Happy February, FOBGs. Another healthy serving of book groceries awaits you this week. Stick to a well-rounded book diet, and you’re sure to stave off a winter cold. We have no actual data to support this contention – we’re book geeks, not science nerds – but it certainly sounds promising. So eat your greens, drink your grains, and check back later this week for a bonus edition of the Book Grocer especially dedicated to Valentine’s Day events for book lovers. (Get it? Book lovers? Right. You get it.)
Poetry Monday: Too much of a good thing is probably, um, too much of a good thing. Though we can probably think of some exceptions to that aphorism. For example, give A Taste of Salt a try and you’ll probably be left wanting more. Tonight’s lineup includes offerings from nine poets – that is, according to the event description, a “smorgasbord.” We like this as it fits nicely into our grocery metaphor and saves us some creative straining. 8–10pm at the Troubadour Club, £6 tickets, £5 concessions.
Tuesday: You’ve probably heard the various claims about Shakespeare’s sexuality: Was he? Or wasn’t he? The controversy probably won’t be resolved today, but you can at least learn more about why this and questions of other historical figures’ sexuality matter. Hosted by Paul Patrick, one of the founders of LGBT History Month. At the Acton Library, 6.30–7.45pm, £2.
Wednesday: Australian author and two-time Man Booker prize winner Peter Carey will be at the Southbank Centre tonight, to read from his latest novel, His Illegal Self, due out in the UK this week. 7.45pm, £10 tickets, £5 concessions. But hypochondriacs and conspiracy theorists would do better to head over to the Dana Centre to lay to rest some of their more nagging concerns. Authors Simon Briscoe and Hugh Aldersey-Williams will be there discussing their forthcoming Panicology, whose subtitle, ‘Killer Birds!! Alien Abductors!! Rising Sea Levels!!’, gives us the heebie-jeebies for the excess of punctuation alone. 7–8.30pm, free.
Thursday: At the risk of sounding repetitive boors, we stand by our earlier recommendation that you go hear Sukhdev Sandhu discuss Night Haunts at the Late @ Museum in Docklands event tonight. Entry to the museum is free after 4.30pm. The talk starts at 7pm.
Friday: We’d recommend the Will Self–Iain Sinclair discussion of psychogeography at the V&A, but Will Self’s been showing up with annoying regularity in our listings lately (it must be book promotion time). And besides, you can do your own psychogeographical experiment (or, at the very least, disrupt pedestrians, which sort of qualifies) Friday night by joining us in St James for Londonist’s fourth Wander Lonely Streets walk. Not technically a book event, but we have the liberty to do with this space as we will. And it’s freeeee. Like, free.
Know of an event that belongs in the book grocer listings? E-mail it to londonist-at-gmail-dot-com.
Borough Market healthy fruit pic courtesy of PistolPeet’s Flickr photostream
