London Book & Screen Week 2018 announces programme celebrating women's suffrage and iconic adaptations

LBSW Ambassador Jojo Moyes champions week of events featuring Fiona Sampson, Nick Harkaway and Helen Pankhurst.

London Book & Screen Week (9 - 15 April, 2018) has today announced its 2018 programme paying homage to great book adaptations. Led by Ambassador Jojo Moyes, this year's line-up includes a special screening of box office sensation  Me Before You, an evening to celebrate 200 years of Frankenstein, and a sing- along screening of Mary Poppins.

As the UK marks the centenary of the women's vote, the festival will host a special screening of Suffragette with Dr Helen Pankhurst, author of Deeds Not Words and consultant on the film. The great-grandaughter of Emmeline Pankhurst (played by Meryl Streep in the film), will discuss women's rights then and now and how far we've come in the last 100 years.

The week will also include a supercalifragilistic sing-along screening of Mary Poppins, giving guests the chance to don a sash and join the chorus of 'Sister Suffragette' with on-screen activist Mrs Winifred Banks.

London Book & Screen Week Ambassador Jojo Moyes will be in conversation about her life and work ahead of a screening of Me Before You, which she adapted for film in 2016. Starring Sam Clafin and Emilia Clarke, the film became  a huge box-office success, grossing over $200M worldwide. The novel has since sold over 12 million copies. Jojo's follow-up book Still Me published in January and is already a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller.

Frankenstein: The Reincarnations will bring together biographer Fiona Sampson (In Search of Mary Shelley) with novelist Nick Harkaway (Gnomon) to discuss Mary Shelley and the enduring appeal of  her  iconic work  which celebrates its  200th anniversary  in 2018. The talk will be followed by a screening of Kenneth Branagh's classic 1994 adaptation starring Robert de Niro, Tom Hulce and Helena Bonham Carter.

The launch night at Soho House, central London (9 April), will host the return of the Creativity Across Media: Entertainment & Originality Awards (CAMEO) for their second year.

Award-winning LGBT literary salon Polari will also return for a London Book & Screen Week  special at the Light Lounge.

Jacks Thomas, Director of The London Book Fair and London Book & Screen Week, said:

“The line-up of this year’s London Book & Screen Week once  again  demonstrates the  range  and depth of London’s creative talent. In this centenary year, we are delighted to showcase so many oustanding female writers whose work continues to be iconic and influential around the world.

As we return with the Creativity Across Media: Excellence and Originality Awards (CAMEOs) for the second year, we will once again recognise the vital role books play to  the wider creative industries  and celebrate the individuals who create some of the most successful film, stage, TV and game adaptations.”

Produced by The London Book Fair, London Book & Screen Week is a seven-day, citywide festival celebrating books and the films, games, plays and TV programmes they  inspire.  London  Book  & Screen Week is run in partnership with some of  the capital’s highest-profile brands, including London  & Partners, the Mayor’s official promotional company for London, which attracts businesses and visitors to the capital and operates VisitLondon.com, the official city guide for London.

The festival combines specially curated events with an open source strand, open to online submissions at www.londonbookandscreenweek.co.uk

To find out more, and book event tickets, visit www.londonbookandscreenweek.co.uk

PROGRAMME HIGHLIGHTS

MONDAY 9 APRIL

POLARI LITERARY SALON
Venue: The Light Lounge, Soho

London's award-winning LGBT literary salon returns once again to The Light Lounge in  Soho  for  London Book &  Screen Week. Polari began in  November 2007 in  the upstairs room of  a  pub in  Soho. It is now based at the Southbank Centre, where events are held every month. It tours regularly across the country, and hosts Polari Prize for Fiction, an award handed annually to the best first book by an LGBT author in the UK.

TUESDAY 10 APRIL

FRANKENSTEIN: THE REINCARNATIONS
Venue: Soho House, 17:30- 21:00

Join us for a themed evening to celebrate 200 years of  Frankenstein in  popular culture. Written by  Mary Shelley, the novel first published in 1818 when the author was just 20 years old and has since become a cult classic, inspiring countless adaptations for both stage and screen. Biographer Fiona Sampson will be in conversation with novelist Nick Harkaway to discuss Mary Shelley and her ground- breaking book, regarded by many as the first work of science fiction. This will be followed by a film screening of Kenneth Branagh’s 1994 film featuring Robert de  Niro,  Tom  Hulce,  Helena  Bonham Carter and John Cleese.

