The Royal Society of Literature 2014 Programme

Our 2014 programme includes: This year's Man Booker winner, Eleanor Catton (pictured), in conversation with the head of the Booker judges, Robert Macfarlane. Jonathan Dimbleby, Kate Fox, Salena Godden, Alan Johnson and Stephen Kelman discuss Toffsbridge v Toughsbridge. Margaret Atwood reads her poetry. Susannah Clapp, Alan Hollinghurst, Hermione Lee and Penelope Lively celebrate Penelope Fitzgerald. Sebastian Faulks, Tobias Hill, Michael Longley, Timberlake Wertenbaker and Louisa Young remember the Great War. Richard Eyre reflects on living with Shakespeare. Alexander McCall Smith tells us how Auden changed his life. Sara Wheeler talks amongst the penguins, at London Zoo. Maggie Gee and Alexandra Harris discuss Virginia Woolf in Manhattan. Booking will open on Monday 16 December. We were very sad to learn of the death of our Companion of Literature Doris Lessing on 17 November. You can listen to our event at the National Portrait Gallery, recorded in 2012, where Margaret Drabble discusses the ethics of portraiture, the public versus the private image, the defining of character in paint and prose, and the many faces of Doris Lessing. Photo of Doris Lessing by Chris Saunders. More