Forty Years of Coronation Street

by Daran Little

A celebration of 40 years of the world's most famous soap opera, written by Coronation Street archivist, Daran Little. It represents a year-by-year review of all the major events in The Street from 1960, including a list of all main cast members.

Genres: Nonfiction

288 pages, Hardcover

First published September 16, 2000

Reviews

[chucklesthescot]

I really enjoyed the format of the book. Each year starts a new chapter and we get a behind the scenes which tells you about strikes, who quits, who joins and any major changes to the series. It then covers the main stories of the year, complete with photos. There is a lot of good stuff in the book and I really enjoyed it, remembering all those stories of the late seventies and eighties that I watched on TV at the time.

Perfect book for the Corrie fan and goes up to the 40th year of the series.

[Peter McGinn]

For me, this is the very best book on Coronation Street out there. I also own the books that were published after 25, 30 and 50 years, and I like them all for their different focuses and strengths, but this volume is the one I keep going back to again and again.

Most of the book covers year by year on the show, with each chapter covering the following for each year: A behind the scenes look at the show, a selection of the intertwining story lines, key dates from that year, a list of how many shows each actor has been in (cumulative), and a few pictures. Oh, and a cast list for that year. Forty chapters for forty years.

And then at the end of the book are the following features: an index of story lines by character. If you remember the Tony Horrocks character but don't remember exactly when he appeared on the show, this listing will show the dates where he appears in the 40 chapters of text. In the back are also a list of anniversaries, births, marriages and deaths on the show. Also a section on who was who and who lived where.

So the encyclopedic content is one reason it is so great, but also it is written by Daran Little, who was not only the archivist/historian of the show for a long time, but who also wrote a lot of scripts that were aired. As you might expect, therefore, he is a good writer and apt at keeping track of the merging and diverging story lines.

[Ryan Barry]

It's rare for a television show to pass 60 years of continuous drama, and as such, Coronation Street's illustrious history, social commentary, and original characterisation makes it ripe for companion books, compendiums, encyclopedias, guide books and spin-off fiction. I've read A LOT of these anniversary books and not necessarily in chronological order, which makes it more exciting.

What makes a Coronation Street book even more exciting is when the writer is a former dramatist, archivist, and writer of the show itself! Therefore Corrie journeyman Darren Little is the perfect author when reviewing the first forty years of this TV behemoth (1960 - 2000).

Each year includes a rundown of the top storylines, the supporting cast, off-set news, gossip, and includes some revisiting history about the soaps sets, production, casting, and the most unforgettable storylines in the show's history.

If you've never read a Coronation Street book before, I suggest you start with Daran LIttle - just brilliant!!

[Petra]

My guilty pleasure is watching the re-runs of classic Coronation Street. I bought this book so that I could chart the connections between the characters through the years. I think it would have been more helpful to photograph all the cast members to jog my memory - some of the names of characters didn’t help me to recall. But it was interesting to see just how many actors appeared several times as different characters.
Interesting, but when all the storylines are condensed in such a way, it does make you realise just how far-fetched it can be!!