''The Secret Kingdom'' is a 1938 novel by the British writer

Walter Greenwood Walter Greenwood (17 December 1903 – 13 September 1974) was an English novelist, best known for the socially influential novel ''Love on the Dole'' (1933). Early life Greenwood was born at 56 Ellor Street, his father's house and hairdres ...

. Like his best-known novel ''

Love on the Dole ''Love on the Dole'' is a novel by Walter Greenwood, about working-class poverty in 1930s Northern England. It has been made into both a play and a film. The novel Walter Greenwood's novel (1933) was written during the early 1930s as a respons ...

'' it is set in

Salford Salford () is a city and the largest settlement in the City of Salford metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. In 2011, Salford had a population of 103,886. It is also the second and only other city in the metropolitan county afte ...

. It portrays the

working-class The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colou ...

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...

Byron family, and particularly the eldest daughter Paula who tries to establish an independent identity after finding working a

parlour maid A maid, or housemaid or maidservant, is a female domestic worker. In the Victorian era domestic service was the second largest category of employment in England and Wales, after agricultural work. In developed Western nations, full-time maid ...

. She encounters Bert Treville in nearby

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...

and the two begin a courtship. After his death due to heavy drinking, she brings up her son Lance as a single-mother, throwing her effort into her talented child she is vindicated when he emerges as a talented

concert pianist A pianist ( , ) is an individual musician who plays the piano. Since most forms of Western music can make use of the piano, pianists have a wide repertoire and a wide variety of styles to choose from, among them traditional classical music, ja ...

- performing on national

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

in the final scene.

Adaptation

In 1960 it was adapted into an eight-part

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

television series of the same title. Greenwood had in the 1940s had written a screenplay based on the story, but it remained unproduced.Hopkins p.109

References

Bibliography

*Baskin, Ellen. ''Serials on British Television, 1950-1994''. Scolar Press, 1996. * Hopkins, Chris. ''Walter Greenwood's Love on the Dole: Novel, Play, Film''. Oxford University Press, 2018. 1938 British novels Novels by Walter Greenwood Novels set in Manchester Jonathan Cape books British novels adapted into television shows Salford {{1930s-novel-stub