lectures for peace 2025
At Literature Cambridge we have a regular lecture to support refugee charities. Since 2024, we also want to do something to help the people of Gaza and to support those working for peace.
We are offering some extra lectures live online. All proceeds to be shared between three charities:
• Oxfam Gaza and Lebanon Campaign (food and medical relief to Gaza and Lebanon)
• Standing Together (Palestinian and Israeli joint peace campaign, currently taking aid into Gaza); updates on their Instagram page
• Gatwick Detainees Welfare Group (helping refugees in the UK)
Since 2024 we have raised £2,670, shared between the charities. Very many thanks for your support.
Why pay the charities directly? Because, if you donate directly to the charities, they get the full sum. Whereas if you book via our website, 20% VAT (Value Added Tax) is deducted from the payment.
Please email us with a copy of the donation receipt and we will add you to the attendance list. If you have any problems doing this, please let us know and we will help to sort it out, if we can.
Thank you.
‘Timing: please note that bookings close at 5.30 pm on the day of the lecture. We can’t monitor the mailbox once we are in the zoom call, so please book before 5.30 pm to be sure that we see your email. Thank you!
Theatre as Protest: Euripides’ Trojan Women with Jan Parker
Euripides' Trojan Women, exploring the devastation and dehumanising effect of war, is sadly timeless. But it was written while the wives and children for sale in the Athenian slave market were, for the first time, the victims of the total reduction of a free Greek state. This decision was taken by the Athenians after a debate arguing that for a strong state, compassion is weakness, that might is right.
We will explore the characters whose fate echoes down the ages: Hecuba, Andromache, baby Astyanax, Helen in the Trojan Women and in the Iliad and ask about the politics of compassion.
With Jan Parker, University of Cambridge.
Sunday 14 December 2025 live online
18.00-20.00 British Summer Time
19.00-21.00 Central European Summer Time
Morning or lunchtime in the Americas
Set Reading
Trojan Women text trans. Ian Johnston (2022).
OR Trojan Women text trans. George Theodoridis (2008)
Optional Further Reading
The Iliad text online.
Jan Parker, The Iliad and Odyssey: The Trojan War, Tragedy and Aftermath (London, 2021)
To book, please make a donation to one or more of the charities via the buttons below, to a total of:
£33.00 full price (£11.00 to each charity)
£30.00 students and unwaged (£10.00 to each charity)
£30.00 CAMcard holders (£10.00 to each charity)
We suggest that people support all 3 charities equally, but it is up to you to decide how to distribute your donation. Links to the charities’ websites for donations:
• Oxfam Gaza and Lebanon Campaign (food and medical relief to Gaza and Lebanon)
• Standing Together (Palestinian and Jewish joint peace campaign, protecting aid for Gaza and protesting within Israel to end the war and the Occupation); updates on their Instagram page.
• Gatwick Detainees Welfare Group (helping refugees in the UK)
Please email us with a copy of the donation receipt and we will add you to the attendance list. If you have any problems doing this, please let us know and we will help to sort it out.
Thank you so much for your support.
Coming up in 2026 Lectures for Peace: Alison Hennegan on Siegfried Sassoon. Details to follow soon.