Events Archive – 2012-2016

Lecture on TS Eliot and Romanticism, December 2016

Dr Scott Freer will be giving a public lecture on TS Eliot and Romanticism on Friday 9th December, 12-1pm at the University of Leicester.

The lecture will outline Eliot’s critical views on Romantic poets, such as Blake and Shelley, and explain how some of his critical concepts (e.g. ‘impersonal poetics’, ‘historical sense’) shaped the legacy of Romanticism in the twentieth century. The lecture will also position Eliot’s anti-Romantic views in relation to TE Hulme’s theological reaction to the politics of Romanticism. For further details contact: sef17@le.ac.uk

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Walk: The Waste Land in the City, December 2016

Another of Miss B’s guided walks around City of London sites mentioned in The Waste Land will take place on Wednesday December 14th at 2pm.

The walk takes in churches such as St Magnus Martyr and St Mary Woolnoth, along with other streets and sites including a glimpse of the former banking hall where Eliot worked.

Full details of the walk are here. Members of the TS Eliot Society are entitled to a discounted ticket porice; see the Members Area for details.

 

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Annual TS Eliot Lecture 2016: ‘Eliot’s Ghost Women’ by Dr Sarah Kennedy, October 2016

Dr Sarah Kennedy is to give this year’s Annual TS Eliot Lecture in Cambridge on Monday 28th November at 7pm. Her subject is ‘Eliot’s Ghost Women’.

Dr Kennedy is Fellow in English at Downing College, Cambridge and, among her writings on TS Eliot, recently contributed the chapter Let these words answer: Ash-Wednesday and the Ariel Poems to The New Cambridge Companion to T. S. Eliot.

The Lecture, presented by the TS Eliot Society (UK), is hosted this year by Newnham College, Cambridge, recipients of the Valerie Eliot Fund for English, and will be given in:

Lucia Windsor Room, Newnham College, Cambridge CB3 9DF

The Lecture is open to the public, and admission is free.

Members of the TS Eliot Society can register for reserved seating at the Lecture, and a private drinks reception on the evening; see the Members Area for details.

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Roger Allam reads Four Quartets, highlighted by music of Bach and Messaien, October 2016

The Riverhouse Arts Centre, in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey is staging a unique programme in which award-winning actor Roger Allam gives an intimate reading of T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets”, highlighted by the music of Bach and Messiaen, performed by pianist Angela Hewitt.
Roger Allam’s roles in The Missing and Endeavour are the latest in a career encompassing stage, screen and television. Angela Hewitt is an internationally celebrated pianist.

The performance will take place on Wednesday 14th December at 8pm. Full details and tickets are available here.

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TS Eliot Festival 2017, October 2016

The Twelfth Annual TS Eliot Festival has been scheduled for Sunday 9th July 2017. Make a note in your diaries; the one-day event will take place in the grounds of Little Gidding, and the line-up will be announced in due course.

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The Waste Land City of London walks, October 2016

Guided walking tours of key City of London sites mentioned in The Waste Land will take place on two dates in October.

The two-hour walks begin at Monument, and take in sights including London Bridge; the key churches (St Magnus Martyr, St Mary Woolnoth); and the streets (Lower Thames Street, King William Street) specifically mentioned in The Waste Land. Other locations are visited  to illuminate further passages from the poem. The walk also takes in the Lloyds Bank in Lombard Street where Eliot worked.

You can hear a podcast recorded on the walk with guide Tina Baxter on Londonist Out Loud – and you can read an article by a group taking the walk on In London Guide.

The coming walks take place on October 13^th and October 29^th – click on the dates for ticket and booking details.

Current members of the TS Eliot Society (UK) can obtain a discount on ticket prices – see the Members Area for details.

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Murder in the Cathedral at Portsmouth Cathedral, August 2016

The Southsea Shakespeare Actors will present TS Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral, as part of Portsmouth Cathedral’s Patronal Festival.  The production will be staged in the atmospheric surroundings of the cathedral nave on the 1st and 2nd of October 2016, and will be directed by Lauren Farnhill.

Further production details are here, and tickets are available here.

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TS Eliot, Magic and Mysticism, August 2016

On 25th August 2016, at 7.30pm, Dr Allan Johnson, of the University of Surrey, will lecture on Eliot’s “lifelong interest in Eastern mysticism and also in Western esoteric traditions, and the power of myth”, at Treadwell’s Bookshop, 33 Store Street, Bloomsbury, London WC1E 7BS.

The outline suggests that “Eliot’s writing was influenced by a life-long intellectual interest in mystical thought, visible in his work from  The Waste Land’s  tarot sequence to the Four Quartets’ alchemical symbolism.

“In Eliot’s view, World War I had disrupted ancient cycles of fertility and renewal, and  tonight’s speaker  suggests that Eliot was attempting to renew the sacred through innovative poetic form.” Details and tickets are here.

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Four Quartets at King’s Lynn Festival, July 2016

Niamh Cusack will now read from TS Eliot’s Four Quartets at the King’s Lynn Festival on Thursday 28th July. She replaces Juliet Stevenson, who has had to withdraw because of filming schedules.

At the event, in St Nicholas’ Chapel, Eliot’s poetry will be interwoven with cellist Guy Johnston playing selections from Bach’s cello suites. And TS Eliot Society Patron Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury. a poet and Eliot authority, will be discussing the texts. Full details and programme of the event are here.

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The Waste Land  City walk, July 2016

Tina Baxter is hosting another of her popular guided walks around City of London sites related to The Waste Land, on Thursday 21st July.

“Seeking out the streets and places that may have been an inspiration to the poet,” the two-hour walk visits City churches like St Mary Woolnoth (right) and other locations mentioned in the poem. Full details and booking are here.

Members of the TS Eliot Society (UK) are entitled to a discount on tickets; see the Members Area for details.

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TS Eliot Festival 2016 moves to single-day event

The 2016 TS Eliot Festival will now be a one-day event, on Sunday 10^th July 2016, at Little Gidding.

Unfortunately, it has not been possible to stage the activities planned for the preceding day, Saturday 9^th. However, the talks by Jim McCue and Matthew Geary have both been rescheduled for Sunday 10^th, which now has an updated and enhanced line-up:

Sunday 10^th July

11.00 Doors Open

11.25 Welcome

11.30 Little Gidding: Such things as seem of least and most importance
A lecture by Jim McCue, one of the co-editors of the acclaimed critical edition of Eliot’s Poems

12.45 The Complete Prose of TS Eliot
A report by Jewel Spears Brooker from the award-winning international publishing project

1.00 Lunch

2.00 An Investigation into Eliot and Motherhood
Matthew Geary talks on TS Eliot and the Mother

3.00 Eliot on Radio 4
BBC Commissioning Editor Jeremy Howe discusses their readings of Eliot’s poetry

4.00 A special reading of Little Gidding at Little Gidding by Adam Begley

4.30 Departure

“We’re very sorry that it’s not been possible to stage a two-day event as originally planned,” said the organisers, “but we can promise a fascinating and even fuller day on Sunday 10^th, and look forward to welcoming Eliot enthusiasts then.”

The organisers apologise to those who have bought either Saturday or Weekend tickets, and purchasers are being contacted regarding refunds. Those holding Weekend tickets will be able to pick-up the appropriate refund on the Sunday, while anyone not attending will receive a refund by post. Any queries should be directed to the Box Office on 01832 274734

Full details of the Festival and all arrangements are on our dedicated page here.

