About this talk

The Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lectures are given in memory of Dean Eric Symes Abbott (1906-1983), who was at various times Dean of King's College London, Warden of Lincoln Theological College, Warden of Keble College Oxford, and Dean of Westminster. The Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Fund was endowed after his death by his friends to provide for an annual lecture on spirituality and pastoral theology. The 40th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture will be given by Francis Spufford, novelist and non-fiction writer, on the theme of Why aren't there more beautiful places?: The built environment is, at least in theory, the result of human choices, and yet the cities and towns known for their beauty are celebrated precisely because they are few and far between. The world contains one Venice, one Florence, one Oxford, one Fatehpur Sikr, one Paris, one Krakow, one San Francisco. Why? What are the conditions of setting and of community and of agreement across time required to produce beauty in its wildly varied forms, and why, given all that variety, does it remain rare? Francis Spufford is a writer of nonfiction who has metamorphosed gradually into a novelist over the last decade. His books include Golden Hill, the recent Nonesuch, and his famously sweary work of Christian apologetics Unapologetic.

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