Special Note

Dear friends of Barter Books –

First, I want to say how much I appreciate your support of our talks series.

All I can say, at a personal level, is how much I like the talks, myself. Just for starters, it gives me a wonderful chance to hear and meet people I might never have heard or met otherwise – and that includes you.

One problem that we do have, however, is with Sell-Outs. That’s a happy problem to have in one sense – one that, by the very nature of things, we don’t always get but that we all devoutly want, including the speakers!

But it’s not happy when, on the night, you see empty seats that had been booked for an event that, on paper, had sold-out. Seats that could so easily have gone to someone else who really wanted to come - someone on the waiting list, or even someone who had just shown up on the night, - had the holders simply let us know, if at all possible, in advance.

What to do?

We decided simply to try to copy the solution of others who have the same problem. And that is to ask those who book in advance to pay in advance (note: we can take payment over the phone!), as well. And if they can’t come, to please let us know as much in advance as possible, and their money will be refunded.

This way, with any luck, any empty seats would be more likely to be empty because the event, itself, was simply geared to more specialised interests.

We do hope the new way of booking seats will make the same sense to you as it does to us. In addition, please know that, for most talks, booking isn’t essential. But as you can never tell when it might be, it is a safeguard. In any case, here’s hoping the new system works out better in future for all of us.

With best wishes and many thanks again for your support,

Mary

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One of the perks I value most about having a bookshop is that our talks series, such as it is (roughly a speaker a month between September – June) enables me to meet professionals in every field (the arts, sciences, even sports) who I would otherwise never have had the opportunity to meet. Some few are well-known to the public – hey! It´s a long way up here, the fee is risible, and the Old Waiting Room wherein the talks take place only holds 50 people tops (60 if they´re skinny).

Still, some serious names (serious names with big hearts) have been willing to make the perilous journey above Watford, eg, Joanna Trollope, David Aaronovitch, Richard Ingrams, Anne Stevenson, James Fleming, Tony Harrison, and the late (loved) (missed!) Miles Kington.

But forget famous; all our speakers are well-known within their field and have given some of the most spell-binding talks of all, enough to have created their very own fan club. (Just try dropping the name ‘Richard Lomas’ around these parts ­ Dick´s the Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Durham ­ and wait for the absolutely slavering response.) Anyway, all the talks begin at 7.30 and cost £5 (and that includes a glass of plonk no less.)

FORTHCOMING TALKS ...

Dr. Richard Lomas

Northumberland New Towns in the Twelfth Century

 

Alnwick, Corbridge, Hexham, Newcastle, Rothbury, Tynemouth, Warkworth, Wooler … Why were they built? Why were they built where they were built? Who built them? And what were they like? We have all visited them many times, but after this talk you will see them with fresh eyes and greater insight.

 

Our speaker, Dr Richard Lomas, is the Emeritus Professor of History at Durham University, and an acknowledged expert on the history of the North East. His academic career also includes working with two American universities on their European Studies courses. Dr Lomas has lectured many times to capacity audiences at Barter Books on subjects as diverse as the Border Reivers, the Dukes of Northumberland, and the Vikings. He has also been called upon by such organisations as BBC Television, the RSC, and English Heritage for in-depth interviews, advice, and information about equally diverse subjects, such as the future of the Monarchy, medieval mystery plays, and the history of our county. His own publications include numerous articles in academic journals; books on the history of Northumberland and on the Percy family, as well as the comprehensive Encyclopaedia of North-East England. His newest book, due to be published in 2020, will be entitled Anglo-Normans in Ireland: 1169 – 1247.

 

Place: Barter Books

THIS TALK IS NOW SOLD OUT

Date & Time:  Monday, March 25th, 7.30pm.

Entrance: £5 (To be sure of a seat, please call in advance, 01665 604888)

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The most recent programme is shown below. If you require further information, please contact Roger Jermy on 01665 606168.

Meetings of the society are held in the Waiting Room, Alnwick Station at 7.00 pm for 7.30pm. They are open to members, their guests and visitors for a small donation towards costs. Refreshments will be available from 7.00 pm.

INDOOR MEETINGS PROGRAMME

Thursday 20th April 2017:

“An evening with Pat Murphy”. Pat is the AVR's Civil Engineer and a noted photographer. He switches from being an audience member to speaker this evening to entertain us with some of his railway pictures.

May 2017: (Date to be confirmed.)

The annual quiz evening when the Aln Valley Railway team competes against the team from Gunnerton Railway Circle for “The Flat Bottomed Trophy”.

 

The Barter Books Book Group meets once a month, 7-9, at the bookshop, and has actually grown into two groups, the Monday and Tuesday night groups, both of which read the same material.

