Bloomsbury Festival

Free entry to the Museum

To celebrate the Bloomsbury Festival the Foundling Museum will be opening its doors for free and until 21:00 on Saturday evening!

Saturday

Jilted, 17:00 - 18:00

What if Miss Havisham could sing? How would one of the heroines of Dickens’ novel Great Expectations describe her fate? Singers Melanie Pappenheim and Rebecca Askew provide the answers in their exciting new show. Jilted imagines a modern day relationship between one of Dickens’s most striking characters, Miss Havisham, the aging, jilted bride in Great Expectations and his own wife, Catherine Hogarth, from whom he separated after 19 years of marriage and ten children. As Catherine attempts to organize Miss Havisham’s belongings in order to move house, the two women needle, irritate each other, and compete for attention. Their stories are revealed through newly commissioned vocal music as they re-enact the wedding that never happened (this event is now sold out, 50 free tickets will be available on the door on a first-come, first-served basis).

Dickens Performance Pieces, 18:15 - 19:15

Poetry performances and readings by Femi Martin, Deanna Rodger, Maresa Schick and Nina Hatchwell based on Dickens's novels, including adaptation of Bleak House, in hidden away spaces in the Museum.

Anthem for the Foundling Hospital, 19:30 - 20:30

A chance to hear George Frideric Handel's Anthem for the Foundling Hospital and Eternal Source of Light Divine, directed by Richard Hetherington in the perfect surroundings of the Museum's Picture Gallery.

Sunday

Afternoon Concert, 15:00-16:00

Piano recital by Sergi Podobedov.

Received, A Blank Child: Dickens, Brownlow & the Foundling Hospital is free for the duration of the weekend.