6th September 2026
Anthony Powell Conference; 9 – 11 April 2027; Edinburgh
Anthony Powell, Author
The English author Anthony Dymoke Powell was born in London on 21 December 1905. He was educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford where he met several other young writers and artists including Evelyn Waugh, Henry Green, John Betjeman, Graham Greene and Osbert Lancaster. Prior to World War II he worked in publishing and as a film-script writer, before becoming a full-time novelist and literary critic.
The Society
The Anthony Powell Society is a charity made up of members across the world particularly in the UK and North America who wish to promote interest in Powell and his work. Powell had a wide range of friends from George Orwell and Evelyn Waugh to V.S. Naipaul, Harold Pinter and Philip Larkin. Fans of Powell have similarly always been found across the political and literary spectrum : Kingsley Amis, Clive James, Tariq Ali, A.N.Wilson and Lady Pinter to name just a few. Hilary Spurling’s official biography is an invaluable guide to his life including the background to his literary masterpiece : the 12 volume sequence of novels entitled ‘A Dance to the Music of Time’. A TV film of ‘Dance’ was made by Channel 4 in 1997 and starred Simon Russell Beale in a BAFTA winning performance.
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14:00Informal quarterly social call for members worldwide to provide the opportunity for discussion following publication of each Newsletter issue.
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19:30Online talk about the Dance character Ralph Barnby
Newsletter #103 (Summer 2026)
Contents
- Editor's Letter
- An Anatomy of Machenalia, Part 2; Daniel O’Sullivan
- Review: The Lost Heinemann Files ...; Ferdinand Mount
- Is the Likely Fate of Dance more akin to Trollope or CP Snow?; Ivan Hutnik
- The Prosopographic Novelist and the Political Historian: AP & Schlesinger Jr.; Jeff Manley
- 2025 Reading Group for Powell Lovers; Guy Robinson
- Powell Collection in Eton College Library; John Moisson
- Lifestyle, Stephen Eggins
- Uncle Giles’ Corner
- Reports of Society Events
- Letters to the Editor
- Society Announcements
Full copies of Newsletter are uploaded 6 months following publication
Quotable Powell
A friend bought me the first three of this sequence [Dance] for my birthday one year. I was sceptical at first, but was soon won over by some of the most magical prose in the English language. Powell made me care about these old Etonians and titled ladies, this crew of bohemians, charlatans, whingers, malcontents and survivors. He created some of the most complex villains in all literature, and transports the reader to a fully realized world - a world I revisit whenever I can.
[Ian Rankin in The Good Book Guide, March 2000]
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