In the beginning: the creation of the King James Bible

The King James Bible is the most famous book in the English language. In 1604 King James VI of Scotland had just arrived in England and was starting to flex his constitutional muscles; fears of Roman Catholic Europe were fanned into flame by the Gunpowder Plot in 1605; the Puritans were agitating for a Calvinist polity. In these turbulent waters the six teams of scholars worked on the translation of Christendom’s most vital – and in the “wrong” hands most dangerous – text. Contemporary drafts, reports and responses will be brought vividly to life in this semi-dramatised account of the translators and their times.

With music by Dowland and Campion: Tim Travers-Brown, counter-tenor, Simon Wall, tenor David Miller, lute

Writer: Nigel Pascoe

The Cast: Robert Akenhead, Anthony Arlidge, Iain Christie, Peter Cowell, Julian Date, Benjamin Long, Matthew Scott, Richard Tutt

Director: Kenneth Richardson