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The Waste Land lecture, discussion and workshop, April 2016

The Warwick Arts Centre plays host in May to two free events, both linked to the curation of the 2018 Turner Contemporary exhibition on The Waste Land, which will travel to Leeds and Warwick.

On Thursday 5th May, A Journey with The Waste Land is a lecture and discussion by Professor Mike Tooby, curator and Professor at Bath School of Art & Design, and Trish Scott, research curator for the project at Turner Contemporary Margate. This evening will explore how Eliot’s great poem generates responses in the visual arts, and how considering the visual arts offers “ways in” to the poem. More details and booking here.

And on Saturday 21st May, A heap of broken images? is an in-depth one-day workshop at the Warwick Arts Centre, including presentations, readings, and discussions, which will enable a small group of people of different backgrounds to contribute ideas and help test possibilities for how an exhibition would look in Coventry. Details and booking are here.

Professor Mike Tooby will also be hosting a workshop on The Waste Land at this year’s TS Eliot Festival.

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TS Eliot’s Four Quartets as a Pattern for Christian Living, April 2016

The Heythrop Institute, in Kensington Square, London, hosts this talk by Professor Jay Parini on Tuesday 24th May at 6pm.

Jay Parini, a poet and novelist, biographer and critic, is Axinn Professor of English and Creative Writing at Middlebury College.

Founded in 2003, the Heythrop Institute: Religion and Society (HIRS) “provides a place for research, reflection and action by means of projects related to the relationship of religion and society.”

You can read further details here, and book tickets here.

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The Waste Land readings by Alton Fringe Theatre, March 2016

In partnership with Hampshire Libraries, Alton Fringe Theatre are to present a series of readings of TS Eliot’s The Waste Land.

‘Five actors will give voice to the many characters, ideas and sounds of the poem drawing out its themes of life and death; hope and despair; memory and desire. The readings will be followed by an informal discussion.’

The dates and locations (click for booking details) are Wednesday 4 May, 7.30pm Alton Library;  Thursday 12 May 2016 7.30pm Petersfield Library; and  Saturday 4 June 2016 7pm, Winchester Discovery Centre.

 

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Four Quartets: Read by Juliet Stevenson, discussed by Rowan Williams, February 2016

This year’s King’s Lynn Festival will feature a TS Eliot event in St Nicholas’ Chapel on Thursday 28th July. Four Quartets will be spoken by acclaimed actress Juliet Stevenson, interwoven with cellist Guy Johnston playing selections from Bach’s cello suites. And TS Eliot Society Patron Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury. a poet and Eliot authority, will be discussing the texts. The Box Office opens in April and details of the event are here.

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The Waste Land at the Asylum Chapel, February 2016

An group exhibition of art inspired by TS Eliot’s poem is to be held in the atmospheric venue of the Caroline Gardens Chapel, in Peckham, London SE15.

Some 21 members of the Asylum artists-led organisation are listed as participants in the show, which will run over the weekend of 12th and 13th March 2016. Full details are here and on Facebook here.

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Booking opens for Royal Society of Literature’s TS Eliot Memorial Reading, February 2016

Poets Simon Armitage (now Oxford Professor of Poetry), Mona Arshi and Zaffar Kunial will be giving the TS Eliot Memorial Reading under the auspices of the Royal Society of Literature. The Reading will be at the LSE in London on April 18th, and the general public can register for tickets at £9.50. Full details are here.

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TS Eliot International Summer School 2016 – booking opens, January 2016

Booking has now opened for the eighth TS Eliot International Summer School, to be held at the University of London from 9th to 17th July 2016.

From Monday to Friday, the School will present two lectures each morning on all aspects of Eliot’s life and work. Students choose one option from a variety of afternoon seminars for a week-long, in-depth study under the guidance of a seminar leader. The seminars cover a range of subjects on Eliot’s poetry, criticism and drama.

The School also includes intellectual programmes at the sites of the Four Quartets: Burnt Norton, East Coker and Little Gidding (where students attend one day of the weekend’s TS Eliot Festival).

Full details of the Summer School are here.

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Clwyd Theatre production of Murder In The Cathedral, January 2016
The Clwyd Theatre, based outside Mold, North Wales,
is staging a production of TS Eliot’s Murder In The Cathedral.

The play runs 28th to 30th January, and tickets are available now from the Box Office here.

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Reading of The Waste Land at Southbank Centre, January 2015

A reading of The Waste Land, open to the public and free to attend, is being held on Sunday 10th January 2016 at 6pm, in the Clore Ballroom at the Royal Festival Hall.

The poem will be read by Tom Mannion, Helen Hobson and David Streames, directed by Charles Sharman-Cox.

Held in partnership with the Eliot Estate and Faber and Faber, this event culminates a year of festivities marking the 50th anniversary of TS Eliot’s death.

For full details, click here.

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TS Eliot Festival 2016 dates confirmed, December 2015

It has now been confirmed that the annual TS Eliot Festival 2016 will run over two days, Saturday 9th and Sunday 10th July 2016, at Little Gidding.

Ticket prices will include food and drink over the two days, and there will be reduced admission for members of the TS Eliot Society.

Further details of speakers and events will be announced on this page as confirmed, with some details provided in advance within our Members Area.

 

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Professor Mark Ford to give annual TS Eliot Lecture in Cambridge, October 2015

This year’s TS Eliot Lecture will be given by Professor Mark Ford, of University College London, on 17th November at 7pm in the Cripps Theatre, Magdalene College, Cambridge. Admission is open to the public, and is free.

The title is TS Eliot in 2015. Professor Ford anticipates drawing upon this year’s publication of the critical edition of The Poems, along with Robert Crawford’s biography, and a volume of new essays on The Waste Land.

The annual TS Eliot Lecture is presented by the TS Eliot Society UK, in association with the Cambridge University Faculty of English.

Professor Mark Ford is Head of the English Department at University College, London, and has published widely on nineteenth-, twentieth- and twenty-first century British, American, and French literature. He has a BA and a DPhil from the University of Oxford. In the academic year 1983-84 he was a Kennedy Scholar at Harvard University, and from 1991 to 1993 a Visiting Lecturer at the University of Kyoto in Japan. He is a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books and the London Review of Books, and a selection of his reviews and essays have been published in two volumes.

Members of the TS Eliot Society are accorded special access to the event – details are in the Members Area of the site.

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David Jones exhibition to feature TS Eliot items, October 2015

An exhibition of works by David Jones will feature some rarely seen items connected with TS Eliot.

Eliot was responsible for publishing David Jones’ In Parenthesis at Faber & Faber in 1937, and over the years, he and Jones became firm friends. In 1958, Jones made a painted inscription, Nam Sybillam, incorporating lines from The Waste Land, as a gift for his friend. This rarely seen inscription, together with a bookplate made for T.S. and Valerie Eliot in 1961, have kindly been loaned by the Eliot Estate to the exhibition David Jones: Vision and Memory at Pallant House, Chichester from 24th October 2015 to 21st February 2016. More details of the exhibition are here.

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Homage to TS Eliot at Wilton’s Music Hall, September 2015

In a repeat of an event staged fifty years ago, The London Library is to benefit from an evening of readings in Homage to TS Eliot.

Eliot was President of The London Library for 13 years, and shortly after his death in 1965 an astonishing cast came together in a special performance of his work. To mark 50 years since this performance, the Library will assemble a cast to again perform Eliot’s work in the atmospheric Wilton’s Music Hall, with proceeds going to support the Library.

