Fifty years after the publication of Keith Waterhouse's Billy Liar, writer Blake Morrison goes in search of the world it evokes - the north of England on the cusp of the 1960s. The story of a frustrated young man in a northern town who escapes from reality into vivid fantasies of power and glory, Billy Liar captured the public imagination. It became a play, a film, a musical and even a TV series.
Blake travels to Leeds to explore the way in which Waterhouse's life there overlaps with Billy's story, and talks to long-term residents and local historians about how the city, and the society depicted in the novel, has changed. The programme also features contributions from Barbara Taylor Bradford, Barry Cryer and Sir Gerald Kaufman MP.
