Family Workshop

‘Lords and Ladies at the Masquerade’

Family Workshop

‘Lords and Ladies at the Masquerade’

Lecture at Gough Square, London
22-02-07

Wednesday 13 February, 7pm

Francis Barb er: From Plantation to Salvation

An illustrated lecture by Graeme Clarke, Sam uel Johnson Birthplace Museum

The fascinating story of Johnson’s manservant, Frank Barb er, a former slave, who became Johnson’s heir

£12/£10 concessions, includes a glass of wine

Thursday 21 February, 11am

Half-term Family Event: 'Masquerade'

Families can learn about the exotic masked balls of the eighteenth century, try on replica Georgian clothes and accessories, and make glittering masks and fans to wear to the Ball.

Free with admission to the House. Includes tea, coffee and snacks.

Wednesday 12 and Thursday 13 March, 7pm

Johnson is Leaving

By John Wain, Performed by Bruce Purchase

“Purchase, for whom the play was written, brings Johnson wholly to life, by turns coarse, tender, rumbustious and reflective:  his is a unique performance.” BERYL BAINBRIDGE

£15/£13 concessions, includes a glass of wine

Tuesday 15 April to Tuesday 27 May

“A most agreeable place”: Dr Johnson, James Boswell and the Inner Temple

Johnson resided and ‘held court’ at the Temple for five years, frequently visited by his future biographer Boswell, who himself was called to the bar in 1786.   Staged with the Inner Temple (who celebrate 400 years since the granting of the Royal Charter in 2008), this display includes original documents, drawings, watercolours and diary extracts.

Wednesday 16 April, 7pm

Dr Johnson and the Law

A lecture by Lord Bingham of Cornhill

This lecture by Lord Bingham, Senior Law Lord and former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales takes place in conjunction with ‘A most agreeable place’,

£12/£10 concessions, includes a glass of wine

*Please not this talk has also been advertised in the Temple 2008 brochure and is expected to book quickly*

Thursday 15 May, 7pm

Boswell and Mason, Johnson and Gray; an Encounter

A lecture by Stephen Clarke

The “encounter” is between Boswell and Mason, both proud defenders of the reputations of their respective literary mentors, Sam uel Johnson and Thomas Gray.

£12/£10 concessions, includes a glass of wine

Wednesday 11 and Thursday 12 June, 7pm

She Wants a Heart: Alexander Pope

Performed by Karin Fernald & Colin Pinney

Dramatic presentation of the life of ‘The Little Nightingale’, as Joshua Reynolds called him, from his childhood in Windsor to the coffee-houses of eighteenth-century London

£15/£13 concessions, includes a glass of wine

Most events take place in the Dictionary Garret, with many unavoidable steps.  If you would like to book any of these events please send a cheque made payable to Dr Johnson’s House Trust along with details of the event, date and type of ticket to Dr Johnson’s House, 17 Gough Square , London EC4A 3DE . 

*** Please include your email or telephone number so that we can let you know when your cheque has arrived. ***

Those entitled to a concessionary rate ticket are the over 60s, students and the registered unemployed.

If you would like to be removed from this mailing list please reply to this email with Unsubscribe in the subject line

Stephanie Pickford

Curator

Dr Johnson's House

17 Gough Square

London EC4A 3DE

020 7353 3745

curator@drjohnsonshouse.org

or

‘The Tale of Mrs Thrale’

Thursday 15 and Friday 16 November 2007, 7:30pm

The setting is Bath , 1820 on the occasion of Mrs Piozzi’s lavish 80^th birthday party, an event which scandalised many of the ‘uninvited prudes in Bath ’.   Mrs Piozzi looks back over her life, her marriages and her friendships….

Hester reminisces about her childhood in Wales , her loveless marriage to Henry Thrale – to whom she bore 12 children - her friendship with the great Sam uel Johnson following their meeting in 1765 and her second, controversial marriage to the Catholic musician Gabriel Piozzi, which lost her many friends. This one-woman performance is a fascinating and colourful account of the vivacious Hester.  Previously performed at Garrick’s Temple and Peg Woffington’s Cottage to great acclaim, ‘Mrs Piozzi’s Party’ is performed by Margaret Stallard and directed by Jill Brooke. 

Seats are limited so you are advised to book early. Doors open at 6.45pm, the performance starts at 7.30pm. A glass of wine is included in the ticket price.  Please fill in the form below to book tickets.  The performance takes place in the Dictionary Garret, with many unavoidable steps.

Also now booking:

My Prettiest Perdita

Thursday 6 and Friday 7 December 2007, 7.30pm.

