"Diaries are like conversation...even if the conversation is with oneself." Alan Bennett.

The eighties were a busy time for Alan Bennett. His insider's ear on the arts world - Thora Hird and Coral Browne, Denholm Elliot and Maggie Smith - is eccentric and unmissable. But Bennett's canvas also includes his mother, a writer's tour of Russia, life in New York and Camden, filming in Egypt, the Falklands War, Mrs Thatcher and Yorkshire.

Bennett's eye-view of the decade confirms him as one of life's great observers - clear-eyed, compassionate and funny.

"Diaries are like conversation...even if the conversation is with oneself."

Alan Bennett, Diaries