New play brings Land Girl E M Barraud’s remarkable life to the stage

The memoirs and private papers of Women’s Land Army writer E M Barraud are being brought to the stage in a new solo production, devised and performed by Cambridgeshire actor and writer Jane Bower.

Call Me John tells the story of Enid Mary Barraud, who signed up to contribute to the government’s Mass Observation project in 1937. Two years later, she exchanged her work as a London insurance clerk for agricultural labour during the Second World War, and went on to become an extraordinarily perceptive chronicler of rural life.

Combining Barraud’s own wordsmithery with sounds, images, and newly gathered oral history, the production will premiere publicly at Downing Place Church, Cambridge, at 7.30pm on Thursday 9 July 2026.

The play will also receive a special first presentation at Eversdens Village Hall on at 7:30pm on Wednesday 1 July, open to local residents, reviewers, and members of Barraud’s family.

Barraud joined the Women’s Land Army as an original wartime volunteer and worked in Cambridgeshire. Her experiences formed the basis of her book Set My Hand Upon the Plough, published in 1946 and described at the time as the first serious account of working life in the Land Army written by an original volunteer.

Far from presenting rural life as a picturesque wartime interlude, Barraud wrote about the physical realities of agricultural labour, the education of rural children, environmental damage, farming practice, and the inadequacies of romanticised writing about the countryside.

She was also a contributor to The Land Girl, the official magazine serving members of the Women’s Land Army. Her work documented both the hardship of agricultural service and the lasting fellowship created among Land Girls.

Jane Bower’s work on the production took eighteen months, and included studying Barraud’s memoirs and private papers, visiting her homes, speaking with her relatives, and recording the memories of local people who still remember her with great affection.

Jane Bower says:

“John was not simply an interesting local character. She was a serious observer of agricultural life, and an important first-hand witness to the Women’s Land Army.

“Her writing resists the sentimental version of the Land Girl story. She records the work itself, the landscape, the animals, the people, and the social inequalities she encountered. Her voice is vivid, intelligent, and extraordinarily immediate.”

Barraud moved from London to rural Cambridgeshire, where she lived for many years and became known locally as John. Her unconventional identity and domestic life form part of the production, as do her ideas about work, class, landscape, literature, and belonging.

Recent archival work has renewed interest in Barraud. Her memoir and Mass Observation writings have been examined as important records of gender, rural life, and the transformative effect of wartime agricultural service.

Call Me John is intended to introduce her work to audiences who may never have encountered either her memoir or her wider contribution to Women’s Land Army writing.

The production may also be booked by museums, libraries, heritage organisations, inclusive churches, village halls, and small theatres.

Premiere performance details
Call Me John: Words, Sounds and Images from the Life of a WWII Land Girl
Devised, written and performed by Jane Bower
Thursday 9 July 2026, 7.30pm
Downing Place Church, Cambridge, CB2 3EL
Tickets: £12
Profits to Downing Place Church
Booking: https://downingplaceurc.churchsuite.com/events/2fd6ohnc