek out 'The Abor'.
August 21, 2022
I read this book in one day. An absolutely fantastic read. Andrea Dunbar is someone I have always been fascinated with after seeing The Arbour documentary.
This book doesn’t shy away from the darker parts of her life but it avoid being condescending. Very raw and very gritty. Highly recommend.
This book doesn’t shy away from the darker parts of her life but it avoid being condescending. Very raw and very gritty. Highly recommend.
February 9, 2021
Excellent. Heart breaking and inspiring. Never thought so much about society and the class divide as I have whilst reading this. Must read for everyone.
August 23, 2018
Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile, by Adelle Stripe, tells the story of Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar who is perhaps best known for the 1987 film adaptation of her second play, Rita, Sue and Bob Too. The book is “a work of fiction and is an alternative version of historic events”. The author has sourced her story from letters, scripts, newspaper cuttings and memories of those who knew Andrea before her death, aged twenty-nine, following her collapse in a local pub she frequented.
Andrea grew up on a run down council estate in the north of Thatcher’s Britain, where factory closures exacerbated the social problems caused by unemployment and limited options for residents. Her skill as a writer was recognised at school but not picked up until a chance meeting with a support worker, Claire, at a women’s refuge where Andrea was sheltering after her boyfriend, the father of her child, started beating her. Andrea was no stranger to domestic violence as her alcoholic father had regularly meted out vicious punishments.
Claire had a contact in London’s theatre land to whom she sent samples of Andrea’s first play, written for her English CSE. The potential of the work was recognised but required that Andrea travel to the capital city. Although excited by the opportunity, this dropped Andrea into a rarefied world that highlighted the stark divide between the lives of those in the north and south of England.
Andrea harboured a great deal of anger at the way she was regarded by the Guardian reading artistic Londoners she had to work with, especially when they edited her words. Having had three children by three different fathers she knew that she appeared to personify the ‘feckless working class’ of political rhetoric. Her gritty plays were written from dialogue she overheard, the life she experienced. Her peers from the estates did not always appreciate the way they were being portrayed.
The author presents Andrea’s story as a mix of diary entries, documentary style dialogue and updates. It is a humane and empathetic representation of a life the protagonist wished to improve but not escape. Living within the crumbling council estates was harsh but there was a sense of community. Andrea was supported by family and friends who were proud of the achievements she struggled to deal with. She fitted in here more than she ever could in London, a city whose influential residents have always, seemingly, failed to comprehend the realities of life beyond their accepted scripts and lived experience.
This story is amongst the best depictions of the north south divide in England that I have read. There is no attempt to glorify the hardship or to tap emotional responses, rather it is a story of a young woman whose messy life brought a degree of fame but rarely happiness. It highlights the reasons for the resentments, the chasm that appears to bewilder those based around London when others beyond the city disagree with their points of view. This is as relevant now as when Andrea lived.
Andrea grew up on a run down council estate in the north of Thatcher’s Britain, where factory closures exacerbated the social problems caused by unemployment and limited options for residents. Her skill as a writer was recognised at school but not picked up until a chance meeting with a support worker, Claire, at a women’s refuge where Andrea was sheltering after her boyfriend, the father of her child, started beating her. Andrea was no stranger to domestic violence as her alcoholic father had regularly meted out vicious punishments.
Claire had a contact in London’s theatre land to whom she sent samples of Andrea’s first play, written for her English CSE. The potential of the work was recognised but required that Andrea travel to the capital city. Although excited by the opportunity, this dropped Andrea into a rarefied world that highlighted the stark divide between the lives of those in the north and south of England.
Andrea harboured a great deal of anger at the way she was regarded by the Guardian reading artistic Londoners she had to work with, especially when they edited her words. Having had three children by three different fathers she knew that she appeared to personify the ‘feckless working class’ of political rhetoric. Her gritty plays were written from dialogue she overheard, the life she experienced. Her peers from the estates did not always appreciate the way they were being portrayed.