The event will be staged at the atmospheric Wilton’s Music Hall on Wednesday 21st October at 7.30pm. For further details, click the image (right) to enlarge, or visit the details on the London Library’s website here.

UPDATE: Sources have suggested that participants may include Jeremy Irons, Fiona Shaw, Simon Russell Beale, Sinéad Cusack and Ben Whishaw; readings to include selections and extracts from classic texts such as The Waste Land, The Hollow Men, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and Four Quartets as well as from popular favourite Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.

FURTHER UPDATE: Photos from the event, via jeremyirons.net, were posted here and there is a review by The Londonist with photos here.

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Call for Papers: The Ferrars of Little Gidding, September 2015

There has been a call for papers for a conference in 2016 on The Ferrars of Little Gidding.

Hosted by Magdalene College, Cambridge between 5th and 7th September 2016, the conference will look at “the influence of the family”, and the conference coincides with the completion of a major project to conserve the 600 Ferrar prints collected by the family at Magdalene College.

Proposals for Papers (of 15-20 minutes length) are invited by 1st December 2015; while Eliot and his relationship to Little Gidding, its founders and their principles are not specifically mentioned, details for submissions and of the conference are here.

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Last chance to register for Conference on FR Leavis & TS Eliot, September 2015

Registration closes this week for the two-day conference, being held 24-25 September 2015 at Downing College, Cambridge in conjunction with the Leavis Society, which will look at FR Leavis and TS Eliot in relation as literary and cultural critics.

The conference consists of short papers, interviews and round-table discussions, with time for general audience participation.

Speakers include Jim McCue, Stefan Collini, Roger Scruton, Michael Aeschliman, and David Ellis.

Full details of the conference are here. (Members of the TS Eliot Society can attend at the rates applicable to members of the Leavis Society.)

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Gresham College, London public lecture on Eliot’s Four Quartets, September 2015

A series of public lectures by Professor Belinda Jack begins on 13th October at 6pm with Poetry and Exile: TS Eliot’s Four Quartets.

“By exploring the idea of exile in relation to locality and the idea of space more abstractly, the shape of Four Quartets as descriptive of a spiritual journey comes into better focus,” writes Professor Jack.

The one-hour Gresham College lectures, held at the Museum of London, are free and open to all on a “first come, first served” basis. Full details of the Eliot lecture are here.

UPDATE: Following the lecture, a transcript and presentation have been made available for download here.

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Eliot events at the Ilkley Literature Festival, September 2015

There are two TS Eliot events in the programme for the Ilkley Literature Festival, which runs from 2nd-18th October 2015.

Through a guided reading group, Georgina Binnie, from the School of English at the University of Leeds, will be offering an expert guide to The Waste Land, “exploring the relationship between modernism and myth in Eliot’s seminal work.” The four sessions begin on Monday 5th October; details are here.

And on Thursday 8th October, A Journey with TS Eliot’s The Waste Land is “a multi layered event exploring the resonances of Eliot’s iconic poem”. Poet and playwright Rommi Smith and actor Damien O’Keeffe give a reading of the poem, followed by input from Professor Mike Tooby, who is developing a participative visual arts exhibition on The Waste Land with Turner Contemporary art gallery in Margate, where Eliot wrote part of the poem. Tooby will outline this exciting project and discuss how we might consider a range of responses to the poem by visual artists. Details are here.

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Editors of the new critical edition to discuss TS Eliot’s poetry, August 2015

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Viggo Mortensen to read The Waste Land at The British Library, August 2015

Best-known for his portrayal of Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings film trilogy, the actor Viggo Mortensen is to give a unique reading of The Waste Land, in the British Library Entrance Hall. The actor is one of the reading voices on the iPad app of the poem.

The reading is on Friday 11th September, from 7.30pm to 9.15pm, in the British Library on Euston Road, London. Details and tickets, both seated and standing, are now available here.

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The Cocktail Party – cast and pre-show platform talks announced, August 2015

The full cast has been announced for the London production of TS Eliot’s The Cocktail Party, which will run at the Print Room at The Coronet, Notting Hill Gate from 14th September to 10th October.

Full details of the cast, which includes double Olivier Award winner Marcia Warren, are here. The Director, Abbey Wright, gives a brief interview about the play and the venue here.

In addition, the Coronet has announced a series of free platform talks related to Eliot and his works prior to performances, by the poets David Harsent, Glyn Maxwell and Lavinia Greenlaw, and an interview with Eliot literary biographer Lyndall Gordon.

A video trailer for the production is here.

Full details of performances, talks and ticket booking are here.

Reviews:

The Stage

The Arts Desk

Time Out

Daily Telegraph

Guardian

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Conference: TS Eliot & FR Leavis as Literary and Cultural Critics – Full Programme Announced, August 2015

The full programme has now been announced for the conference being held 24-25 September 2015 at Downing College, Cambridge in conjunction with the Leavis Society, which will look at FR Leavis and TS Eliot in relation as literary and cultural critics.

The two-day programme can be downloaded here.

According to the Leavis Society, Leavis “wrote more – and more forensically – on Eliot than on any other single author…  preoccupied especially by the question of Christian affirmation in his later poetry.”

The conference consists of short papers, interviews and round-table discussions, with plenty of time for general audience participation.  Confirmed speakers include Jim McCue, Stefan Collini, Roger Scruton, Michael Aeschliman, and David Ellis.

Full details of the conference are here. (Members of the TS Eliot Society can attend at the rates applicable to members of the Leavis Society.)
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Sweet Thames Run Softly, a collection of work inspired by The Waste Land, July 2015

The Beecroft art gallery, Southend, is hosting a travelling installation of mixed media art inspired by Eliot’s The Waste Land. The work is by The Thames Group, a collective of thirteen working artists, each with a direct link to the River Thames, either through family, childhood or domicile.

More details on the exhibition, which runs until 5th September, are here; and more details on The Thames Group of artists are here.

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Reading of TS Eliot’s Four Quartets at Shakespeare’s Globe, July 2015

As part of a series of performances by internationally renowned pianist Angela Hewitt, there is to be a Concert by Candlelight at the Globe on Monday 3rd August programmed around Eliot’s Four Quartets.

Award-winning Globe actor Roger Allam will give an intimate reading of the entire Four Quartets, around which Hewitt will perform the spiritual music of Bach and Messiaen. Details and tickets are available here.

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TS Eliot Festival at Little Gidding 2015 – full programme released, May 2015

The Tenth Annual TS Eliot Festival will be held in the grounds of Little Gidding on Saturday 18th July 2015, with access to the church which inspired him. Details of the programme have been released, and booking is now open.

The Festival commemorates and celebrates the life and work of Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888-1965). This year – one hundred years after The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock was first published, changing poetry forever – it focuses on the poet’s youth and development.

Robert Crawford, author of the new and acclaimed biography Young Eliot: From St Louis to The Waste Land, will be asking: was Eliot ever young?

And there will be music from Caprice, playing tunes that Eliot would have heard in his formative period in Paris, 1910.

Lyndall Gordon, author of The Imperfect Life of TS Eliot,  will give a talk, Footfalls Echo in the Memory: Eliot’s Expatriation; and Jewel Spears Brooker will update us on the online publication of the complete prose Works.

Eliot located the last of his Four Quartets here so it is our custom to give a reading of Little Gidding; this year, it will be read by the writer, teacher and lecturer Graham Fawcett, President of the Society.