Performed by Karin Fernald and Clara Sanabras (voice and baroque guitar), music and songs of the period arranged by Richard Burnett & Graham Sharpe

Mary ‘Perdita’ Robinson, actress, courtesan and icon of fashion, became notorious for her glamorous and much-publicised love affair with the Prince of Wales, the future George lV, after he fell for her playing Perdita in The Winter’s Tale.  However her life was far from easy…. This highly entertaining and moving dramatic and musical performance is based on Perdita’s memoirs, published in 1798.  Price includes a glass of wine and a festive mince pie.

Mrs Piozzi’s Party

 My Prettiest Perdita

I enclose a cheque for the total sum of £ ________ Please make the cheque payable to Dr Johnson’s House Trust and return to Dr Johnson’s House, 17 Gough Square , London EC4A 3DE . Tel: 020 7353 3745 or curator@drjohnsonshouse.org

 

Name               _______________________________________

Address            _______________________________________

                        _______________________________________

Email               _______________________________________

Telephone       _______________________________________

 

Please include your email or telephone number so we can confirm receipt of your cheque. 

Stephanie Pickford

Donald Hyde Curator

Dr Johnson's House, 17 Gough Square , London EC4A 3DE

020 7353 3745

Sunday afternoons at 3.00pm
United Reformed Church, Frog Lane, Lichfield.
Admission £3.00

28 October 2007

Printers, Booksellers and Presssmen in Eighteenth Century Staffordshire Staffordshire

Andrew Dobraszczyc

25 November 2007

Anna Seward: A Woman of Abilities and some Renown

Marion Roberts

27 January 2008

The Litchfield Squabble: The General Election of 1746

Rose Wheat

24 February 2008

Johnson's Wardrobe: Fashion in the EighteenthCentury

Penny Alfrey

A visit to explore the links with the Lunar Society and to see the Joseph Wright room in Derby Library.
This visit will be undertaken by private cars.

For further details

Family Workshop

‘Lords and Ladies at the Masquerade’

Saturday 4 August, 2007 2-4pm

This family workshop looks at eighteenth-century makeup, clothes and accessories for a Masquerade ball.

It’s 1775. There’s a Masquerade ball tonight and you’re going … but what will you wear?

·         Create your own feathered mask to disguise yourself at the Ball!

·         Design a glittering fan and learn the secret language of fanology. 

·         Try on makeup eighteenth-century style.

·         Model our handmade Georgian clothes and see how you would have looked in the eighteenth century …

All at Dr Johnson’s House.

There will be prizes for the best Fan and the best Mask!

Places are limited, so you are advised to book early.

The workshop is free with entrance to the House (£4.50 for adults, £3.50 concessions, £1.50 children, £10 family ticket) and all materials will be provided by Dr Johnson’s House. All children must be accompanied by an adult.  Simply book your place by filling in the form below and returning it by post or email and arrive at the House at 2pm on the day.

FAMILY WORKSHOP
‘Lords and Ladies at the Masquerade’
Saturday 4 August 2007, 2-4pm

Name               _______________________________________

Address            _______________________________________

                        _______________________________________

Email               _______________________________________

Telephone       _______________________________________

Number of children and ages __________________________

Please include your email or telephone number so we can confirm your reservation.  

Elizabeth Emerson

Deputy Curator/Education Officer

Dr Johnson's House

17 Gough Square

London EC4A 3DE

020 7353 3745

A lecture by Sara Bird

In 1754, seven years after acquiring the half-patent of the Drury Lane Theatre , David Garrick bought his country retreat by the Thames at Hampton . He immediately set about altering the house and redesigning the gardens to reflect the taste of the time. The crowning glory was a charming little octagonal temple in honour of William Shakespeare erected on his riverside lawn. Inside he installed Roubiliac’s life-size statue of the bard, commissioned for the purpose.

This statue went to the British Museum in 1822/3, under the terms of Garrick’s will but the temple remained and survived, despite the various hazards which have threatened it over the years. Following a major restoration project (1997- 99) it made a triumphant entry into the 21st century, complete with a replica of Roubiliac’s statue and a permanent exhibition of pictures relating to Garrick’s stage career and life in Hampton. Since the end of 1998 the building has been open to the public on a regular basis and the garden has been restored to echo its 18^th-century appearance. 

Sara Bird is Education Committee Representative for Garrick’s Temple to Shakespeare.  For more information on Garrick’s Temple click here

Seats are limited so you are advised to book early – please fill in the form at the end of this email. Doors open at 6.45pm and the lecture starts at 7.30pm. A glass of wine and entrance to the exhibition are included in the ticket price.  The lecture takes place in the Withdrawing Room, Dr Johnson’s House, 17 Gough Square , London EC4A 3DE .  Many unavoidable steps.

