The Royal Society of Literature is proud to announce its new President - Colin Thubron

In the RSL Review, published later this month, Colin Thubron, who, since
his first book Mirror to Damascus in 1967, has published almost twenty
novels and travel books, writes of the challenges and possibilities facing
him as he takes over the role:

We live in the age of the threatened book. Libraries and the small bookseller survive in a state of siege. Google and Amazon are barging in. The e-book looms. My initial response to these threats, if threats they are, is that it is less literature that is threatened than the book as an artefact. And our first duty is to literature: the written and read word, in whatever form it comes. Whatever we may imagine, we live in a fertile age of literature, and in the body of our Fellows – as diverse and talented a concentration of writers as exists – we are well equipped to nourish it.

Outgoing President Sir Michael Holroyd reflects on his 7 years as
President of the RSL and welcomes his successor:

Colin is a very individual writer, a very distinct and distinguished – and distinguishable – character. It is a time of real change and, as I have already confided to him, he will be a hard act to precede.

The RSL will be hosting a party at the Portico Rooms, Somerset House, on
Thursday 28th January at 6.30pm to thank the outgoing President,
Sir Michael Holroyd, and welcome Colin Thubron as his successor.

On 1st February Colin will chair the event “Going Public”, where
P.D. James and Andrew Motion will discuss whether it is possible to
combine life as a writer with public service.
This event will take place in the Kenneth Clark Lecture Theatre at the Courtauld Institute,
Somerset House, Strand, London WC2R 1LA. The doors will open at 6pm
and the discussion will begin at 7pm.

Tickets are limited.
Please contact Rachel Page:
Royal Society of Literature, Somerset House, Strand, WC2R 1LA
Telephone: 020 7845 4677
Email: rachel@rslit.org