Last week I left the sunny, comfy, biscuit-and-teaness of a normal Saturday morning behind to head down to the London Lore conference at the beautiful Bishopsgate Institute near Liverpool St.
Organised by the Folklore Society and the South East London Folklore Society (SELFS), it sold out weeks beforehand, so there were about 200 of us there in the Institute’s modestly ornate pale green great hall. The amateur enthusiasts, middle-aged men with thick glasses and shirts tucked into their jeans were out in force, as were a number of wild-eyed men sporting exciting hairstyles of both scalp and face. However, I was pleased to discover the audience also contained large numbers of pale bookish girls (that’s me), elderly women in strange purple garments, and goth couples, one half of whom sitting behind me was sporting a fantastic skeletal hand hairclip (like this one).
I won’t write up the whole event, as Bad Witch has already done a good summary of the speakers and topics, but overall I was very very impressed with the quality of talks and speakers. Everyone was clear, engaging, entertaining and kept to time. There was a good variety of topics, my favourites being a talk by Noel Rooney about the way the traditional character of the fox has been adapted for an urban setting and John Constable’s introduction to the Southwark Mysteries although the Chair pressed him into singing a song which I’m not sure the quiet audience really wanted.
There were also intriguing glimpses of two London museums from a folklore perspective – one, the Wellcome Collection, is already on my list of badass places, but the other – the Cuming Museum – was new to me. Everyone seemed good-natured and lightly eccentric and the whole event had a lovely atmosphere.
The Newham Bookshop were running a stall at the back where all the speaker’s books were available and I very nearly spent a fortune. I did get quite a few copies of 21st century ‘penny dreadful’ One Eye Grey, but haven’t read many of the stories yet.
SELFS hold monthly talks at the King’s Head pub on Borough High Street, which is very near my office, so I shall go along and see what they’re like. Encouraged by the quality of the conference, less so by the fact that the second message I received after joining their email list was a lame sexist joke. Sigh.
