Happy New Year to followers of the Ayckbourn blog and the playwright’s official website.

To kick off 2023, I’m delighted to be able to share throughout the course of this year an archival discovery which has brought a smile to my face.

Forty years ago in 1983, the first – and only – Ayckbourn’s Scarborough calendar was published, in which the playwright celebrated his adopted home town and surrounding area with a light-hearted publication.

He wrote the captions to accompany photographs by Michael Stead offering a guide to places and sites of interest in and near Scarborough – with his tongue firmly in cheek.

It’s not known how the calendar came about, whether it was a fundraiser for the theatre or another good cause in Scarborough, nor why it was never followed up. It’s quite a rare piece of Ayckbourn ephemera though and not many are believed to have survived.

To celebrate the discovery in archive of this fascinating piece of Ayckbourn ephemera, the blog will be reproducing each image and Ayckbourn caption at the start of the appropriate month.

Tomorrow’s blog will kick off with – obviously – the January entry and I hope you get as much pleasure following this quirky calendar through the year as I’ve have done.

Ayckbourn’s Scarborough Calendar was discovered in the Ayckbourn Archive and was published in 1982 by Rosedale Publications Limited. It featured captions by Alan Ayckbourn alongside photographs by Michael Stead with the calendar designed by Bernard Stead FRSA. It was published by the Scarborough firm Pindar Print Ltd.

Stop by tomorrow for the first of Alan’s humorous looks at his home town!