Its year is divided into two sessions, the Autumn session (September to December) and the Spring session (January to the end of May), with the reading for both sessions ranging over a wide range of choices, both classic and modern, fiction and nonfiction. The specific books to be read within that range are chosen by the leader (with an ear to suggestions from the group) according to a theme.

The Book Club is led by Rosemary Hartill, a former BBC correspondent, who has reported from some thirty countries (including BBC World Service broadcasts). Among the radio series Rosemary has presented for the BBC are: Meridian Books (World Service books programme), Writers Revealed (fourteen interviews on Radio 4 with authors ranging from Iris Murdoch to Anthony Burgess), and Immortal Diamonds (a Radio 4 series about poets). The recipient of two honorary doctorates in literature, Rosemary has also written for the Guardian and the Times Educational Supplement and is the author of several books.

Two separate groups meet once a month in Barter Books, 7-9 pm – one group meets on a Monday, another on a Tuesday.

Cost: £36.

Payment can be made online here

For more information about joining the Book Group, please contact: Dan Robinson

Book Group: Spring 2019

Theme: Navigating Ulysses

7 and 8 January: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man This ends a few months before Ulysses begins and the latter was originally intended as a sequel to Portait although it developed into something far greater.

11 or 12 February: Ulysses, Planning our Voyage

Details to be confirmed

11 and 12 March: Setting sail. Ulysses, Episode 1 (Telemachus) 2 (Nestor) 3 (Proteus) 4 (Calypso) 5 (Lotus Eaters) 6 (Hades) (150 pages in total) In this first 150 pages we meet Stephen and his cronies in episodes 1-3 and then our other main characters Leopold and Molly Bllom in 4-6. Most of this is very readable narrative and dialogue, with some interior monologue. If you get lost in 1-3, jump to 4.

Now... At the point, we can review how we are feeling, and possibly do two different things in the two bookgroups. One group might possibly like to divert to other books (choice to be confirmed). Others who want to stick with Ulysses can continue.

1 and 2 April: Mid-Ocean. Episodes 10 ( Wandering Rock) and 11 (Sirens) (100 pages in total) and, if you are up for more, 13 (Nausicaa) (50 pages)

Episodes 7-9 cover Bloom's movements around Dublin after the funeral and his lunch, and Stephen's discussions of Shakespeare in the National Library. We can use whatever resources suit us to fill in these episodes. Episode 10, Wandering Rocks introduces us to a selection of characters mostly new to us, so can be read without knowledge or 7-9. Episode 11 takes place in a bar and is very musical - reading aloud or listening to a talking book is recommended. Episode 12 includes 33 digressions in various styles and so is a challenging read, we may choose to leave for later. In 13 we are back on the beach with a parody of the sentimental romantic novel which is much more accessible, as a group of girls are watched by Leopold Bloom. But be warned the end of this episode got the book banned in the U.S.

13 and 14 May: Reaching Port. Episode 17 (Ithaca) and 18 (Penelope) (150 pages in total)

Episode 14, Oxen of the Sun, is possibly the most challenging of the whole book. 15, Circe, is much more fun as it is written as a stage play. We can dip into it if you have time but it is 140 pages long. Again, we can use whatever resources suit us to fill 14, 15 and 16.

In 17, Bloom and Stephen walk and talk back to Bloom's house. Then the book concludes with Molly Bloom's Soliloquy in which she contemplates her life and loves, leading up to one of the famous endings in literature

Book Group Archive ... here

Barter Book Group – books read

We began Sept 03.

 

2018

September – December 2018

Theme:the Long and the Short of it...

Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales; Lawrence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman; Raymond Queneau, 2013 and A World of Difference

 

2018

January – May 2018

Theme: Beginnings and Endings

Muriel Spark, The Comforters; George Saunders, Lincoln in the Bardo; Ngugi wa Thiong'o, A Grain of Wheat, Joseph Roth, The Radetzky March; Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending

 

2017

September - December 2017

Theme: Great Ideas

Marcus Aurelius, The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius; Edward Gibbon, The Christians and the Fall of Rome; Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince; William Hazlitt, On the Pleasures of Hating

January - May 2017

Theme: Blue

Penelope Fitzgerald,The Blue Flower; Georges Simenon, The Blue Room; William Boyd, The Blue Afternoon; Kay Redfield Jamison, An Unquiet Mind:A memoir of moods and madness; Danielle Steele, Blue

January 2017 – Party Twelth Night Party (at Barter Books)

2016

January - May 2016

Theme: Comings and Goings / Between Two Places

Shaun Tan,The Arrival; Rose Tremaine, The Road Home; Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin; Sunjeer Sahota, The Year of the Runaways; Col Tóibín, Brooklyn

 