The author presents Andrea’s story as a mix of diary entries, documentary style dialogue and updates. It is a humane and empathetic representation of a life the protagonist wished to improve but not escape. Living within the crumbling council estates was harsh but there was a sense of community. Andrea was supported by family and friends who were proud of the achievements she struggled to deal with. She fitted in here more than she ever could in London, a city whose influential residents have always, seemingly, failed to comprehend the realities of life beyond their accepted scripts and lived experience.
This story is amongst the best depictions of the north south divide in England that I have read. There is no attempt to glorify the hardship or to tap emotional responses, rather it is a story of a young woman whose messy life brought a degree of fame but rarely happiness. It highlights the reasons for the resentments, the chasm that appears to bewilder those based around London when others beyond the city disagree with their points of view. This is as relevant now as when Andrea lived.
July 23, 2023
[Not a spolier exactly but mentions Dunbar's death and also CW for mention of child neglect]
Whilst this is a novel of Dunbar's life the description led me to think it'd be far more fictionalised, and perhaps experimental. Instead it seems to be a well researched biography so I'm curious as to the distinction between the two formats. I'm guilty of reading too quickly and that may be the case here but I didn't pick up on the fact that it covers her death in the pub and only realised that's what happened when I researched her afterwards (she died of a brain hemorrhage at 29) - I thought she was just sick in that particular chapter. The book stays completely focused on Dunbar, and the author has done a brilliant job of character building here. I had no idea about her life before this and just read it as I was a fan of Rita, Sue and Bob Too. Really interesting to see what happens when someone is offered a "big break" that isn't quite big enough and isn't supported through it.
(Not covered in the book but after Dunbar died it resulted in a continued poverty loop for her children, Lorraine became a heroin addict and sex worker after life in care and was convicted of manslaughter after her 2 year old son died from ingesting her methadone. Her other daughter died of stomach cancer in 2007 but at the time was campaigning for Dunbar to be recognised in the city and not just in the blue plaque on their home.)
Whilst this is a novel of Dunbar's life the description led me to think it'd be far more fictionalised, and perhaps experimental. Instead it seems to be a well researched biography so I'm curious as to the distinction between the two formats. I'm guilty of reading too quickly and that may be the case here but I didn't pick up on the fact that it covers her death in the pub and only realised that's what happened when I researched her afterwards (she died of a brain hemorrhage at 29) - I thought she was just sick in that particular chapter. The book stays completely focused on Dunbar, and the author has done a brilliant job of character building here. I had no idea about her life before this and just read it as I was a fan of Rita, Sue and Bob Too. Really interesting to see what happens when someone is offered a "big break" that isn't quite big enough and isn't supported through it.
(Not covered in the book but after Dunbar died it resulted in a continued poverty loop for her children, Lorraine became a heroin addict and sex worker after life in care and was convicted of manslaughter after her 2 year old son died from ingesting her methadone. Her other daughter died of stomach cancer in 2007 but at the time was campaigning for Dunbar to be recognised in the city and not just in the blue plaque on their home.)
January 22, 2018
I started Adelle Stripe’s Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile having not heard of Andrea Dunbar or her work. I finished the novel feeling like I knew Andrea intimately, that I understood her desires, her anxieties, her frustrations and fear.
While reading this book I have read articles about Andrea but also about her daughter, Lorraine, who was jailed in 2007 for gross neglect after she allowed her 2-year old to ingest drugs which ultimately killed him. And now that I’ve completed the book I want to go out and read Andrea’s plays and watch both Rita, Sue and Bob Too and the 2010 film The Arbour which, much like this novel, documents Dunbar’s short life. Stripe has done something special here. There’s nothing hagiographic about her account of Andrea, Stripe doesn’t shy away from Dunbar’s alcoholism, her horrible choice in men or her failures as a mother. And yet while the subject matter is difficult – the physical abuse Dunbar experiences, the poverty she faces on a daily basis, the prejudice she’s exposed to just for being ‘working class’ – there’s nothing earnest or miserable about this book. It’s full of cheek and humour and some cracking dialogue and, most of all, it celebrates Dunbar as a unique and brilliant writer, one who deserved a longer more fruitful career.
