To Sir, With Love (novel)

To Sir, With Love
First edition
AuthorE. R. Braithwaite
LanguageEnglish
GenreAutobiographical novel
PublisherBodley Head
Publication date
1959
Publication placeUnited Kingdom
Media typePrint
Pages200 pp (paperback)
Awards1961 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award

To Sir, With Love is a 1959 autobiographical novel by E. R. Braithwaite set in the East End of London. The novel is based on the true story of Braithwaite accepting a teaching post in a secondary school. The novel, in 22 chapters, gives insight into the politics of race and class in postwar London.

In 1967, the novel was made into a film of the same name starring Sidney Poitier and Lulu. The film's title song became a U.S. No. 1 hit that year. The setting for the film was changed from post-war London to the "swinging sixties", and, notwithstanding its success, Braithwaite had ambivalent feelings towards it, as he admitted in an interview with Burt Caesar conducted for a 2007 BBC Radio 4 programme entitled To Sir, with Love Revisited (produced by Mary Ward Lowery). [1] Also in 2007, the novel was dramatised for Radio 4 by Roy Williams and broadcast in two parts, starring Kwame Kwei-Armah.[2]

To Sir, With Love was included on the "Big Jubilee Read" list of 70 books by Commonwealth authors, selected to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II in June 2022.[3]

In 2013, Ayub Khan Din adapted To Sir, With Love for the stage as part of Royal & Derngate, Northampton's Made In Northampton season. The play was directed by Mark Babych and starred Ansu Kabia in the title role and Matthew Kelly.[4] This was the first theatre-adoption of the book.[5]

  1. ^ Thomas, Susie (August 2013). "E.R. Braithwaite: To Sir, with Love". London Fictions. Retrieved 4 April 2021. (minor amendments, January 2016)
  2. ^ Radio Drama reviews Online – To Sir with Love by E. R. Braithwaite, adapted by Roy Williams, BBC Radio 4 Extra, 18–19 May 2011.
  3. ^ "The Big Jubilee Read: Books from 1952 to 1961". BBC. 17 April 2022. Retrieved 18 June 2022.
  4. ^ The List retrieved 2014-9-25
  5. ^ Fisher, Gillian (October 2013). "Ansu Kabia – interview - To Sir With Love". Afridiziak Theatre News. Retrieved 17 December 2022.