Along with Alan Sillitoe and John Braine, Stan Barstow was considered one of the pioneers of the 1960s school of northern literary realism. He produced eleven novels and three books of short stories, as well as TV scripts. A Kind of Loving became a film directed by John Schlesinger and starring Alan Bates. He also wrote Joby, a television play starring Patrick Stewart and the television drama Calon Gaeth, which he co-wrote with Diana Griffiths, won a Welsh BAFTA for best drama. Stan was a Fellow of Academi. He passed away in 2011.

'Stan Barstow's stories... have what is so rare in a successful writer - a kind of primary vision, a feeling for characters, the mileux he originally knew and might have grown away from. He speaks for urban provincial life with piercing vividness; for a particular outlook and mortality that few other writers touch...' Financial Times

Along with Alan Sillitoe and John Braine, Stan Barstow was considered one of the pioneers of the 1960s school of northern literary realism. He produced eleven novels and three books of short stories, as well as TV scripts. A Kind of Loving became a film directed by John Schlesinger and starring Alan Bates. He also wrote Joby, a television play starring Patrick Stewart and the television drama Calon Gaeth, which he co-wrote with Diana Griffiths, won a Welsh BAFTA for best drama. Stan was a Fellow of Academi. He passed away in 2011.

'Stan Barstow's stories... have what is so rare in a successful writer - a kind of primary vision, a feeling for characters, the mileux he originally knew and might have grown away from. He speaks for urban provincial life with piercing vividness; for a particular outlook and mortality that few other writers touch...' Financial Times