And festivalgoers are invited to read their own choices in the popular session My Favourite Eliot.

Join us in the summer garden at Little Gidding for a thought-provoking and enjoyable festival day, including refreshments. It will begin with coffee at 10.30am, with the first speaker commencing at 11am, and finish at 5pm.

Booking is now open via the Oundle Box Office at www.oundlefestival.org.uk or by phone 01832 274734. Note that there is a discount for members of the TS Eliot Society; for details see the Members Area.

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The Cocktail Party by TS Eliot returns to the London stage, June 2015

A major revival of TS Eliot’s play, The Cocktail Party, opens the autumn/winter season at the Coronet in London’s Notting Hill  from 14 September to 10 October 2015.

First performed at the Edinburgh Festival in 1949, it was Eliot’s most popular play in his lifetime, but has only been occasionally revived since. Casting for the production, to be directed by Abbey Wright, is still to be announced.

It will be the first dramatic work to play in the Coronet’s main house, which was converted into a cinema in the early 20th century, for nearly 100 years.

Details and tickets are here.

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TS Eliot events at Padiham, Lancashire, June 2015

The Nazareth Unitarian Chapel at Padiham, near Burnley, is hosting a series of Eliot events during June 2015.

On Saturday 6th June, 7 to 9 pm. lecturer and poetry teacher (and President of the TS Eliot Society) Graham Fawcett will deliver his new Eliot lecture.

On Saturday 13th June, 7 to 9 pm, Unitarian minister the Rev Jim Corrigall will give an illustrated lecture on ‘Religion and Poetry in TS Eliot’ focusing on Four Quartets.

And on Saturday 20th June, 7 to 9 pm, poet and theologian Christopher Southgate will read his verse biography of Eliot, A Love and its Sounding, together with Sandy Southgate. Christopher Southgate, who is a theology teacher and Anglican layman, will also lead a short discussion on Eliot as contemplative poet.

Tickets, to include a glass of wine and light refreshments are £10 for Fawcett night; £7 each for other 2 nights. Combined ticket: £20. Tickets will be available at the Chapel door. For enquiries contact Rev Jim Corrigall via corrigalljim@gmail.com

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Harwich Festival presentation on TS Eliot, May 2015

As part of the Harwich Festival of the Arts,  there will be a presentation on Eliot entitled Shafts of Sunlight, on Thursday July 2nd at 7.30 at the Electric Palace, Harwich.

It will be given by Richard Brock, author of a new book, Four Quartets: TS Eliot and Spirituality (Patrician Press).

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Young Possum, with Robert Crawford and Fiona Shaw, May 2015

Short notice, but some tickets remain for this event at the Charleston Festival, staged at the legendary country house of the Bloomsbury set in East Sussex. On Monday 25th May Eliot biographer Robert Crawford will be joined by actress Fiona Shaw, who will read some of Eliot’s most celebrated work, including a section from The Waste Land. Details here.

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Shared readings of TS Eliot’s poems, Liverpool, May 2015

The Reader Organisation, the award-winning charitable social enterprise working to connect people with great literature through shared reading, is hosting three sessions based on Eliot’s poetry.

They are held at Calderstones Mansion House, Liverpool and begin with The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and The Waste Land on Friday 19th June. Following Fridays feature Burnt Norton and East Coker on Friday 26th June, and The Dry Salvages and Little Gidding on Friday 3rd July.

Meetings last from 10.30 to 3, with lunch provided. More details about The Reader Organisation are here.

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An Evening of TS Eliot and Four Quartets, Temenos Academy, London, April 2015

On Saturday 30th May at 6pm the Temenos Academy is hosting ‘An Evening of TS Eliot & his “Four Quartets”‘, at The Art Workers Guild, 6 Queen Square, Bloomsbury WC1.

James Harpur will give an introductory talk on Eliot’s life and Four Quartets; Lord Gawain Douglas will give a recitation of Four Quartets.

Full details here.

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TS Eliot events at his Parish Church, London, April 2015

The Saint Stephen’s Festival of Arts & Faith returns to the Gloucester Road, London church from Monday 1st to Sunday 7th June 2015. This year’s festival features a number of events related to the work of TS Eliot, who was a member of the congregation and Church Warden for 20 years.

On Tuesday 2nd June at  6.30pm there is a symposium on the life and work of TS Eliot featuring experts from the fields of theatre and academia . These include Kate Pfeffer, Trinity College Cambridge, and John Haffenden, Emeritus Professor, the University of Sheffield. The symposium will be followed on the same evening at 8.15pm by a reading of Eliot’s poetry by actors and real-life husband and wife team, Edward Fox and Joanna David; details and tickets here.

Then there are two exclusive performances of Murder in the Cathedral on Wednesday 3rd and Thursday 4th June at 8pm. A professional cast, headed by Philip Franks as Thomas a Becket, perform alongside actors drawn from the talents of the British and Irish Bar. (This is the site-specific production staged at Temple Church in January; scroll down to that entry in Events below for details.) Both performances will be preceded by a talk on the play by Kate Pfeffer, of Trinity College Cambridge. Ticket details are here.

For further details visit www.saint-stephen.org.uk, call 020 7370 3418 or email saint.stephen@homecall.co.uk

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TS Eliot and Lancelot Andrewes, April 2015
On Thursday 21st May at 7pm, Poet in the City and
Southwark Cathedral are presenting an event in celebration of T.S. Eliot and the Elizabethan cleric Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626).

“Eliot’s…conversion to orthodox Christianity midway through his life, and its resulting impact on his work, coincides with his discovery of one of the most dynamic orators in the English language, Lancelot Andrewes. In the heart of the Cathedral, burial place of Andrewes, we explore his transformational influence on the life and work of one of the great pioneers of modernism.”

Contributors include Peter McCullough, author of Lancelot Andrewes: Selected Sermons and Lectures; Lyndall Gordon; and Mark Ford. Full details are here.

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TS Eliot is focus of Beckett Festival, April 2015

T.S. Eliot will be the artist in focus at the fourth Enniskillen International Beckett Festival, Happy Days, taking place over two long weekends, between 23 July and 3 August 2015.
This follows last year’s focus on Joyce, and Dante in 2013, as artists with special connections with Beckett. Beckett chose Eliot (along with Joyce and Proust) as one of his earliest literary models.

Four Quartets will be presented in two cycles, each poem being followed by one movement of Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 131, performed in Enniskillen’s three different churches, St Macartins Cathedral, St Michael’s Church, and the Presbyterian Church. (25 July)

Adrian Dunbar will direct a new staging of The Waste Land interspersing the text with commissioned music by saxophonist and experimental composer, Nick Roth. (1 and 2 August)

Enniskillen, in County Fermanagh, one of the most beautiful parts of the west of Northern Ireland, has become renowned for its association with Samuel Beckett, who attended Portora Royal School in Enniskillen. Full details of the Festival are here.

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TS Eliot & FR Leavis, April 2015

A conference is being organised for 24-25 September 2015 at Downing
College, Cambridge in conjunction with the Leavis Society, which will look at FR Leavis and TS Eliot in relation as literary and cultural critics. Full details are here.

According to the Leavis Society, Leavis “wrote more – and more forensically – on Eliot than on any other single author…  preoccupied especially by the question of Christian affirmation in his later poetry.”
The conference will consist of short papers, interviews and round-table discussions, with plenty of time for general audience participation.  Confirmed speakers include Jim McCue, Stefan Collini, Roger Scruton, Michael Aeschliman, David Ellis and Peter Cochran.