While reading this book I have read articles about Andrea but also about her daughter, Lorraine, who was jailed in 2007 for gross neglect after she allowed her 2-year old to ingest drugs which ultimately killed him. And now that I’ve completed the book I want to go out and read Andrea’s plays and watch both Rita, Sue and Bob Too and the 2010 film The Arbour which, much like this novel, documents Dunbar’s short life. Stripe has done something special here. There’s nothing hagiographic about her account of Andrea, Stripe doesn’t shy away from Dunbar’s alcoholism, her horrible choice in men or her failures as a mother. And yet while the subject matter is difficult – the physical abuse Dunbar experiences, the poverty she faces on a daily basis, the prejudice she’s exposed to just for being ‘working class’ – there’s nothing earnest or miserable about this book. It’s full of cheek and humour and some cracking dialogue and, most of all, it celebrates Dunbar as a unique and brilliant writer, one who deserved a longer more fruitful career.
August 2, 2017
I hoped this book would speak in an authentic voice about the struggles of life on an estate where poverty, hard work and community were the common currencies. I wasn't disappointed. Adelle Stripe skilfully crafts a history of Andrea Dunbar and allows her character to come through so that although the story is told about her, she owns the narrative too. The fine details included are testament to indepth research and the telling of Andrea's life with care and attention to detail is impressive and gripping. The flow of the writing made this book both easy to read and difficult to put down, but I found myself pausing and wanting to wait and fully consider each episode in Dunbar's life. The contrast between North and South are all too clear in this work, and I think it is a timely and telling reminder that the world does not centre around London, and many live in realities that are far removed from metropolitan experiences. This is a fascinating and compelling work, and I do not hesitate to give it five stars.
February 19, 2021
This is a fictionalised version of the short life of Andrea Dunbar. She was a working class playwright from Bradford most well known, for Rita, Sue and Bob Too. She was intensely talented but struggled with alcoholism and a complicated personal life including domestic violence; her first work was written when she was in a women’s refuge.
What is captured in this book so well, is the struggles she had with reconciling her London / theatre life with her home life and the difficulty of believing that she had the right to a voice and to be heard. The scenes of London journalists and their response to Andreas work is a great example of the challenges that working class writers, women in particular, face.
What is captured in this book so well, is the struggles she had with reconciling her London / theatre life with her home life and the difficulty of believing that she had the right to a voice and to be heard. The scenes of London journalists and their response to Andreas work is a great example of the challenges that working class writers, women in particular, face.
December 22, 2021
Captures the remarkable, brave and tragically short life of immensely talented young playwright Andrea Dunbar.
Set against the Bradford estates in Thatcher’s Britain, and the London of experimental theatre and subsequently Cannes world of film, Dunbar’s voice is at last, heard.
But nothing can take Bradford out of the girl and she is deeply offended and utterly refuses to participate in the compromises demanded by commercial film makers. Her initial script is too real and too close to her experiences, and she demands its integrity is maintained despite the promise of huge wealth.
Bravo Adelle Stripe for handling this story with power and insight.
Set against the Bradford estates in Thatcher’s Britain, and the London of experimental theatre and subsequently Cannes world of film, Dunbar’s voice is at last, heard.
But nothing can take Bradford out of the girl and she is deeply offended and utterly refuses to participate in the compromises demanded by commercial film makers. Her initial script is too real and too close to her experiences, and she demands its integrity is maintained despite the promise of huge wealth.
Bravo Adelle Stripe for handling this story with power and insight.
June 14, 2021
This is my life on an estate in West Yorkshire. So familiar in every way. I met Andrea several times. She was scary in the pub. Her dad was even scarier. When I found out what she had done I wanted to talk to her but was to scared. Throughout this book I wanted her to escape, even though I knew the ending. This is passionate, empathetic writing, no gloss, no apologies. More from Adele please?
