Flora Thompson (1876????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????1947) wrote what may be the quintessential distillation of English country life at the turn of the twentieth century. In 1945, the three books Lark Rise (1939), Over to Candleford (1941), and Candleford Green (1943) were published together in one elegant volume, and this new omnibus Nonpareil edition, complete with charming wood engravings, should be a cause for real rejoicing. In his introduction, H. J. Massingham observes that Thompson possesses the attributes both of sympathetic presentation and literary power to such a degree of quality and beauty that her claims upon posterity can hardly be questioned. He calls the books themselves a triune achievement: a triumph of evocation in the resurrecting of an age that, being transitional, was the most difficult to catch as it flew; another in diversity of rural portraiture engagingly blended with autobiography; and the last in the overtones and implications of a set of values which is the author's 'message'.

Flora Thompson (1876 to 947) wrote what may be the quintessential distillation of English country life at the turn of the twentieth century. In 1945, the three books Lark Rise (1939), Over to Candleford (1941), and Candleford Green (1943) were published together in one elegant volume, and this new omnibus Nonpareil edition, complete with charming wood engravings, should be a cause for real rejoicing.

The books have inspired two plays that ran in London, and the trilogy has been adapted into a multi-part, long-running television drama series by the BBC. The first series of ten episodes is scheduled to be syndicated on various PBS stations throughout the United States. A second series of twelve episodes, currently being broadcast in the United Kingdom, will follow in the United States shortly after.