There may still be room for further contributions.  If you would like to offer suggestions or to express an interest in attending, please contact either our Chairman, Hugh Black-Hawkins via black_hawkins@yahoo.com or our Secretary Kathy Radley via kathyradley@hotmail.com
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TS Eliot Festival at Little Gidding 2015 – details released, March 2015

The Tenth Annual TS Eliot Festival will be held in the grounds of Little Gidding on Saturday 18th July 2015. Details of the programme have just been released, and booking will open on March 30th.

The Festival commemorates and celebrates the life and work of Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888-1965). This year – one hundred years after The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock was first published, changing poetry forever – it focuses on the poet’s youth and development, with Robert Crawford, author of the new and acclaimed biography Young Eliot: From St Louis to The Waste Land, and music at teatime from Caprice, playing tunes that Eliot would have heard in his formative period in Paris, 1910.

Lyndall Gordon will give a talk, Footfalls Echo in the Memory: Eliot’s Expatriation; and Jewel Spears Brooker will update us on the online publication of the complete prose Works.

Eliot located the last of his Four Quartets here so it is our custom to give a reading of Little Gidding; and festivalgoers are invited to read their own choices in the popular session My Favourite Eliot.

Join us in the summer garden at Little Gidding, one of the places that inspired Eliot, for a thought-provoking and enjoyable festival day, including refreshments.

Booking will open on March 30th via the Oundle Box Office at www.oundlefestival.org.uk or by phone 01832 274734. Note that there is a discount for members of the TS Eliot Society; for details see the Members Area.

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Burnt Norton at Chipping Camden Literature Festival in May, February 2015

At the Chipping Camden Literature Festival, close to Burnt Norton itself, Eliot biographer and critic Lyndall Gordon will speak on Tuesday 5th May at 7pm. She will be “focusing on stories in writing family memoir; on Eliot’s play of memory when he visited Chipping Campden and trespassed into the garden at Burnt Norton with Emily Hale, whom he’d loved when a young man; and why Eliot’s discarded wife chose the role of Henry James’s famously doomed heroine, Daisy Miller”. Full details are here.

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Three TS Eliot events at the FT Weekend Oxford Literary Festival, February 2015

Held in Oxford from 21st to 29th March 2015, this year’s FT Weekend Oxford Literary Festival includes three events of interest to Eliot enthusiasts.

On 24 March Robert Crawford, author of the new biography Young Eliot, will trace the poet’s life from his childhood in St Louis to the publication of The Waste Land. Details here.

On 25th March the poet Don Paterson will take a look at A Hundred Years of The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock. Paterson will read the poem and talk about its importance in Eliot’s work and in the wider context of modern poetry. The event will also include clips from the 2009 BBC Arena documentary on TS Eliot. Details here.

And on 29th March, teachers and performers including Juliet Stevenson, present Poetic Memory and Music – An Oxford Masterclass, exploring Eliot’s interest in music as a funnel for memory. Participants will work towards producing a collage of sound, song and imagery. Details here.

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Harvard celebrates the centenary of Prufrock, February 2015

An exhibition and series of events at Eliot’s Harvard University will mark the centenary of the first publication of The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock.

An exhibition, Ragged Claws, curated by Carey Adina Karmel, PhD candidate at the University of London, will explore the genesis of the poem by way of various manuscript and typescript reproductions. The exhibition includes multiple printings of Prufrock, from its debut in 1915 in Poetry magazine to its first independent appearance in book form in 1917, along with books from Eliot’s library that provided source material. The exhibition runs from 6th April to 27th June. There will also be a series of lectures, by speakers such as Sir Christopher Ricks; details are here.

 

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The Unattended Moment, an anniversary exploration of TS Eliot, London

For the 50th anniversary of the poet’s death, Dr Christopher Southgate, of the Department of Theology & Religion, Exeter University, is hosting two events in the Chapel of King’s College, London.

On Wednesday January 14th, at 6pm, there will be a performance in the Chapel of his verse biography of Eliot; followed at 11am the next morning, Thursday January 15th, by a seminar discussion of Eliot as a contemplative poet, chaired by Professor Russell Goulbourne, Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Humanities, King’s College London.

Full details are here.

 

 

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Words and Music, anniversary broadcast, BBC Radio 3

On Sunday January 4th at 5.30pm, Words and Music on BBC Radio 3 is broadcasting a special edition of music and poetry read by Simon Russell Beale to mark the 50th anniversary of T.S. Eliot’s death. Poems include Four Quartets, The Waste Land, Marina and Landscapes, with music by Thomas Ades, Beethoven, Stravinsky and Chopin.

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Four Quartets – anniversary production, London

A production of Four Quartets is being held in London on 4th January, the 50th anniversary of TS Eliot’s death.

Director Katie Mitchell talked to The Guardian about her original production here.

This is a fundraising event for the threatened Horse Hospital space, at the Colonnade, Bloomsbury, London WC1N 1JD – just metres from the site of the original Faber & Faber offices where Eliot worked.

Four Quartets will be read by the actor Stephen Dillane, well known for his roles in Game of Thrones, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and The Hours.

Full details of the event and tickets are here.

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Talk on TS Eliot’s life and work: Lewes, Farnham and Bridport

Poetry educator and performer Graham Fawcett, who is also President of the T.S. Eliot Society, is touring with his World Poets talk on Eliot, to mark the 50^th anniversary of the death of the poet.

“The journey from his early Preludes to his late Quartets is so extraordinary as to suggest that there might have been several T S Eliots.”

The talk will be given in Lewes on 15th January; Farnham on 19th January; and Bridport on 22nd January.

Full details of the dates, with some offering an optional supper afterwards, are here.

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Commemorative Epiphany Mass, St Stephen’s, Gloucester Road, London

At 11am on 4th January 2015, St Stephen’s Gloucester Road, the church where Eliot regularly worshipped, is holding ‘An Epiphany Mass in commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the death of TS Eliot.’

‘At this mass we will offer thanks for him and his work and dedicate pictures of TS and Valerie Eliot to hang near the memorial in this anniversary year.’

Saint Stephen’s has a long been a “shrine Church” and stands firmly in the Catholic tradition.

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Murder In The Cathedral in London’s Temple

A new production of TS Eliot’s Murder In The Cathedral is to be staged in Temple Church.

This is one of the very few surviving churches in Britain built by the Knights Templar, in their characteristic circular style representing the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

The production stars Philip Franks, is directed by Joe Harmston, and is the product of a close collaboration with Middle Temple and the Temple Church. Performances are on Friday 30th January, Saturday 31st January and Sunday 1st February.

Full details of the production are here and booking is here.

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TS Eliot’s expatriation: a London talk by Lyndall Gordon

The acclaimed Eliot scholar Lyndall Gordon will give a talk at the Keats Community Library in Hampstead, London to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the poet’s death.

Footfalls Echo in the Memory: Eliot’s Expatriation will be given on Thursday 8th January at 7pm.

Perhaps best known for her book Eliot’s Early Years, Gordon is a Senior Research Fellow at St Hilda’s College, Oxford.

Full details of the talk and venue are here, and a direct link to the ticket sales is here.