February 1, 2018
An absolute gem of a book. A beautifully written and unique portrayal of the life of the Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar. It's a gritty, poignant and sometimes funny debut novel. Looking forward to more from Adelle Stripe. Superb!
September 13, 2023
A tragic but beautiful telling of the life of Andrea Dunbar, a woman so wonderfully talented yet severely misunderstood. A fantastic and important read especially if you want to understand the struggles working class women faced and continue to grapple with
January 29, 2020
Fascinating and compelling in equal measure, Adelle Stripe's gritty novelisation of Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar's short, troubled life - which frequently inspires even more attention than her dramatic works - is shot through with gallows humour to create a vivid portrait of a difficult, talented woman who was that unique thing: "a genius straight from the slums" who was totally unaffected.
May 6, 2024
I’ve had this on my TBR for so long and it’s one of those books you wonder why you’ve left it so long to read.
Andrea Dunbar was a remarkable person and a bit of a genius but the notoriety she experienced after writing Rita, Sue and Bob Too didn’t do her any favours and she died at 29 of a brain haemorrhage.
I enjoyed the book immensely. You should read it!
Andrea Dunbar was a remarkable person and a bit of a genius but the notoriety she experienced after writing Rita, Sue and Bob Too didn’t do her any favours and she died at 29 of a brain haemorrhage.
I enjoyed the book immensely. You should read it!
March 25, 2021
Absolutely marvellous. Reminded me of Nell Dunn’s writing. Brilliant debut novel.
March 21, 2020
Not quite sure where to start. My overwhelming feeling at the end is one of being unsettled. The writing is excellent, sparing nothing and seemingly felt faithful to what Andrea Dunbar would probably have felt and thought.
I liked that Adelle Stripe doesn’t patronise at all. She reflects on Andrea Dunbar’s working class life as her own experience, she doesn’t judge or explain. She doesn’t suggest it is every working class persons experience. The best writing does that. It leaves you to think and reflect. And each reader will probably take something unique away from it.
The primary thread for me is how the men in her life abused Andrea, almost without exception, whether in her personal or professional life. And conversely the women were her supports.
But Adelle reflects how class permeates everything. I like to think I understand these things reasonably well, despite my very middle-class affluent upbringing. But I still half-questioned why Andrea didn’t move away, use her money more wisely. And yet experientially, rationally and historically I know all the multiple reasons why not. And yet there remains a but. I wonder how much of that lack of understanding by the London-centric drama critics contributed to her death. They seemed intrigued by her in the way you would a being from another planet.
A lesson for our times ... ‘seek to understand (and not judge) others’. But Adelle Stripe would never have said anything so patronising.
I liked that Adelle Stripe doesn’t patronise at all. She reflects on Andrea Dunbar’s working class life as her own experience, she doesn’t judge or explain. She doesn’t suggest it is every working class persons experience. The best writing does that. It leaves you to think and reflect. And each reader will probably take something unique away from it.
The primary thread for me is how the men in her life abused Andrea, almost without exception, whether in her personal or professional life. And conversely the women were her supports.
But Adelle reflects how class permeates everything. I like to think I understand these things reasonably well, despite my very middle-class affluent upbringing. But I still half-questioned why Andrea didn’t move away, use her money more wisely. And yet experientially, rationally and historically I know all the multiple reasons why not. And yet there remains a but. I wonder how much of that lack of understanding by the London-centric drama critics contributed to her death. They seemed intrigued by her in the way you would a being from another planet.
A lesson for our times ... ‘seek to understand (and not judge) others’. But Adelle Stripe would never have said anything so patronising.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 24, 2024
A fictional account of the life of playwright Andrea Dunbar and how the film that was based on her play Rita, Sue and Too came to be made.
It is difficult to decide what is fact and what is fiction in this novel but there is no doubt this is an excellent read.
The writing style of Stripe is to the point and no flowery language much like Dunbar herself. At 230 pages the author demonstrates how you get give the reader so much in a short time.
