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Throughout the 1920s the Common University provided a free and ready source of education to the working classes of England through various lecture series and the distribution of educative pamphlets in the East End. At the time it renowned as a philanthropic exercise noted more for its good intentions than its practice of asking for lecturers' credentials. In the mid 1930s it shut down amid a small furore over the nonsense it was teaching. It was assumed by all involved that that would be the end of it.

Then, toward the end of the 1990s the English poet A.F. Harrold discovered a box of papers in the attic of an elderly stranger. After exhaustive investigations, leads followed and clues uncovered he discovered that what he held in his hands were lecture notes, reports of speeches, lessons and seminars from the Common University long thought lost by educational historians. "Gosh," he thought, "This stuff's jolly interesting."

Looking into the history of the Common University he found that the lives of those involved in it were surprisingly exciting and he dramatised those events and those intrepid people in a series of novels that begin with The Curious Education of Epitome Quirkstandard. Now, however, he has decided to share some of the original documents that lead him to stories through an irregular series of readings. He's right, it is jolly interesting. If not entirely factually correct.

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Audio Quality: Out of 23 ratings

Narration Quality: Out of 23 ratings

Writing Quality: Out of 23 ratings

Overall Rating: Out of 23 ratings

By: jeff white
This was a scream. Laugh-out-loud funny. I loved the bit about fainting, which was actually about marriage, which was actually a sort of existential treatise regarding hominids and how damned hard it is to get through the day, unless you happen to have that certain special miniscule winged insect in your life. And also about how joy is fleeting, and tragedy inevitable. The tone is perfect, from the first plonk-plunkety-plonk notes of the music to the last signoff. (What does it say about me that when I downloaded this book, I understood it to be literally true that you were going to be sharing lectures from the Common University? I thought it might be slightly humorous at times, dry enough at others, and interesting mostly in its evocation of the worldview/zeitgeist of the 1920s. I felt duly and regretfully stupid, for only for a short bit). af harrold, you are a brilliant man. The spiritual heir, surely, to John Cleese. Or, because I'm an American and thus clueless about such things, whichever articulate, absurd, witty, philosophical, wildly creative and bust-a-blood-vessel funny English fellow you might choose. My hat is off to you, sir.

By: The Red Chef
Pretty humorous overall, for British humor of course, if you can call that humor. Not haha funny, but amusing enough to listen too. A.F. Harold's other story on Podiobooks "The Curious Education of Epitome Quirkstandard" is quite good and I recommend it.

By: Jeff
I've just listened to the first episode. It was delightful, I hope to see more from this author in the future. It reminded me of one of my favorite authors, Douglas Adams, and that is high praise indeed.

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