Dignity

Magda lives alone in a house by the sea. Proud and bad-tempered, she finds it hard to accept help - despite her derelict house and her body's betrayals. She gets through carers at a rate of knots - until Susheela arrives, and the two women strike up an unlikely friendship. Susheela's Bengali heritage brings back memories of Magda's childhood in India, and the tragic figure of Magda's mother, Evelyn. Once a free-spirited schoolteacher, her optimism was ground away by a controlling husband and the misery of being a respectable member of the Raj's ruling class - with devastating consequences...