The film is about the poet Laurie Lee's childhood and youth, between the ages of four and twenty-one, growing up in the Cotswolds village of Slad, Gloucestershire, in the years following the First World War. It observes the ending of the traditional English village way of life, with the arrival of motor cars and electricity, the death of the local squire, and the declining influence of the church. As part of that breaking-down process, Lee's father deserts his family, leaving his wife to bring up eight children. A central theme is Lee's awakening sexuality, as he grows older, and the title refers to his first flirtation, with a village girl called Rosie.