Book description
Edna the Inebriate Woman was written when Jeremy Sandford, whose
documentary Cathy Come Home had focused public attention on the plight
of homeless families, decided to study the equally grave problems faced
by Britain's thousands of single homeless people. The author follows
Edna on her continuous journey through town and country and shows us at
first hand the shortcomings and sheer absurdities of a society whose
response to Edna's predicament is insensitive, inappropriate and
expensive. Sandford's own anger and impatience with our reluctance to
help those who wander through the twilight world at the bottom of
society is infectious.
Jeremy Sandford was born in 1930, died 2003, and was educated at Eton,
Oxford, and joined a touring military band when young. He is the author
of the screenplay Edna the Inebriate Woman. Cathy Come Home was awarded
the Writers Guild Best Television Play, the ACTT Best TV Play of the
Year, and the Italia Prize. Ken Loach directed the TV documentary of the
book, and after it was aired, the then government called a special
screening of the play to Housing ministers in Westminster, following
the fierce political debate in the newspapers that followed the TV
airing. Discussions on the 4000 plus families who were homeless in the
UK in 1966 commenced, and following governments passed laws on social
housing to improve conditions.
