Please see below for:

● An introduction to the new RSL President Colin Thubron.
● A reminder of Monday’s RSL event with P.D. James, Andrew Motion and Colin Thubron.
● News of other forthcoming literary events that might be of interest to you.

In the RSL Review, published later this month, Colin Thubron, who, since his first book Mirror to Damascus in 1967, has published almost twenty novels and travel books, writes of the challenges and possibilities facing him as he takes over the role:

We live in the age of the threatened book. Libraries and the small bookseller survive in a state of siege. Google and Amazon are barging in. The e-book looms. My initial response to these threats, if threats they are, is that it is less literature that is threatened than the book as an artefact. And our first duty is to literature: the written and read word, in whatever form it comes.

Whatever we may imagine, we live in a fertile age of literature, and in the body of our Fellows – as diverse and talented a concentration of writers as exists – we are well equipped to nourish it.

Outgoing President Sir Michael Holroyd reflects on his 7 years as President of the RSL and welcomes his successor:

Colin is a very individual writer, a very distinct and distinguished – and distinguishable – character. It is a time of real change and, as I have already confided to him, he will be a hard act to precede.

Monday 1 February, 7pm
The Roy Jenkins Memorial Lecture
Chaired by Colin Thubron

Is it possible to combine life as a writer with public service?  P.D. James, Baroness James of Holland Park, has worked as a civil servant, a governor of the BBC and a magistrate while writing her detective stories, and Roy Jenkins, whom this evening commemorates, published four biographies while he was an active MP. Yet Sir Andrew Motion admits that, in devoting himself to the post of Poet Laureate, he became quite unable to write poetry.  ‘If you are leading a public life and speaking up for poetry,’ he has said, ‘the fully conscious mind will become dominant, which is wrong for the vital mix you need for writing poetry.’  What is the vital mix and should writers feel they have a duty of public service?  Would either P.D. James or Andrew Motion organise their working lives differently if they could live them again? Colin Thubron, who, though reclusive by nature, is the new President of the Royal Society of Literature, umpires the discussion.

The talk will be held in the Kenneth Clark Lecture Theatre at the Courtauld Institute.

The Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy and Poetry Live have invited 20 of our leading poets to perform at Westminster Central Hall on Saturday January 30th 2010 at 2.30pm in a fundraising event for the people of Haiti.

Poets include Carol Ann Duffy, Roger McGough, Andrew Motion, John Agard, Dannie Abse, Brian Patten, Gillian Clarke, Imtiaz Dharker, Grace Nichols, Elaine Feinstein, Daljit Nagra, Ian Duhig, Lachlan Mackinnon, Owen Sheers, Glyn Maxwell, Jo Shapcott, Robin Robertson, Colette Bryce, Maura Dooley and Robert Minhinnick, along with the musicians John Sampson and Andy Roberts.

Tickets are £10. Telephone 01497 822629  or go to www.poetryliveforhaiti.org to book tickets. Tickets will be available at the door on the day for cash only.

All proceeds will go to the Disasters Emergency Committee’s Haiti Earthquake Appeal.

This event has been made possible thanks to the huge generosity of the Guardian Hay Festival, Westminster Central Hall and Eclipse Sound and Light.

In association with Spread the Word

The internet and digital technology are transforming - some would say decimating - traditional publishing, whilst online arenas offer writers new ways of creating literature and new routes for reaching audiences.

How do writers orientate themselves in this changing landscape? Is the democracy of online publication eroding editorial standards? Is quality publishing financially viable in this environment?

Conversely, digital media and online platforms are enabling writers to produce some of the most exciting developments in literary form and creative collaborations.

Prize winning author and leading writer in digital media Kate Pullinger, and writers commissioned by Spread the Word, demonstrate and discuss how they use the internet to produce new work and how it has informed their creative practice. Claire Armitstead, Guardian's Literary Editor, leads the debate on these questions with commentator Ian Jack, Sara Lloyd Digital Director at Pan Macmillan, writer Kate Pullinger and Jason Peglar from Chipmunka Publishing.

Saturday, 13 February 1pm - 5.45pm at the Free Word Centre, 60 Farringdon Road, London, EC1R 3GA.

Book Now at the Spread the Word website. Tickets: £35/£25

2010 is an exciting year in the life of the London Library, as Phase 2 of a major redevelopment brings new spaces and facilities to its members, including an additional Reading Room, a magnificent central lightwell with reader spaces, and the redesign and refurbishment of its beautiful Art Room.  All this in addition to the existing privileges offered by London Library membership:

•    More than one million books, from the 16th century to the present day, held on open access shelving
•    850 journal and periodical subscriptions
•    Wifi-equipped reading rooms in which to work or relax
•    The ability to take books home for as long as you need them
•    A postal loans service
•    The London Library Magazine delivered quarterly
•    Around 8,000 new books added to the Library’s collections every year
•    Extensive electronic resources, from academic journals to Who’s Who online, accessible from any internet connection

The London Library has been a haven for passionate writers and readers since it was founded by Thomas Carlyle in 1841, and it continues to provide unparalleled literary resources today.  Membership is open to all.  Join now!
www.londonlibrary.co.uk/join