Caroline, Countess of Cranbrook
Desert Island Discs: Archive 2005-2010
BBC
4.4 • 804 Ratings
🗓️ 31 May 2009
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Kirsty Young's castaway is Caroline, Countess of Cranbrook. Caroline has travelled the world to see how different zoos worked, spent years living in the jungle and, when she returned to Britain, taught herself how to be a farmer. She has become a champion of the countryside and, when a supermarket giant announced plans to open a store on her doorstep, she decided to take them on.
[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]
Favourite track: No. 54 Chorale: O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden by Johann Sebastian Bach Book: Food in England by Dorothy Hartley Luxury: Ink and a pen.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're about to listen to a BBC podcast, but this is about something else you might enjoy. |
| 0:05.4 | My name's Katie Lecky and I'm an assistant commissioner for on demand music on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:10.7 | The BBC has an incredible musical heritage and culture and as a music lover, I love being part of that. |
| 0:17.4 | With music on sounds, we offer collections and mixes for everything, from workouts to helping |
| 0:22.7 | you nod off, boogie in your kitchen, or even just a moment of calm. And they're all put together |
| 0:28.7 | by people who know their stuff. So if you want some expertly curated music in your life, |
| 0:34.9 | check out BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Krista Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. |
| 0:41.8 | For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music. |
| 0:45.1 | The program was originally broadcast in 2009. |
| 1:09.2 | Music My castaway this week is the countryside campaigner, the countess of Cranbrook. |
| 1:12.4 | Both protester and promoter, Caroline Cranbrook, |
| 1:18.5 | is a champion of independent shopkeepers, farmers and small-scale producers. But as matron of the awkward squad, she's probably best known for her part in taking on supermarket Goliath Tesco |
| 1:23.5 | and winning. At first glance, she may seem an unlikely folk hero, but her pedigree more than |
| 1:29.4 | hints at a character, well suited to meeting obfuscation and resistance head-on. The daughter of two |
| 1:35.3 | spies, she says she is like a rat, living under the floorboards and popping up in the most |
| 1:41.7 | unexpected places. You did say that, didn't you? They did, yeah. |
| 1:44.7 | It's not the way we're used to a countess being described, |
| 1:47.2 | or certainly hearing her describe herself. |
| 1:49.1 | Is that the key to successful campaigning then, |
| 1:51.6 | this subversive element of people not quite knowing |
| 1:55.5 | when you're going to poke your nose into their business? |
| 1:57.7 | I think that's part of it, is being there. But I think also, in my own life, |
... |
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