2015

September - December 2015

Theme: Rage against the Machine (Rebels with a Cause)

Plato, The Last Days of Socrates: Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida: Franz Kafka, The Castle: Loretta Napoleoni, The Islamist Phoenix

June 2015 – Party at The Hoolies, Alnmouth

January - May 2015

Theme: Old and New World Gold

Laurie Lee, As I walked out on a Midsummer Morning;Introduction to Spanish Poetry: A Dual-language Book editor: Eugenio Florit; Gabriel Garcia Marquez, 100 years of Solitude; Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist; Laura Esquivel, Like Water for Chocolate

January 2015 – Party - Howick Village hall Circle Dancing; reading that made an early impression on our lives

2014

September - December 2014

Theme: Russia

Forty Stories by Anton Chekhov; Mikhail Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita; Victor Pelevin, Babylon; Andrey Kurkov, Ukraine Diaries

June 2014 - Party Chinese takeaway and film Yellow Earth

January - June 2014

Theme: China

Peter Hessler, River Town -  Two Years on the Yangtze; Dai Sijie,Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress; Jung Chang,Empress Dowager Cixi: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China; 170 Chinese poems translated by Arthur Waley; Leslie Chang, Factory girls

January 2014 -Party - Dinner at Barter Books

 

2013

September-December 2013

Theme: Heroes and Tricksters

The Mahabharata, a shortened  version by R.K. Narayan; and The Bhagavad Gita; Martin Bennett, West African Trickster Tales; Tennyson’s Morte  d’Arthur (part); Anthony Price, Other Paths to Glory.

June 2013 – Party - Ship Inn, Low Newton-by-the-Sea

January-May 2013

Theme: INDEPENDENCE: Who We Are … and What We Can Be?

Fitzroy Maclean (with Magnus Linklater), Scotland: a revised history; Kate Fox, Watching the English - the Hidden Rules of English Behaviour; Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart; Alan Watts, The book on the taboo against knowing who you are; Anne Tyler, Digging to America

January 2013 - Party - Howick Village Hall Dancing with Alistair Sinton

2012

September - December 2012

Theme: REVOLUTIONS and what it's like to live through them

George Eliot, Middlemarch; Mikhail Bulgakov,The White Guard; Ryszard Kapuscinski,Shah of Shahs; Sahar Khalifeh, Wild Thorns

June 2012 – Party - Howick Village Hall Music. Singing with Sarah Gray

January - May 2012

Theme: COMING-OF-AGE (Bildungsroman) novels

Mary Shelley, Frankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus; Bapsie Sidhwa, Ice-Candy Man; Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South; Jean Rhys, The Wide Sargasso Sea; Selma Lagerlof, The Wonderful Adventures of Nils

January 2012 - Party

 

2011

September - December 2011

Theme: Ways of Seeing

Tim Mackintosh-Smith, Travels with a Tangerine: A Journey in the Footnotes of Ibn Battutah; Charles Darwin, Voyage of the Beagle; John Berger, Ways of Seeing; Bill Bryson, A short history of nearly everything 

June 11 – Party

January – May 2011

Theme: Life and Work

Charles Dickens, Hard Times; John Lanchester, Whoops!:Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay; Bernard Shaw, Major Barbara; Polly Toynbee, Hard Work; The Gospel according to St Matthew.

January 2011 – Party - Barter Books – Seven Ages of Man(at Barter Books)

2010

September – December 2010

Theme: Journeys of Discovery

Barack Obama, Dreams from my Father: a Story of Race and Inheritance; Salley Vickers, The Other Side of You; R.K Narayan, The English Teacher; Sara Maitland, A Book of Silence

June 2010 – Party at Poppy's house in Newcastle

January – May 2010

Theme: The Italians

Tim Parks, An Italian Education (1996, Guardian Books2001); March 1, 2: Dante, The Divine Comedy: Hell; Carlo Levi, Christ did not stop at Eboli; Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an author; Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities (1972)

January 2010 – Party - Barter Books – Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (at Barter Books)

2009

September - December 2009

Theme: Mystery, or Deception

Claire Tomalin, The Invisible Woman; Joseph Conrad, The Secret Agent; John Banville, The Untouchables; Ian Rankin, The Naming of the Dead

June 2009 – Party - Barter Books – exploration/discovery (at Barter Books)

January - May 2009

Theme: Food

Nigel Slater, Eating for England: The Delights and Eccentricities of the British at Table; Julia Child, My Life in France; Bill Buford, Heat; John Lanchester, My Debt to Pleasure; Joanna Blythman, Bad Food Britain

January 2009 – Party - Barter Books – trains (at Barter Books)

