The Charles Parker Prize is awarded every year for the best student radio feature. The latest prize went to a short documentary about one of the most famous supernatural entities in English folklore - Black Shuck.
You can hear the entire radio show here on the iPlayer. The documentary 'Back Shuck - Hellhound of the East takes up the last twenty minutes of the show.
Black Shuck's finest hour, so to speak, took place back in 1577 when he appeared in a church at Bungay and munched on some parishioners. He then telepored a few miles to Blytheborurgh and committed more mayhem. Other accounts suggest the dog is a portent of death, or simply wanders about scaring people, or is even benevolent to lone travellers, especially women.
This may just be because people are describing, y'know, dogs. But the radio show is well worth a listen. I think it captures in a short space the essence of folklore, with its mixture of history, anecdote, humour, fear, and enduring mystery.
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