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Annual TS Eliot Lecture 2014 – full details

This year’s TS Eliot Lecture will be TS Eliot and the Ecstasy of Assent, given by Jewel Spears Brooker, Professor Emerita of Literature at Eckerd College in St Petersburg, Florida.

 

“In the year before his conversion, in an essay on Lancelot Andrewes, Eliot maintained that the movement of the Bishop’s thought led to an examination of words that terminated in an ‘ecstasy of assent,’  says Professor Brooker. “In this lecture, I will use this description as a reference point for understanding Eliot’s own intellectual and spiritual journey, from the tortured indecision of Prufrock to the preoccupation with language in The Waste Land to the ecstatic moments of the Quartets.”

Full details of Dr Brooker’s work on Eliot are on her website here.

The Lecture will be on Tuesday 25th November at 7pm, in Cripps Theatre, Magdalene College, Cambridge. Admission is free, and open to the public.

However, 2014/15 members of the TS Eliot Society ONLY are able to reserve seats in advance; please e-mail the secretary to reserve seats: kathyradley@hotmail.com

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The Waste Land in the City – a literary walk

As part of their October Literary Festival, the guided walks company Footprints of London are hosting The Wasteland [sic] in the City, a walk around some of the London sites mentioned in Eliot’s poem.

“The walk will involve readings of parts of the poem at relevant spots in the City, particularly from III, The Fire Sermon” (Pictured right, St Mary Woolnoth)

Further details of the walk, on Sunday 19th October, and booking are here.

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Eliot College, University of Kent, Annual Lecture, October 2014

This year’s lecture at Eliot College, University of Kent, will be given by Professor Mark Ford, University of London, on Tuesday 14th October.

His lecture is titled, ‘O City, city’: TS Eliot and the Metropolitan. 

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International Symposium: Time and Place in TS Eliot and His Contemporaries

Focussed on, but not limited to, TS Eliot and Modernism, this major international symposium is to be held in Florence, 18th to 21st January 2015.

“Time and place have huge symbolic significance in Eliot’s work and that of his contemporaries,” say the organisers.  “Space and time exist as symbolical, religious, philosophical, historical, political and personal ‘nodes’ in Eliot’s writings.  This conference wants to explore these ‘nodes’ in greater depth — where they exist, how they interact with other nodes and themes in Eliot’s writing, and how they intersect with the aesthetic and philosophical thinking of Eliot’s contemporaries.”

Full details of the symposium are here; the deadline for abstract submissions is 1st October, and registration for attendance is open now.

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Diagnosing The Waste Land

A one-day group seminar in Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, on Thursday 18th September 2014, led by Dr Sophie Ratcliffe (Lady Margaret Hall) and Dr Andrew Schuman (GP and Clinical Tutor) – and with a guest lecture from the critic and poet Craig Raine.

“We will…use The Waste Land to think about matters which affect those who work in the health service  –  these will include ideas of empathy, chaos, trauma, communication difficulties, fertility, sexuality and gender.”

This one-day seminar is part of a series, The Poetry of Medicine, designed primarily for General Practitioners and Hospital Doctors, but open “to those who work in the health service/people who work with patients. This has, in the past, included, nurses, counsellors, psychotherapists, midwives, as well as hospital doctors, medical students and GPs – both retired and practising.”

Full details of the seminar are here, and of The Poetry of Medicine here.

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Ninth Annual TS Eliot Festival, Little Gidding, 5th & 6th July 2014

The programme has now been announced for the 2014 TS Eliot Festival, held at Little Gidding.

A PDF of the programme with booking form can be downloaded here, while details of online booking are here. Earlybird and Society members’ booking discounts currently apply.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A Heap of Broken Images: paintings by Bartholomew Beal, Fine Art Society, June 2014

The Fine Art Society (148 New Bond St, London W1) is hosting Bartholomew Beal’s first exhibition at the gallery from June 24th to August 29th 2014.

“The title A Heap of Broken Images, is borrowed from The Waste Land. The entire body of work is a translation of this literary work into paint on canvas, and whilst some pieces have stayed quite true to that starting point with clear references, others have ‘run away with themselves’.” (Pictured left, Madame Sosostris).

Full details of the exhibition and further examples of the work are here.

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Dear Mr Eliot: When Groucho met Tom, BBC Radio 3, June 2014

On Saturday June 14th at 9.30pm, BBC Radio 3 broadcasts “a musical fantasy by Jakko M Jakszyk, woven round the real-life 1964 dinner encounter between the greatest poet in the English language of the twentieth century, TS Eliot and the legendary star of A Night at the Opera, Duck Soup and Horse Feathers, Groucho Marx.” Full details, listening and download facilities (for a limited time) are here, and an Independent article about the incident and programme are here. (See also our Letters by TS Eliot page for links to two articles about the correspondence between Marx and Eliot.)

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Lecture: TS Eliot & Kathleen Raine – Two Contemplative Poets, May 2014

The Tenemos Academy is organising a lecture by Professor Grevel Lindop on Tuesday 17th June, entitled TS Eliot & Kathleen Raine: Two Contemplative Poets. The lecture will be at The Lincoln Centre, Lincolns Inn Fields, London, and admission is £5 (concessions £3.50).  Full details are here.

Murder in the Cathedral, Saint Bartholomew the Great, London, April 2014

TS Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral is to be staged at Saint Bartholomew the Great, in West Smithfield, London, during May and June 2014.

The production is by the Little Spaniel Theatre, and the venue, Saint Bartholomew the Great, is one of London’s oldest churches. It was mentioned by Eliot in a letter of 26 April 1911, to Eleanor Hinkley, in which he lists the church as one which he had visited.

The production runs from Friday 16th May to Saturday 14th June; full details are here and online booking is here.

NB: There is a reduced admission price for Members of the Society – see the Members’ Area for details.

 

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Telegraph/How To: Academy Event – How To Read TS Eliot’s Four Quartets, April 2014

A Telegraph/How To: Academy seminar will discuss How To: Read TS Eliot’s Four Quartets, on Saturday 7th June at Waterstone’s, Piccadilly, London.

Repeated due to popular demand, the one-day seminar will be led by Professor Mark Ford, of University College, London. A small group “will be guided through the historical and biographical context of the work and shown how to unlock its meanings, release its power, and absorb the quality of its strangeness”. Full details are here.

Members of the Society have a special ticket offer to this event – see the Members Area for details.

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Literature in Conversation – The Waste Land, Pitfield London, April 2014

The Pitfield London exhibition/shop/café space in Hoxton hosts a Lit in Pit salon on Thursday 17th April 2014, with Wendy Meakin (Channel 4 Four Rooms) and Toby Brothers (London Literary Salon). An evening of “literary exploration…combining deep knowledge with passion for language, this event also includes a tasty meal and wine.” Only 30 places available, with tickets £55 including supper and wine. Full details here.

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TS Eliot – Personal Perspectives, Union Gallery, Edinburgh, April 2014

The Group 13 collective, a showcase for some of Scotland’s most celebrated artists, has chosen Eliot as the focal point of their latest (third) collaboration. This exhibition will be the first time the collective has exhibited in Edinburgh, and runs at the Union Gallery, Broughton Street, Edinburgh from 4th-30th April 2014.  More details here.

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BLAST 2014 – Vorticist Centenary Conference announced, March 2014

BLAST 2014 is an interdisciplinary conference on the cultural and artistic significance of Vorticism one hundred years after the first issue of BLAST was published in June 1914. It will include all scholarly disciplines which provide an enlightening perspective on BLAST and its cultural context.