Other events of interest:
Samuel Johnson and the Theatre: A three-day conference at Pembroke College , Oxford , 21-23 June 2007
see http://www.pmb.ox.ac.uk/pembroke_college/2007Johnson.html for more information

Further information

It may seem a long way away but preparations are already in hand for the celebration of the Tercentenary of the birth of Samuel Johnson. All the latest information can be found at the site given below.

The Johnson Tercentenary Site. All the latest information about preparations for the Tercentenary Celebrations of Dr Johnson's birth to take place in 2009.

9.00am                         Coach leaves Lichfield Bus station

12.00noon                    Lunch at Christ Church College

                                      Menu:
                                      Roast leg of lamb

                                      Vegetarian:   Crusted bean  cassoulet

                                      Gratin dauphinoise potatoes
                                      Broccoli florets

                                      Desert: Glazed fruit flan with Chantilly cream

                                     Chilled still or sparkling water with meal and tea or coffee to follow.

The Buttery bar is open for the purchase of alcoholic beverages

2.00pm                       From this time onwards;

                                   Group visits to the OUP Museum (see booking form in mailing)

                                   Attend festival events (as advised when available)

                                   Enjoy Oxford's wonderful ambience.

Those wishing to be nominated for council membership and/or a position of office should apply for an application form from: The Hon General Secretary, 7, Maple Close, Chasetown, Burntwood. WS7 4RP

Plants and Gardens in the Eighteenth Century

Jenny Uglow

Get your applications in for tickets to this lecture which will be given by Jenny Uglow author of 'The Lunar Men' and 'Hogarth - A Life and a World'.

Members tickets are free on application to Peter Barrett, Outings Secretary, c/o the Birthplace Museum, Breadmarket Street, Lichfield, Staffs. WS13 6LG. Please enclose an stamped addressed envelope. The evening starts with coffee and biscuits at 7.00pm. The lecture will begin at 7.30pm.

After mid-February tickets will be available to non-members.

A lecture by Nicola J. Watson

Thursday 22 February 2007 at 7:30pm

Nicola Watson tells the story of how London was transformed into a city saturated with literary anecdote over the course of the nineteenth century, a city ranged over far and wide by the book-loving Victorian tourist, in search of poets’ graves and memorials, sites associated with writers’ lives, and places immortalised in fiction.  Inspired and organised in the first instance by biographies such as Boswell’s Life of Johnson and by novels by Dickens, such tourists could by the last quarter of the century draw upon an ever-expanding shelf of guide-books and travel-writings to help them navigate. This evening we will explore how ‘Johnson’s London’ was melded together with ‘Shakespeare’s London’ and ‘Dickens’ London’ to produce an imaginary literary terrain, and how that phantom terrain was increasingly made real in the early twentieth century through the preservation of the houses of Johnson and Dickens.

Nicola J. Watson is Senior Lecturer in Literature at the Open University.  Her latest book, The Literary Tourist: Readers and Places in Romantic and Victorian Britain, has been published in the last few months by Palgrave.

Seats are limited so you are advised to book early. Doors open at 6.45pm, the lecture starts at 7.30pm and a glass of wine is included in the ticket price.  Please fill in the form below to book tickets.  The lecture takes place in the Dictionary Garret, with many unavoidable steps.

For information on forthcoming events including a talk on Hogarth and our spring exhibition ‘Behind the Scenes: The Hidden Life of Georgian Theatre 1737-1784’ please check our website on www.drjohnsonshouse.org .

Literary Tourism in London , 22 February 2007

I/We would like ____ ticket(s) @ £12.00 each

I/We would like ____ ticket(s) @ £10.00 (student and senior rate)

I enclose a cheque for the total sum of £ ________ Please make the cheque payable to Dr Johnson’s House Trust and return to Dr Johnson’s House, 17 Gough Square, London EC4A 3DE. Tel: 020 7353 3745 or curator@drjohnsonshouse.org

Name               _______________________________________

Address            _______________________________________

                        _______________________________________

Email               _______________________________________

Telephone       _______________________________________

Please include your email or telephone number so we can confirm receipt of your cheque.

If you no longer wish to receive updates from Dr Johnson’s House please reply to this email with unsubscribe in the subject line

Stephanie Pickford

Curator

Dr Johnson's House

17 Gough Square

London EC4A 3DE

020 7353 3745

curator@drjohnsonshouse.org

Members, friends and interested members of the public are invited to attend the  talks all of which will take place in the Johnson Room of the newly refurbished United Reform Church, Wade Street, Lichfield

All lectures begin at 3.00pm

Members, friends and interested members of the public are invited to attend the talks all of which will take place in the Johnson Room of the newly refurbished United Reform Church, Wade Street, Lichfield

All lectures begin at 3.00pm