4. Prisoners of war: escapism and escape

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As the BBC marks the 80th anniversary of VE Day, Professor Emma Smith uncovers five unexpected stories about how World War Two changed books, publishing and reading forever. The classic image of British prisoners-of-war during World War Two is of fearless and ingenious attempts at escape, but Emma learns that the vast majority of those kept in captivity found escapism in a less cinematic manner – through books and reading. She visits the site of the New Bodleian’s ambitious Educational Books Service in Oxford, where librarians worked tirelessly to send books to men who hoped to spend their enforced inactivity in self-improvement. But she also learns about popular reading, including James Hadley Chase’s No Orchids for Miss Blandish, a novel which became infamous for its sado-erotic content and which has been described by one historian as the most popular book among servicemen in the entire war. Emma is surprised to discover the single work which never made it past the prisoner-of-war camp censors With contributions from Midge Gillies Produced for Just Radio by Beaty Rubens