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The worthy Workers� Educational Association is offering a free online lecture on Thomas Hardy on 7 November from 1800-1900 UK time. I’m on the WEA mailing list, so perhaps that’s a requirement? Link below.

“Taking place from Monday 6th to Friday 10th November, Lifelong Learning Week celebrates adult learners and shines the spotlight on just some of the brilliant work that’s taking place right across the sector.

In partnership with our friends at the Learning for Work Institute and City Lit, we’ll be hosting a special free lecture taking place on Learning for Creativity and Culture Day, Tuesday 7th November, 6pm - 7pm, focusing on Thomas Hardy, a man regarded by many as the elder statesman of literature.

Presented by Historian Margaret Mills and titled Thomas Hardy: then and now, our free lecture will take place online, allowing you to join us from the comfort of your own home.

As the WEA celebrates its 120th anniversary, we’ll consider Hardy the man, rather than the writer, and what was happening in his life towards the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century.�

Thanks David - that does sound interesting!

(I have moved this thread to the "Members threads" folder.)

Thanks David! I registered but didn´t have to be on the mailing list. Obviously the event will be recorded and put on the WEA website.

WEA has posted the lecture on YouTube here:



It was interesting, informative and quite informal as an event. It will serve well as an introduction to Hardy for those who have not gone full heavy-duty. Useful in ‘marketing� Hardy to friends yet to discover the delights.

The WEA is a very worthy organisation, providing educational opportunities to people who may not have had such opportunities through the formal provision via schools, colleges etc, something I’m sure that would have been welcomed and supported by Hardy himself.

I agree! In fact I just checked to see if he might have been involved, but it started in 1903 (in Reading and Rochdale) - of course you said about the anniversary. I do remember it being active in Sheffield many years ago - fantastic that stuff is now available online. Thanks for this, David.

I listened to the event live, where there were more than 600 people online on Zoom. It was a short summary of Hardy´s life, and the questions (and answers, esp. about his political involvement) were interesting too. Not for the experts here, but good as an introduction.

Good to hear that it was well-received. I was multi-tasking as it was playing (filing and discarding CDs and books) and I was tempted to offer Tim Pears as a contemporary author who resembles Hardy in some ways, especially Pears’s West Country Trilogy.

Ah yes, there Mills was struggling a bit... Will have to have a look at Pears, thanks David!