Think of the Bible and Homer, think of Shakespeare and think of me. - Gertrude Stein 

Join The London Library’s regular Art/Lit Salon for chat, discussion, drinks and provocation, exploring art, literature and where the two forms collide. This time we’ll be celebrating possibly the best-known art/lit salonnière of all time, the radical, iconic writer and art collector Gertrude Stein, whose salons brought together some of the most famous writers and artists of the twentieth century. 

Our very own salon host, Katie Popperwell, will be joined by Francesca Wade and Lauren Elkin, both the authors of recent Stein biographies, to delve into Stein’s extraordinary life and the mythology that has built up around her. From her place at the centre of Bohemian Parisian artistic life, hosting the likes of Hemingway and Matisse, posing for Picasso’s portrait, her storied relationship with the enigmatic Alice B Toklas and her sell-out US book tour, to her experimental writing and the ultimate shaping of her memory, we'll explore her complex, fascinating legacy and revel in the spirit of the salon... and by that token, the bar will be open for drinks and conversation before and after the talk.  

Lauren Elkin is the author of several books, including Flâneuse: Women Walk the City and Art Monsters: Unruly Bodies in Feminist Art. Her essays have appeared in the London Review of Books, the New York Times, Granta, Harper's, Le Monde and frieze, amongst others. She is an award-winning translator, most recently of Simone de Beauvoir's The Inseparables and The Image of Her. Her first novel, Scaffolding, was published in 2025 and her next book, Vocal Break: On Women, Music, and Power will be published in May 2026. She is currently writing a biography of Gertrude Stein for the Yale University Press/Leon D. Black Foundation Jewish Lives series.

Francesca Wade is the author of Square Haunting, which was longlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize and shortlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize. She has received fellowships from the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center at the New York Public Library, the Leon Levy Center for Biography and the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. Her work has appeared in the New York Review of Books, London Review of Books, Granta, Paris Review and other places. Her latest book is Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife, published by Faber in May 2025. 

Katie Popperwell is an arts consultant, broadcaster and Chair of Manchester UNESCO City of Literature, working at the intersection of literature, culture and public life. Her practice ranges from producing work with independent artists and grassroots organisations to devising multi-disciplinary international programmes for the British Council and the Royal Society of Arts. She regularly hosts conversations with leading writers and is a former presenter of BBC Radio 4’s flagship arts programme Front Row. 

Books by the speakers will be available to buy at the event and online from our partner bookshop Hatchards. 

NB This event will take place in person at The London Library. Doors (and the bar and chat) open at 6.30pm, the talk will run from 7-8pm and the bar will close at 8.30pm. Please see our Event Access Guidelines before you arrive. 

London Library events are subject to Terms & Conditions

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