Please see below for:

● A reminder of Monday’s RSL event with David Hare and Christopher Hampton.
● Booking details for our joint event with the Antiquarian Book Fair in June.
● News of other forthcoming literary events that might be of interest to you.

Monday 12 April, 7pm
The Garrick Lecture
Chaired by Christopher Hampton

Asked by a Sunday newspaper to name the best British film of the last 25 years, Sir David Hare suggested The Power of Nightmares, Adam Curtis’s BBC documentary series about how Western politicians have, for reasons of their own, talked up a war on terror. But why, he wondered, did his mind go unhesitatingly to a documentary rather than a fiction? At a time when Hare’s own plays – about the diplomatic process leading up to the Iraq war, about Labour Party funding, about the privatisation of the railways, and about the financial crisis – have employed such a dizzying mix of reportage and invention, how does he answer sceptics who believe in the old forms? In this lecture David Hare contrasts a journalistic view of life and an artistic one.

We are grateful to the Garrick Charitable Trust for sponsoring this lecture.

This event is free for Fellows and Members of the Royal Society of Literature. There are a limited number of tickets available for members of the public at all RSL events. These are sold on the door, from 6pm, on a first-come-first-served basis. We suggest a contribution of £7 (£5 concessions). For further information please visit our website www.rslit.org, or call us on 020 7845 4676.

Kenneth Clark Lecture Theatre Courtauld Institute, Somerset House Strand, London WC2R 1LA

The Royal Society of Literature is delighted to have been selected as the Charity Partner of this year’s Antiquarian Book Fair.

The Fair Charity Preview - 3 June 2010
The fair will host a Charity Preview on Thursday 3 June from 2 - 4pm, before the official fair opening, in aid of the RSL.

Fair Patron - Melvyn Bragg
Lord Bragg is widely recognised as both author and broadcaster, particularly well known for the late, much lamented, South Bank Show. He is a Fellow and supporter of the Royal Society of Literature. Lord Bragg will open the Fair on Thursday 3 June during the Preview. Guests will be offered a glass of wine, and the opportunity to have first look at the books on offer.

The London International Antiquarian Book Fair, Olympia is the only truly international fair of its kind in the UK and attracts over 3,500 visitors every year. While some books are expensive, some are not. Prices start from as little as £10. Whether your taste is Adam Smith or Adam and Eve, Dickens or Diderot, Potter or Proust, Speed or Schedel, Fleming or Foujita, there is likely to be something that appeals to you.

We are offering Fellows and members of the RSL the opportunity to purchase tickets to the preview at the discounted price of £10 (normally £25). To buy a ticket or for more information, please call Rachel Page on 0207 845 4677 or email rachel@rslit.org

When asked in an interview whether he ever intended to return to his Motherland, Joseph Brodsky replied: "Such a journey could only take place anonymously..."

The creators of this film imagined that the journey in question was undertaken after all, selecting the genre of an ironic fairytale. The poet sails to the country of his childhood, and with him we traverse not only geographical expanses, but travel through time as well; stringing together a number of facts from the Nobel Prize Laureate's biography, we return to the USSR of the 50s and early 60s, soaking up the atmosphere of the "European" city of St. Petersburg, to this day Russia's cultural centre. Along with live-action sequences, the film features animation, as well as documentary footage concerning Brodsky and his milieu.

A Room and a Half • starring Alisa Freyndlikh, Sergei Yursky, Grigoriy Dityatkovskiy, Artem Smoal and Yevgeniy Ogandzhanyan • written by Yuriy Arabov and Andrey Khrzhanovskiy • produced by Artem Vassiliev and Andrey Khrzhanovskiy • Directed by Andrey Khrzhanovskiy • Russia, 2008.

From 7 May in Curzon Mayfair, Everyman Hampstead, Ritzy Brixton, Cine Lumière and selected cinemas nationwide.

9, 10 and 11 April 2010

Authors appearing include Hilary Mantel, Hanif Kureishi, Will Hutton, Don Paterson, Jon McGregor, Blake Morrison, John Simpson, Owen Sheers and Rebecca Stott.

With an election looming, Lionel Shriver, Blake Morrison, Andrew O’Hagan and Prue Leith discuss the intersection of Politics & Literature; documentary maker and founder of the 10:10 campaign, Franny Armstrong (The Age of Stupid, McLibel) is in conversation with environmental campaigner Tony Juniper; and independent minded MP Martin Bell discusses the expenses scandal.

Visit www.cambridgewordfest.co.uk for full details