T. S. Eliot’s first poems to be published in the UK appeared in the pages of BLAST 2: The War Number.

The Conference will be based at Sion Hill, the home of Bath Spa University’s School of Art and Design, and will take place on 24th and 25th July 2014. Full details are here. There is a call for papers, open until April 1st 2014, and details are here. UPDATE: The Call for Papers has been extended to April 15th 2014.

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The Waste Land, in a musical setting by Anthony Burgess, February 2014

Psappha, “Manchester’s pre-eminent new music ensemble and one of the UK’s leading contemporary music groups”, are staging a multimedia performance of Anthony Burgess’s musical version of The Waste Land.

“Anthony Burgess’s extraordinary musical version illuminates and intensifies T.S. Eliot’s seminal text.

Performances at 6pm and 8pm take place on Friday 28th February, at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation, Engine House, Chorlton Mill, 3 Cambridge Street, Manchester M1 5BY. Full details and booking are here.

 

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TS Eliot International Summer School – open for applications, February 2014

The prestigious TS Eliot International Summer School will be hosted by the Institute of English Studies of the University of London from 5th to 13th July 2014, and is now open for applications.

“Poetry lovers and Eliot enthusiasts are invited to the sixth annual, week-long celebration of the life and writing of one of the greatest modern English poets.

“From Monday to Friday, the School will present two lectures each morning on all aspects of Eliot’s life and work. Students choose one option from a variety of afternoon seminars for a week-long, in-depth study under the guidance of a seminar leader. The seminars cover a range of subjects on Eliot’s poetry, criticism and drama.

“In addition to the lectures, seminars, receptions and coach trips, there will also be a series of social activities, including poetry readings, discussion groups, and late afternoon walking tours of T.S. Eliot’s London and literary Bloomsbury. The Summer School aims to maximise opportunities for social interaction and intellectual exchange within a convivial and scholarly environment.”

The School also includes intellectual programmes at the English sites of the Four Quartets. This includes attendance at our own TS Eliot Festival at Little Gidding.

Full details of the 2014 summer school, and how to apply, are here.

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Weekend Seminar – how to: Read TS Eliot, February 2014

A Telegraph/How To Academy seminar considering all phases of Eliot’s career will be held on 15th February 2014 at Waterstone’s, Piccadilly, London, .

The Telegraph/How To Academy seminars, in association with Waterstones and Penguin Classics, celebrate the art of reading and the craft of criticism.

With Mark Ford, a Professor in the English Department at University College London, “This weekend will explore the relationship between the meanings of Eliot’s poetry, as developed by generation after generation of academics labouring in the Eliot industry, and the experience of reading – and hearing – the poems themselves”

Professor Ford wrote an overview of Eliot in the Daily Telegraph here.

Full details of the seminar are here.

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The Poetry School – Online Reading Group – The Waste Land, February 2014

The Poetry School – “the only major national organisation whose sole focus is teaching the art of writing poetry” – is running an interactive online course on The Waste Land.

Led by poet and performer Siddhartha Bose, “this interactive reading group allows readers and writers alike to explore this classic text both collaboratively and asynchronously, with reading notes supplied.”

Details of the ten-week course, which starts on Thursday 6th February, are here.

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Other Eliots: Contemporary Trends in TS Eliot Studies – Conference, January 2014

Details have been finalised for the one-day conference at the University of Birmingham on 18 April 2014.

The conference, aimed at the postgraduate and early career researcher level, “seeks to draw attention to the multifarious research into Eliot’s life and work which is currently being undertaken”. A programme of speakers and panels, along with full details of the conference, have now been announced here.

Admission is free but registration through the conference website is required

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Four Quartets read by Jeremy Irons on BBC Radio 4, January 2014

The BBC have announced that their recording of Four Quartets, read by Jeremy Irons, will be broadcast on Radio 4 on Saturday 18th January at 2.30pm.

(This follows the reading of The Waste Land by Irons, which now forms part of the poem’s iPad app.)

Full details here.

You can also read more about Jeremy Irons’s relationship with Eliot’s poetry via our TSE & Me page, here.

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The Annual TS Eliot Lecture 2013, November 2013

Details of this year’s TS Eliot Lecture have now been released.

Given by Dr Rowan Williams, Patron of the Society, the title of the Lecture is Eliot’s Christian Society and the current political crisis.

The Lecture will be given in the Riley Auditorium, The Gillespie Centre, Clare College, Cambridge, at 7pm on 26th November. For full details, click on the poster (left)

Admission is free to all, but members of the TS Eliot Society are accorded special advance booking privileges, which are detailed in the Members’ Area of the site.

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Eliot College Lecture, University of Kent: Patrick Heron’s Portraits of TS Eliot, November 2013

This year’s Eliot College Lecture is being given by Dr Nuzhat Bukhari on November 15, with the title Variants & Versions: Patrick Heronʼs Portraits of TS Eliot.

Between 1947 and 1950, Patrick Heron, one of the greatest British painters of the Twentieth Century, made fourteen portraits of TS Eliot. Nuzhat Bukhari’s lecture explores the implications of these portraits (recently exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery, for Eliot scholarship.

One of the paintings, permanently housed at Kent University (right) will be present during the lecture. The others will be shown on screen. There will also be an opportunity to see the Epstein bust of Eliot, recently bequeathed to the college (see News).

For full details of the lecture, click here.

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Premier Radio to broadcast Four Quartets for National Poetry Day, September 2013

From Sept 29th to Oct 3rd, Premier Christian Radio will broadcast readings of each of Eliot’s Four Quartets. The readers include our patron, the Rt Rev Dr Rowan Williams, and our Chairman, Hugh Black-Hawkins.

The readings will be followed, on National Poetry Day (Oct 3rd) by a panel discussion, including previous Eliot Festival participants Lyndall Gordon and Lord Harries.

Premier Christian Radio broadcasts nationally on DAB and Freeview 725. It is also available at www.premier.org.uk.

Full details of the event, with participants, readings and discussion, are here.

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Vivienne, August 2013

An operatic song cycle, dramatically and intimately staged, based on the life of Eliot’s first wife, Vivienne Haigh-Wood. “This is Vivienne’s life told in a series of short scenes each containing a song. There are hints of cabaret or music hall (a favorite of both Eliots), perhaps something seedier or grander, full of Vivienne’s wit and intelligence as she finally takes charge of her own story”. The libretto is fascinating for anyone with a knowledge of Eliot’s life and work. Full details here.

Following its successful premiere, there are performance dates in August, October and November – full performance schedule here.

Tickets for the Bloomsbury Festival performance on October 17th are available here.

One song from the cycle has now been posted online here – and an online review containing two video clips is here.

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Exhibition – Poetry in Print, August 2013

An exhibition of limited edition prints by Nic Farrell featuring quotations from TS Eliot. At the Cambridge Arts Picturehouse, 38-39 St Andrews Street, CB2 3AR from 13th August, until “at least” 19th September. Private View details here, pictures of the works in progress here.

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Other Eliots: Contemporary Trends in TS Eliot Studies, August 2013

A postgraduate conference has been announced, to take place at the University of Birmingham on 18th April, 2014. It “seeks to draw attention to the multifarious research into Eliot’s life and work which is currently being undertaken.” The organisers welcome papers from postgraduate and early career researchers which address all areas of Eliot studies. Full details are here.

