When the Boat Comes In is a British television period-drama produced by the BBC between 1976 and 1981.
The series stars James Bolam as Jack Ford, a First World War veteran who returns to his poverty-stricken (fictional) town of Gallowshield in the North East of England in the 1920s.
The memorable traditional tune "When The Boat Comes In" was adapted by David Fanshawe for the title theme of the series. Fanshawe also composed the incidental music.
The BBC revived the series in 1981, with this fourth series telling the story of Jack Ford as he returned to Britain penniless, after six years spent bootlegging in the United States and set up in London. The series ended with Ford shot and killed while attempting to deliver guns to the partisans in the Spanish Civil War.
The series' creator James Mitchell also wrote three tie-in books to the T.V. show: When the Boat Comes In, When the Boat Comes In: The Hungry Years and When the Boat Comes In: Upwards and Onwards. The final book brings the reader up to date with the end of the second series of the TV show.
Read more about When The Boat Comes In: Series Breakdown, Regular Cast, Semi-Regular Cast, Series One (1976), Series Two (1976-77), Series Three (1977), Series Four (1981), DVD Release, Further Reading
Famous quotes containing the words when the and/or boat:
“Kings were wont to honour philosophers; but if I had such I would honour them as angels that should have such purity in them that they would not seek when they are the second to be the first, and when they are third to be the second.”
—Elizabeth I (1533–1603)
“Translation is entirely mysterious. Increasingly I have felt that the art of writing is itself translating, or more like translating than it is like anything else. What is the other text, the original? I have no answer. I suppose it is the source, the deep sea where ideas swim, and one catches them in nets of words and swings them shining into the boat ... where in this metaphor they die and get canned and eaten in sandwiches.”
—Ursula K. Le Guin (b. 1929)