Forthcoming non-society events
A round-up of other literary events of interest coming up over the next couple of months.
This lecture investigates one of Dickens's most peculiar and enigmatic characters, Master Humphrey, the narrator of The Old Curiosity Shop (that is, until he is mysteriously dismissed from this role). It details some of Humphrey's oddities, and speculates about his puzzling past, before discreetly following him into the streets of London at night. It identifies him as a far more disturbing individual than readers of this supposedly sentimental novel tend to assume, and locates his unsettling descendants in novels by Stevenson, Joyce and Nabokov, among others.
Admission: Free and open to anyone on a first-come first-served basis.
Further information: Dan Martin - 020 3108 3840 or click here.
A romantic candlelit tour of Keats House for lovers of all ages. There will be fizz, chocolate and a creative writing challenge inspired by Keats’s love letters to Fanny Brawne.
£10 / £8 concessions. Please book in advance.
www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/keatshousehampstead / 020 7332 3868
Few novelists have written so intimately about a city in the way that Charles Dickens wrote about London. A near photographic memory made his contact with the city indelible from a very young age and it remained his constant focus. Dickens was drawn to the character of London itself, all aspects of the capital from the coaching inns of his early years to the taverns and watermen of the Thames; these were the constant cityscapes of his life and work. Based on five walks through central London, Peter Clark illuminates the settings of Dickens’s greatest works, his life, his journalism and his fiction. He also explores ‘The First Suburbs’ (Camden Town, Chelsea, Greenwich, Hampstead, Highgate and Limehouse) as they feature in Dickens’s writing. In this talk, Peter Clark will be focusing on the walk from Bermondsey to Holborn Circus, sharing highlights which feature in Dickens's all-time favourite Oliver Twist.
Admission: £5.00
Please book at www.woolfsonandtay.com/peterclark.html or ring 0207 407 9316.
A Valentine poetry reading for you and your love, including extracts from Keats’s love letters to his fiancée Fanny Brawne, the girl next door.
FREE with an admission ticket to the house (valid for one year).
www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/keatshousehampstead / 020 7332 3868
Featuring
Booker-nominated author Paul Bailey
Author/Aerialist Will Davis
Filmmaker Campbell X
Writer/Publisher Helen Sandler
Poet/Performer Andra Simons
Artist Aliyahgator
This event celebrates the diverse voices of leading lesbian and gay authors and artists. An accompanying exhibition by Aliyahgator - Home And Away: LGBT Londoners - will also be on show.
FREE, but booking is advised: instore, online or call 0207 407 9316
April De Angelis will be in conversation with Chris Campbell, Literary Manager of the Royal Court, about her life, career and work; hear a reading from one of her plays; and join us in discussion with April about her themes, styles and methods of writing.
Training as an actress, April De Angelis soon became one of the most exciting voices writing in theatre in the late eighties and early nineties. Her work is frank and funny and often features historical figures. Her play Jumpy, starring Tamsin Grieg, was a huge success at the Royal Court last year. Plays also include Playhouse Creatures (West End, 1993), A Warwickshire Testimony (RSC, 1999) and Wild East (Royal Court, 2005).
Tickets: £8. Book via 020 7407 0234 or online.
Write to Play… events focus on a contemporary playwright, changing venues each time and strive to give audiences the opportunity to engage with playwrights. www.inthesameboat.org.uk
One of the few contemporary institutions to have Dickens's unqualified approval was the Metropolitan Police. The supremely resourceful and effective Inspector Bucket in Bleak House was based upon Detective Inspector Charles Field who would escort Dickens and his friends on tours of some of London's most notorious criminal slums. 'Mr Inspector' in Our Mutual Friend is another police character admiringly presented by Dickens. In his talk Michael Slater will discuss not only the Metropolitan Police in Dickens's novels but also his extensive journalistic writings about the Force, especially the Detective Branch.
Price: £8 / £6 (concs.)
Further information: Click here / 020 7392 9200
On the 23rd February 1821, John Keats died in Rome at the age of 25. To commemorate the anniversary of his death, we present a programme of poetry and prose to celebrate the life of this inspirational poet. This will include a reading of Shelley’s eulogy to Keats, Adonais.