Stripe shows a definite North/South divide and you do get the feeling there is a bit of snobbery shown by some of the arty types in London.
A gem of a book.
It is difficult to decide what is fact and what is fiction in this novel but there is no doubt this is an excellent read.
The writing style of Stripe is to the point and no flowery language much like Dunbar herself. At 230 pages the author demonstrates how you get give the reader so much in a short time.
Stripe shows a definite North/South divide and you do get the feeling there is a bit of snobbery shown by some of the arty types in London.
A gem of a book.
July 30, 2024
I found this book when I was looking for a biography of Andrea Dunbar, and while it isn't exactly a biography, Adelle Stripe shows us Dunbar's brief life in a way that few 'proper' biographies could. It's a fictionalised yet faithful account of her life from the time she started writing as a teenager, to her sudden death at the age of just 29. As well as three plays, most famously Rita, Sue and Bob Too, she left behind three young children.
I had never heard of Andrea Dunbar until about a decade ago, when the innovative docudrama The Arbor was shown on TV one night. Previously I had heard of Rita, but only due to the film (which Andrea disliked for the changes to her original downbeat ending), but hadn't known it was a play first - let alone one written by a young woman whose first play had been written, then staged at London's Royal Court, when she was still a teenager. A young woman who was twice a teenage mother, who had lived in a battered women's shelter, who had left school before doing A Levels to work in a wool mill like her mother, who had never had any academic or literary aspirations in the first place. Someone who simply wrote what she saw and heard all around her and was encouraged to do so despite her own misgivings about it.
The working class is comparatively celebrated now (just ask my dad about the lack of RP use by TV presenters if you want a laugh). Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are targeted by schemes to get them into further education, training, given chances to share their stories and experiences. Own Voices it's called. Authenticity. When Andrea Dunbar was brought down to London to see her first play being developed, she felt alienated from the privileged bohemians of the theatre and found them fake; they'd tell her she was a wonderful talent and they'd champion her plays but it relied on her remaining their "diamond in the rough" and giving them that authentic taste of Life Up North Under Thatcher - after all, it wouldn't be authentic if she was financially stable I kept thinking while reading. Whatever their intentions were, I couldn't help feeling that it had all been rather exploitative.
While I believe it's a good thing, I do sometimes wonder if the modern enthusiasm for nurturing the talents of young working class people today means that a voice coming from the rawness of Andrea's life wouldn't be possible any more. She wrote what she did because she'd lived it, and she wrote about her life a way that was utterly unselfconscious. Despite the condemnation of the morality mob that came out in force when the film based on Rita, Sue and Bob Too was released in 1987, she remained defiant:
The real tragedy to me is that Andrea Dunbar's work was only so electrifying because it was so real; by never escaping the cycle of poverty, abuse, and alcoholism experienced by so many in the area she grew up in, she never became one of those fake people she despised who had transcended their start in life to live and work beyond the confines of a council estate. I can't help but wish that, despite everything, she had managed to.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c...
(Andrea Dunbar mural appears in home city, April 2024)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3thx...
(Inside Out magazine show looks back on the life and work of Andrea Dunbar in 2010)
I had never heard of Andrea Dunbar until about a decade ago, when the innovative docudrama The Arbor was shown on TV one night. Previously I had heard of Rita, but only due to the film (which Andrea disliked for the changes to her original downbeat ending), but hadn't known it was a play first - let alone one written by a young woman whose first play had been written, then staged at London's Royal Court, when she was still a teenager. A young woman who was twice a teenage mother, who had lived in a battered women's shelter, who had left school before doing A Levels to work in a wool mill like her mother, who had never had any academic or literary aspirations in the first place. Someone who simply wrote what she saw and heard all around her and was encouraged to do so despite her own misgivings about it.