2008

September - December 2008

Theme: Contemporary world writing

Andrey Kurkov, Death and the Penguin; Uwem Akpan, Say You're One of Them; Yiyun Li, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers; Marina Lewycka,Two Caravans

January - May 2008

Theme: French literature

Marguerite Duras, The Lover; Proust Swann's Way (vol 1 of 'In Search of Lost Time'); St Exupery Le Vol de Nuit (Night Flight)  and Southern Mail;  Albert Camus, The Stranger; Irene Nemirovksy, Suite Francaise (French Suite)

2007

September - December 2007

Theme: Diaries/ memoirs

Simon Garfield, Our Hidden Lives; James Boswell, Boswell's life of Johnson; Isabella Bird, A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains; Simon Wiesenthal, The Sunflower

January - May 07

Theme: Lucky Dip

Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time; Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland; David Malouf, The Great World; Giuseppe di Lampedusa, The Leopard; Khalid Hosseini, The Kite Runner

2006

September - December 2006

Theme: The Arab World

Rory Stewart, Occupational Hazard – My Time governing in Iraq ; Amin Ma’alouf, the Crusades through Arab Eyes; 1001 Nights; Karen Armstrong, A short history of Islam

January - May 2006

Theme: American literature

Mark Twain, Huckleberry Finn; Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage; Theodore Dreiser, Sister Carrie; Henry James, Selected short stories; Chaim Potok, My Name is Asher Lev

2005

September - December 2005

Theme: Travel books

H.V. Morton, Travels through Bible Lands; Paul Theroux, The Great Railway Bazaar; Ryszard Kapuscinski, Imperium; Homer, Odyssey

January - May 2005

Theme: Five women’s books linked to experiences of childhood or adolescence

Julia Darling, The Taxi-Driver’s daughter; Margaret Atwood, Cat’s Eye; Sally Morgan, My Place; Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse; Chimamanda Ngoze Adichie, Purple Hibiscus

 

2004

September - December 2004

Theme: Light and Dark

Nick Hornby, How to Be Good; Tolstoy, Resurrection; Philip Pulman, His Dark Materials; Gawain and the Green Knight

January - May 2004

Theme: War

Evelyn Waugh, Officers and Gentlemen; Ivo Andric, The Bridge over the Drina; Jaroslav Hasek, The Good Soldier Svejk; Homer, The Iliad; Michael Ondaatje, Anil’s Ghost

 

2003

September - December 2003

Theme: Colliding Cultures

Graham Greene, The Quiet American; Doris Lessing, The Grass is Singing; Hanif Kureishi, The Buddha of Suburbia; Orhan Pamuk, My Name is Red

 

Barter Books

invites you to a very special book launch

Herterton House and a New Country Garden

(The collaborative creation of Frank and Marjorie Lawley)

With a talk by the author:  Frank Lawley

and

A slideshow of Herterton photographs by the well-known garden photographer

Val Corbett

For all those who love gardens, Herterton Garden, created by Frank and Marjorie Lawley over a forty-year period on the Wallington estate near Cambo, is one of the truly outstanding gardens in England. Among many brilliant reviews, Robin Lane Fox, writing in the FT, called Herterton Garden quite simply “one of the most influential gardens to be created since the end of World War II”.

This book launch celebrates the new book, Herterton House and a New Country Garden, written by Frank Lawley and beautifully illustrated by Val Corbett. It recounts the story of two young artists who, virtually alone, slowly and meticulously restored over forty years what was basically a 16th century ruin of a house and embellished it with a garden worthy of it. The book is also a fascinating social history of a whole era on the Wallington estate (of which Marjorie Lawley’s father was the head gardener) along with fascinating asides on art and architecture. As important, maybe even more so, Frank and Marjorie did all this on no assurance, beyond the odd empty promise, that their garden would even survive.

For all this and more, the well-known garden writer, Susie White, counts the book as unique among garden books as the life it describes – and a modern classic.

Can you come to the book launch?

We can’t promise you that there will still be seats left in the old Waiting Room, but we can promise you that we will do our best to make up for it with seating outside the Waiting Room, speakers so you can hear all the proceedings, plenty of wine and nibbles, compare garden notes with half the audience (including Frank Lawley, himself!),  see a little exhibition of Frank’s artwork as a young art teacher, and even meet the author, photographer, book designer, as well as two representatives from the book’s publisher, the much-esteemed Pimpernel Press.

Most of all, and the whole point of the evening really, is just to have this chance to cheer on the lives of two people who have contributed so much to our own.

Place: Barter Books
Date & Time:  Monday, July 13th, 7:30pm
Entrance: No charge but any donations appreciated! Advance booking, however, is essential. If you’d like to be there on the night, please let us know so we can arrange the right amount of seating, wine and nibbles! (To book telephone 01665 604888 or call into the shop)