FREE with an admission ticket to the house (valid for one year)
www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/keatshousehampstead / 020 7332 3868
Follow the story of Keats's life in this two and a half hour walk around Hampstead with readings from some of his best-loved poems. Starting at Hampstead tube, we will stroll through old Hampstead, visit the Vale of Health, dip into the Heath and finish at Keats House.
£6.00 (no concessions). Please book in advance by calling 020 7332 3868.
Following our highly popular debates featuring publishers and agents, we ask leading literary editors and reviewers to reveal the secrets of how they work. What kinds of books are likely to find favour with them? How do they juggle the sometimes competing factors of literary merit, newsworthiness and popularity? How is the role of the editor and critic changing?
Tickets: £10. Please send cheques (made out to the Biographers’ Club) to Jane Mays, 21 Marsden Street, London NW5 3HE. secretary@biographersclub.co.uk
One of the great imaginative writers of all time, Charles Dickens was a consummate storyteller who could draw his readers into the heart of his narrative. Michael Rosen delves into Dickens's story-telling skills and techniques, including how his 'voice' appeared both as the narrator and in the minds and mouths of his characters. With the skill of the modern-day filmmaker, Dickens could convey the broadest scene to the most intimate detail.
Price: £8 / £6 (concs.)
Further information: Click here / 020 7392 9200
Join Guildhall Art Gallery curator Sonia Solicari for an exploration of Keats and the cult of the poet in early nineteenth century art.
FREE with an admission ticket to Keats House (valid for one year)
Dickens consistently challenged the orthodoxy that prostitutes were to be regarded as 'no longer women'. This talk explores Dickens's portrayal of prostitutes in his novels, in particular Nancy in Oliver Twist and Martha in David Copperfield, both of whom are offered a new life, and a new identity, by enlightened benefactors.
Price: £8 / £6 (concs.)
Further information: Click here / 020 7392 9200
From his childhood acquaintance with London, when he feared he might become ‘a little robber or a little vagabond’, Charles Dickens was fascinated by crime. His novels all include criminal activity of some kind as he investigates criminal psychology and the causes of crime. Dickens lived through a period of considerable development in society’s treatment of criminals: the foundation of the Metropolitan Police in 1829, the Detective Force in 1842, the same year as the New Model Prison opened at Pentonville; the ending of transportation and of public executions; the word ‘penology’ was first used in 1838, the year he began to publish Nicholas Nickleby. Dickens engages with these issues very fully, both in his fiction and in his journalism, as this talk will explore.
FREE (the event will be run on a “first come, first served” basis)
More details from Gresham College.
The urban detective has traditionally been a figure supremely able to penetrate the mysteries of the city, yet set apart from the populace he protects. Have recent London crime stories abandoned their confidence in the interpretative abilities of the detective? Can we still believe in omnipotent figures such as Dickens’ Inspector Bucket or Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes? Is London still a place where mysteries can be satisfactorily solved? This talk will explore the changing role and persona of the London detective, and look at novels where the detecting is done by some unlikely figures, including female pharmicists (Janet Stevenson's London Bridges) or children (Siobhan Dowd's The London Eye Adventure).
FREE (the event will be run on a “first come, first served” basis)
Details from Gresham College.
London is a city of secrets, a shifting, seething mass of intrigue, venality and violence, in constant cultural flux. The perfect setting for crime fiction - but how does the modern writer decode this centuries' old conurbation?
FREE (the event will be run on a “first come, first served” basis)
Details from Gresham College.
From the impressions of his first youthful visit, to his mature years when all doors opened for him, London was an important backdrop to much of Conan Doyle's life and work. From the Sherlock Holmes stories to The Lost World (in this, the 100th anniversary year of Professor Challenger's first great adventure) this lecture examines some of the locations which influenced him. It will also touch on some of his lesser known works and include the place which perhaps meant more to him than any other in London, and to which he returned in his writing throughout his life.
FREE (the event will be run on a “first come, first served” basis)
Details from Gresham College.