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Lecture: Portraits of TS Eliot, National Portrait Gallery, 8 August 2013

Marking the display of the many sketches and paintings of the poet TS Eliot by Patrick Heron, Nuzhat Bukhari discusses the fascinating relationship between poet and painter, the nature and importance of these experimental portrait works in art history, their relevance to Eliot’s poetry and some wider notions of the self in philosophy. Full details here.

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TS Eliot’s India: Many Gods, Many Voices, BBC Radio 4, Sunday 4 August 2013

Poet Daljit Nagra explores the often overlooked Indian element to T.S Eliot’s poetry. Partly recorded at this year’s TS Eliot Festival, where Daljit was a reader, the programme begins with the backdrop of the Festival itself. (Sadly this programme is no longer available to hear online.)

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Eighth Annual TS Eliot Festival, Little Gidding, 6-7 July 2013 

Full details of the 2013 TS Eliot Festival have now been released, and advance booking is now open.

Click on the image above to see a larger version – or click here for a printable PDF

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Burnt Norton hosts performances of As You Like It, June 2013

A series of charity performances of Shakespeare’s As You Like It provide a rare opportunity to visit the gardens of Burnt Norton.

BurntOut Theatre have scheduled a series of matinee and evening performances from Thursday 20th to Sunday 23rd June; audiences are allowed to wander the gardens for an hour and a half before performances.

The press release is here and further ticket details are here.

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Jeremy Irons to read Four Quartets at Hay Festival, May 2013

Jeremy Irons is to read Four Quartets, in their entirety, at the Hay Festival on Saturday 1st June 2013. For details click here. Irons, who has previously recorded The Waste Land,  talked to the Daily Telegraph about reading Eliot here.

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Jacob Epstein bust of TS Eliot on display, April 2013

A rarely-seen 1951 bust of TS Eliot is on display at the National Portrait Gallery, London (Room 33) until November 24th, as part of an exhibition, Jacob Epstein, Portrait Sculptor. Admission is free.

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Manuscript sale, Bonhams, 10^th April 2013

A major sale of Poetical Manuscripts and Portraits of Poets includes several items of interest to Eliot enthusiasts.

Chief amongst these is a typescript of Journey of the Magi, dating from 1927, with revisions to the poem in Eliot’s hand. The page is signed with the poet’s initials, and has an estimate of £6-8000. UPDATE: This typescript was sold on the night for a remarkable £44,450 – more than six times its estimate.

The sale also includes several photographs, including those of rare meetings between Eliot and Auden (est £2-3000) and between Eliot and Hughes (est £1200-1800)

Earlier, on 19^th March, Bonhams are also auctioning correspondence between Eliot and Methuen concerning publication of The Sacred Wood (est £2-3000); and a First Edition of Four Quartets, signed by TS Eliot (est £1000-1500)

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TS Eliot International Summer School 2013

The Institute of English Studies, University of London is hosting the fifth annual TS Eliot International Summer School between 6-14 July 2013. Applications are now open.

Anyone with an interest in his writings is welcome to participate in this week-long celebration of Eliot’s life and work by some of the most eminent scholars, poets and teachers.

In addition to the academic programme, the School visits Little Gidding (during the Eliot Festival), Burnt Norton and East Coker.

Enquiries, registration and programme information are available here

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Reading of Four Quartets, Michaelhouse, Cambridge, February 2013

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Patrick Heron: Studies for a portrait of TS Eliot National Portrait Gallery (Room 32), St Martin’s Place, London, 26 January-1 September 2013 (Admission free)

Heron’s 1949 portrait of T.S. Eliot is shown alongside rarely seen studies: from life-drawings to experiments in form and colour, revealing the process of abstraction for which the artist is best known. A Daily Telegraph article on the exhibition and its contents can be read here and two of the most interesting, previously unseen studies can be viewed at the foot of the curator’s blog here.

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Annual TS Eliot Cambridge Lecture 2012

Details have been announced of this year’s Annual TS Eliot Cambridge Lecture, to be delivered by Dr Jeremy Noel-Tod on 14th November. For full details click here.

Waste Land – an exhibition by Sally Waterman at the Ruskin Gallery, Anglia Ruskin University, 3-27 October 2012

Waterman employs literary adaptation as a mechanism for self-portraiture, producing photographic and video works that explore memory, place and familial relationships. Waste Land draws upon Eliot’s The Waste Land; Waterman re-interprets the poem to retrieve memories of conflict and separation.

Society members are invited to a Q&A session with the artist at the exhibition on 27 October – see the Members Area for details.

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TS Eliot: A leader on the Mythical Path, 7 October 2012

The Right Rev’d David Walker, Bishop of Dudley, preaches in the Chapel, St John’s College, Cambridge

You can listen to a recording of this here.

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Celebratory TS Eliot Lecture, University of Kent, 26 September 2012

To commemorate the anniversary of Eliot’s birth, Professor Ken Pickering will be giving an evening lecture entitled “In the presence of a masterpiece”, on the background of Murder in the Cathedral. Open to all, drinks to follow; full details here.

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Meeting with Archbishop Rowan Williams at Lambeth Palace, September 2012

A small number of members were invited to Lambeth Palace to meet the Society’s patron, Archbishop Rowan Williams. Among the topics discussed were the relative merits of Eliot’s earlier and later poetry; His Grace believes the later poetry to be more “worked” than the earlier. A photograph of the meeting is in the Members Area.

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TS Eliot’s words to “emerge” in unique Thames Festival installation, September 2012

Fragments from The Waste Land are being “written” on the Thames’ riverside walkway, as part of a new art installation.

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Adult Course, Literature and Creative Writing – Marlborough Summer School, August 2012

Two Great Modern Poets: TS Eliot and WH Auden – With Susan Abbott

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East Coker TS Eliot Event, 15 July 2012

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TS Eliot International Summer School  University of London, 7-15 July 2012

The fourth annual T.S. Eliot International Summer School will again bring together a host of the most distinguished international scholars of T.S. Eliot and Modern literature.

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Seventh Annual TS Eliot Festival, Little Gidding, 7-8 July 2012 

Talks, readings, music and celebration, with a significant programme of speakers and events, all taking place at Little Gidding itself.

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Forthcoming publication: The Letters of TS Eliot Vol 3 – 1926-1927 5 July 2012

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Eliot’s Little Gidding Day, 3 July 2012

On location in Little Gidding, Graham Fawcett will attempt to recreate Eliot’s own experience of this place, and to unravel the poem.

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Unreal City: A Walk Through London’s Waste Land, London, 23 June 2012

A guided walk inspired by Eliot’s poem

(This walk was subsequently reported in The Guardian here.

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The Cocktail Party, Performed by Theatre Alba

The Netherbow Theatre, Scottish Storytelling Centre, Edinburgh, 15 & 16 June 2012

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Reading Group: Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, Kensington Unitarians, London W8 22 May 2012

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TS Eliot and the Dry Salvages, Poetry Day, Orthona, West Dorset 12 May 2012

With Graham Fawcett

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Tutored course: The Development of TS Eliot’s Faith, Norwich Cathedral, 5 May 2012

with Hugh Black-Hawkins

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TS Eliot Poetry Evening, Guildford Cathedral, 21 April 2012

An evening on Four Quartets presented by Kevin Laue

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Public Lecture: The Beauties of TS Eliot, 7 Feb 2012, Durham University

A lecture by Dr Seamus Perry, University of Oxford, in The Persistence of Beauty Lecture Series