PlayITV1, April 2008
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From Westminster Bridge - the location for Wordsworth’s celebration of dawn - Melvyn Bragg travels down river by boat.
In a captivating second programme in the series he twists up to the West End on a double-decker bus before delving into the dark world of London’s 19th century child sweatshops.
Later, Bragg arrives on the South Bank, and the home of foul-mouthed Thames boatmen and the street slang of William Shakespeare’s day.
Crossing a city of fog, fire and filth, we hear why Victorians feared to tread the streets of the East End.
And outside the old city limits, the Thames passes through Wapping, which was for centuries a lawless outpost for low-lifes before heading on to Joseph Conrad’s Gravesend and the ghosts of Britain’s sea-faring tradition.
Contributors include: Stephen Fry, Boris Johnson, Tracey Emin, Martin Amis, PD James, Peter Ackroyd, Ian Hislop, Peter Bazalgette, Monica Ali, Ken Livingstone.
View images taken from the making of the show across the literary heritage of the London
