Mr. Golyadkin, a minor government official, is a rather middling man. Then one day he meets his “double”—a man with the same name, face, and background. Initially charmed by the coincidence, Golyadkin soon notices a discernable cooling in the reaction of his friends and colleagues, while his double seems to grow in popularity. Unable to escape the relentless presence of “Golyadkin junior,” even the most ordinary activities begin to take on a terrifying significance, until Golyadkin finds himself on the verge of a breakdown. Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821­81) is regarded as one of the greatest prose writers of all time.

The League started life in the early 1990s, evoking old-style revues with their name and their tuxedo-clad performances. The material, however, bore little relation to that of genteel 1950s performers--the League's dark, twisted sketches have seen them likened to both Monty Python and David Lynch. After winning the Perrier award at Edinburgh in 1997, and before turning their attentions to television, they produced On The Town With The League Of Gentlemen, a Sony award-winning series for Radio 4.

This welcome release from the BBC Radio Collection contains the complete series, and is an essential purchase for the many fans of the television version who missed the earlier incarnation. Many of the storylines are similar to the TV version, but there is plenty of material which will be new to listeners, including characters who did not make it onto the screen--and for anyone new to the League, the radio edition easily stands on its own as one of the best comedy series of recent years. Running time approx 3 hours --John Oates