The working class is comparatively celebrated now (just ask my dad about the lack of RP use by TV presenters if you want a laugh). Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are targeted by schemes to get them into further education, training, given chances to share their stories and experiences. Own Voices it's called. Authenticity. When Andrea Dunbar was brought down to London to see her first play being developed, she felt alienated from the privileged bohemians of the theatre and found them fake; they'd tell her she was a wonderful talent and they'd champion her plays but it relied on her remaining their "diamond in the rough" and giving them that authentic taste of Life Up North Under Thatcher - after all, it wouldn't be authentic if she was financially stable I kept thinking while reading. Whatever their intentions were, I couldn't help feeling that it had all been rather exploitative.
While I believe it's a good thing, I do sometimes wonder if the modern enthusiasm for nurturing the talents of young working class people today means that a voice coming from the rawness of Andrea's life wouldn't be possible any more. She wrote what she did because she'd lived it, and she wrote about her life a way that was utterly unselfconscious. Despite the condemnation of the morality mob that came out in force when the film based on Rita, Sue and Bob Too was released in 1987, she remained defiant:
I don't look at my characters as slags, just because they've been with a man before they find the right one, doesn't mean to say they are slags. I mean, nobody would look on it like that in middle-class backgrounds, but if it's working-class they get called slags. I don't see it like that at all...
The real tragedy to me is that Andrea Dunbar's work was only so electrifying because it was so real; by never escaping the cycle of poverty, abuse, and alcoholism experienced by so many in the area she grew up in, she never became one of those fake people she despised who had transcended their start in life to live and work beyond the confines of a council estate. I can't help but wish that, despite everything, she had managed to.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c...
(Andrea Dunbar mural appears in home city, April 2024)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3thx...
(Inside Out magazine show looks back on the life and work of Andrea Dunbar in 2010)
April 20, 2020
A biography of Andrea Dunbar written by Adelle Stripe.
"Best known for her classic black comedy Rita, Sue and Bob Too, Andrea Dunbar wrote three plays before dying at a tragically young age. This new literary portrayal features a cast of real and imagined characters set against the backdrop of the infamous Buttershaw estate during the Thatcher era."
This book was very honest about the grim way of life up north and the harsh upbringing that Andrea experienced in her life, which led her to become a troubled teenager and adult. It is told in short chapters and is both gritty, dark, funny but above all tells of a sad life that ended too short before she had a chance to be recognised for the genius of the writings and future potental.
It is interspersed with letters, scripts, newspaper articles and memories of those that knew her. It mad me go onto YouTube and watch some of her work and I was pleasantly surprised by how relevant is still all seems today, the grimness of working class communities has not changed.
"Best known for her classic black comedy Rita, Sue and Bob Too, Andrea Dunbar wrote three plays before dying at a tragically young age. This new literary portrayal features a cast of real and imagined characters set against the backdrop of the infamous Buttershaw estate during the Thatcher era."
This book was very honest about the grim way of life up north and the harsh upbringing that Andrea experienced in her life, which led her to become a troubled teenager and adult. It is told in short chapters and is both gritty, dark, funny but above all tells of a sad life that ended too short before she had a chance to be recognised for the genius of the writings and future potental.
It is interspersed with letters, scripts, newspaper articles and memories of those that knew her. It mad me go onto YouTube and watch some of her work and I was pleasantly surprised by how relevant is still all seems today, the grimness of working class communities has not changed.
July 4, 2019
I read this knowing only snippets about Andrea Dunbar, so had no strong preconceptions. What emerges is an honest, no frills account of a writer who had the potential to be held in the same regard as Kay Mellor, Alan Bennett or Shelagh Delaney. Sadly, a combination of crippling self doubt, alcoholism and exploitation at the hands of a theatre scene looking for kudos through “authenticity” meant this never came to be. Stripe’s writing is unadorned and clear eyed, and is unafraid to show the ways Dunbar successfully self sabotaged throughout her short career, as well as the ways in which she was exploited for the financial gain of others.
A powerful story of working class life which isn’t afraid to take aim at the sources of so much pain and suffering.
A powerful story of working class life which isn’t afraid to take aim at the sources of so much pain and suffering.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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