Long before he commanded the Enterprise, Patrick Stewart picked up a sword.
In 1978, BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Night Theatre broadcast J. C. W. Brook’s extraordinary The Tale of the Knight, the Witch and the Dragon, with Stewart as Sir Hugh of Monreth—an aging knight living in a peaceful world that has begun to think knights, witches, dragons, and perhaps even the old stories themselves are no longer necessary.
Then the dragon comes back.
In this Saturday Night Theatre Companion, we return to this remarkable production: Patrick Stewart’s performance, Peter Howell and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop’s extraordinary sound world, the strange power of radio fantasy, and the deeper question hiding beneath the adventure:
What happens when a civilized world decides it has outgrown fairy tales?
Along the way, we bring G. K. Chesterton into the conversation—The Ethics of Elfland, The Red Angel, St. George, the necessity of wonder, and the old truth that the important thing about dragons is that they can be fought.
🎧 Listen to the original play, then join us for the Companion.
Keep Chesterton Radio’s door open. If these rediscoveries of great radio, literature, drama, and forgotten culture are worth preserving, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support helps us continue finding, researching, and sharing them.
And when the podcast ends, the radio doesn’t.
Step through the Open Door and listen to Chesterton Radio’s 24/7 stream at Live.ChestertonRadio.com.
The old stories are still being told.
