Talks and Events

Ken Worpole & Melissa Benn: Brightening from the East

Date /Time: Wednesday, 26 March 2025, 7pm

Ken Worpole, ‘a literary original, a social and architectural historian whose books combine the Orwellian ideal of common decency with understated erudition’ (New Statesman), has written on many subjects during his long career, from cemeteries to hospices to the novels of Alexander Baron, but has often returned to the subject of his beloved Essex. His latest essay collection Brightening from the East (Little Toller) focuses on the natural and built landscapes of the ‘region of the mind’ that is the estuarine marshlands of the Thames and the East Anglian coast, bringing us stories of radical communities and arcadian dreams of new ways of living. Worpole will be in conversation about his work with writer and journalist Melissa Benn.

Information & booking: www.eventbrite.co.uk
Venue: London Review Bookshop, 14 Bury Place, London WC1A 2JL

 

The Gibson Library Society, Saffron Walden: Brightening from the East. The nonconformist landscapes of 20th century Essex

Date /Time: Wednesday 30 April 2025, 7:30 pm

In his new book, Brightening from the East, writer and social historian Ken Worpole explores a unique ‘region of the mind’ – the Thames Estuary, the marshland landscapes of the East Anglian shoreline, and the Quaker and Anglican strongholds of the Essex interior - where Essex has been fertile soil for a rich variety of radical and religious settlements, ‘the Thaxted experiment’ being the most well-known. The author will focus on the powerful mix of East End political radicalism, the English Folk Revival, and the Christian ‘leavening’ of rural Essex, which all combined to produce some of the most remarkable episodes in the history of social reform in 20th century, a number of which will be discussed in greater detail.

Information & booking: Non-members are welcome to attend. There is no charge for admission, and the Library has disabled access. For further information: www.gibsonlibrary.org.uk
Venue: The Gibson Library at Saffron Walden Library, 2 King Street, Saffron Walden, CB10 1ES

How We Live and How We Might Live
From communities of interest to communities of care

Date /Time: Thursday, 3 April 2025. Drinks 6.30/ Talk 7pm

In his 1964 essay, ‘Urban Place and the Non-Place Public Realm’, American urban designer Melvin Webber coined a phrase which anticipated the changing nature of social life in the modern world: community without propinquity. This suggested that the communities of the future would be based more on shared interests and identities than physical proximity and face-to-face encounters. Webber predicted this long before the Internet made the creation of online ‘communities’ – whose reach now extends across the globe - even more commanding.

Social media now generates millions of such self-described ‘communities’, none of whose members have ever met in person. In such conditions social change becomes ever more difficult to achieve, for as John Stuart Mill argued in Principles of Political Economy (1848), society needs ‘experiments in living’ – new forms of working and living together - to guard against ‘the weight of Custom bearing down upon human capacity for improvement.’

Ken’s talk, based on his new book, Brightening from the East, explores the post-war history of such experiments in living and working together, now commonly called elective or ‘intentional’ communities, highlighting four remarkable case studies– one environmental, one pacifist, one religious in origin but open to all, and one a newly opened experiment in social care - and discusses what we might learn from them as we face the environmental and social upheavals of tomorrow.

Information & booking: This paying event is organised by Kairos, a central London space exploring radical ideas for social and cultural change in response to the climate and nature crises. Booking is essential at: www.kairos.london/event/how-we-live-and-how-we-might-live-with-ken-worpole/
Venue: Kairos, 84 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4TG

Fresh air and freedom: arcadian communities & radical dreams

Date /Time: Saturday, 17 May 2025, 2pm

Writer & social historian, Ken Worpole, has written many books including works of literary criticism, architectural history and the landscape. He has a long-standing interest in the social history of Essex and has researched the history of Frating Hall Farm near Elmstead: a Christian pacifist community on a 300 acre farm providing a home for more than 50 people including refugees and prisoners of war between 1943 and 1954. This became the much-acclaimed book, No Matter How Many Skies Have Fallen: back to the land in wartime Britain (2022). His latest book Brightening from the East (Little Toller) focuses on the natural and built landscapes of the ‘region of the mind’ that is the estuarine marshlands of the Thames and the East Anglian coast, bringing us stories of radical communities and arcadian dreams of new ways of living. 'A charismatic speaker, and champion of Essex in his writings, we are honoured to host him.'

Information & booking: www.stleonard-at-the-hythe.org.uk. Free admission.
Venue: St-Leonard’s-at-the-Hythe, Hythe Hill, Colchester, Essex, CO12NP