Fiona Sampson is a prize-winning poet, and author of In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein (Profile, February 2018). She has been published in more than thirty languages and received an MBE for services to literature. Sampson is a Fellow of the Royal Society for Literature, and the recipient of  a  number of  national and international honours for  her poetry. She has worked    as an editor, translator, and university professor as well as a violinist.

Nick Harkaway was born in Cornwall in 1972. Author of the  novels Gnomon (Guardian Book  of  the  Year 2017), The Gone-Away World, Angelmaker and Tigerman, he lives in London with his wife and two children.

Ticket: £25 / Two books & ticket: £50 | http://bit.ly/2Buv55M

WEDNESDAY 11 APRIL

ME BEFORE YOU: A SPECIAL SCREENING WITH JOJO MOYES
Venue: Soho House, 17:45- 21:00

Join us for a special screening of Me Before You, the heart-warming box office hit starring Sam Claflin (The Hunger Games) and Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones), based on the bestselling novel by Jojo  Moyes. The sumptuous one-off screening will be accompanied by  an  in-conversation with  Jojo  who  will discuss her experience bringing the book to screen.

Young and quirky Louisa "Lou" Clark (Emilia Clarke) moves from one job to the next to help her family make ends meet. Her cheerful attitude is put to the test when she becomes a caregiver for Will Traynor (Sam Claflin), a wealthy young banker left paralyzed from an accident two years earlier. Will's cynical outlook starts to change when Louisa shows him that life is worth living. As their bond deepens, their lives and hearts change in ways neither one could have imagined.

Jojo Moyes worked as a journalist for  ten  years  and  has  been a  full time novelist since 2002, when her  first book, Sheltering Rain was  published. Since then she has written a  further eleven novels, all   of which have been widely critically acclaimed. She has  won  the  Romantic  Novelist’s  Award  twice, and Me Before You was nominated for Book of the Year at  the UK  Galaxy Book Awards. Me Before You has since gone on to sell over 12 million copies worldwide. Jojo wrote the screenplay for the film adaptation of Me Before You starring Sam Claflin and Emilia Clarke. It was released in  June 2016 and  was a huge box-office success, grossing over $200M worldwide.

Ticket: £25 / Book & ticket: £35 | http://bit.ly/2rDkiGy

THURSDAY 12 APRIL

MARY POPPINS: A SUPERCALIFRAGILISTIC SING-ALONG
Venue: Soho House, 18:00- 21:00

Join us at an exclusive  Soho  screening  room  for  a  supercalifragilistic  screening  of  Mary  Poppins, the childhood classic adapted from the novel by P.L Travers. Raise a glass to the iconic nanny and questionably cockney chimney sweep Bert as you join in with a song or two or seven.

We’ll bring the spoonfuls of sugar. You bring your singing voice. Tickets: £25 | http://bit.ly/2Bs5oCM

FRIDAY 13 APRIL

VOTES FOR WOMEN: CELEBRATING 100 YEARS OF WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE
Venue: Soho House, 17:45- 21:00

Don your sash and join us to celebrate the centenary of the women’s vote. 2018 marks 100 years since the Representation of the People Act 1918, which enabled some women over the age of 30 to vote for  the first time. In honour of this milestone we’re bringing in Dr Helen Pankhurst, author of Deeds Not Words and great-granddaughter of Emmeline Pankhurst, to discuss the women’s movement then and now, and how far we’ve come in the last 100 years.

This will be followed by a screening of 2015 blockbuster Suffragette, for which Pankhurst was a consultant. Starring Carey Mulligan, Meryl Streep and Helena Bonham-Carter, the  film  tells  the  story of the foot soldiers of the early feminist movement.

Dr Helen Pankhurst is a women's rights activist and senior advisor to CARE International, based in  the UK and in Ethiopia, where her work focusses on the interests and needs of women and girls. In the UK  she is a public speaker and writer on feminist issues. Helen is the great-granddaughter of Emmeline Pankhurst and granddaughter of Sylvia Pankhurst, leaders of the  British  suffragette  movement. Her new book Deeds Not Words combines historical insight with inspiring argument to reveal how  far women have come since the suffragettes, how far we still have to go, and how we might get there.

Tickets: £25 / Book & ticket: £35 | http://bit.ly/2rO6pWm

ENDS

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