Since first finding and falling in love with Liza Lehmann's musical settings of some of the Behind the Nightlight stories in June this year, it's been an adventure bringing them to the stage! 

So some thanks are in order:

• to Edward Picton-Turbervill for meeting with me after the Radio 3 recording and going through the pieces, and Tom Carradine for recording some backing tracks to experiment with
• ​to the Alternative Comedy Memorial Society and Lose Your Marbles Comedy for allowing me to experiment with The Blue Gueeze at their new material nights
• to Sarah Rose and Dusty Limits for saying yes to the idea of the Being Human Festival event
• to the Being Human Festival, and the CAA, RCSSD, Muriel Matters Society, and Francis Routh Trust for making the BH event possible
• to Janie Dee for her creative directing
• to Melinda Hughes for inviting us to Chelsea Arts Club
• to Brydges Place and David at the Museum of Comedy 
• to my agent Georgi at Gag Reflex Management 
• to the many friends who have been supportive and enthusiastic! Thank you all.

The whole show continues to evolve and I'm thrilled to have been able to include research as well as other music by Liza Lehmann in the show, including a piece from her score for the 1904 West End hit "Sergeant Brue" and one of the songs from her "Nonsense Songs from Alice in Wonderland" series from 1911. 

The next performance is on the 29th January at Crazy Coqs in Piccadilly Circus - here's the link: www.brasseriezedel.com/events/ada-campe-behind-the-nightlight-quaint-beasts-in-an-edwardian-nursery/?instance_id=1855088

I was thrilled to be asked to present a BBC Radio 3 Sunday Feature about Actresses' Franchise League member and composer Liza Lehmann in June 2025. Here's a link to the programme, and some of my research that didn't make it into the edit.

​Liza Lehmann frequently appears on lists of “forgotten” female composers of the 19th and 20th centuries, a dubious endorsement of a woman who wrote classical music, musical comedy, had over 300 songs published, and toured and performed internationally.

I first encountered her whilst looking through the names of members of the Actresses’ Franchise League. Liza was an active member alongside many other women musicians and composers, performing at events and fairs, and maintaining connections with the suffrage movement up until her death in 1918. Networking with and advocating for women in music and the arts was an important part of her professional and personal life. She became the first president of the Society of Women Musicians on its foundation in 1911, an organisation that would go on to support and champion women in music for 60 years.
 
In her inaugural address to the Society of Women Musicians she quoted a line from author Robert Hichens “Art is a door through which we pass to our dreams” adding her own sentiment “I think that is beautifully expressed but in my own case I have unfortunately the habit of dreaming on both sides of the door.”[1]
​
Liza spoke about the scarcity of professional female musical role models in this area when interviewed in April 1910: “The idea of my becoming a composer was never even considered. Why? Simply because during my childhood the thought of a woman becoming a composer was not a popular one in England. It never seemed to occur to those who had the guidance of my early education that a woman could ever be taken seriously as a composer.”  [‘Liza Lehmann – To The Young Musician Who Would Compose’, The Etude, April 1910]

She was fortunate in coming from an artistic family, having a mother who was already a composer, and finding mentors and supportive networks for both her performance and composition work. Like her mother, she also taught singing and published a book in 1913 called Practical Hints for Students of Singing which has vocal exercises and advice.

She pops up frequently in my research into suffrage entertainments, especially for militant societies - for example, she was a pianist and had songs performed at the WSPU Christmas Fair and Fete in 1911, and was on the entertainment committee of the Endell Street Military Hospital during WW1.

As well as being networked with political creatives it seems that she was very aware of the importance of the business side of music too – she published her work, collaborated with established and emerging writers, and wrote her own autobiography in her 50s. She’s quite humble in her book, and seems to wear her celebrity lightly – but although it's a slim volume it packs a punch, with extensive press reports of her work and accounts of her touring in America.  

The variety of her output is impressive, and shows a keen eye for the popular and quirky. Lehmann set two stories by Oscar Wilde to incidental music – The Happy Prince and the Selfish Giant – wrote four beautiful Nonsense Songs from Alice in Wonderland and set the Cautionary Tales of Hillaire Belloc to music too. She set poems and writing by a wide range of creatives including Robert Browning, and Radclyffe Hall.  She also wrote the score for the hugely successful musical comedy Sergeant Brue which opened in London in 1904 and then on Broadway a year later, and wrote a comic light opera The Vicar of Wakefield with fellow suffragist Laurence Housman in 1906.

Her autobiography and much of her vocal music can be found online in the public domain, although as you'll hear if you listen to the BBC programme, her orchestral music is more elusive. Recordings of her music are relatively few, considering how prolific and popular she was, but if you are wanting to get a sense of the beauty and breadth of her vocal music I would recommend the CD put together by her grandson Steuart Bedford who was a conductor and pianist. It was published in 2004 by Naxos - info here.

[1] Lehmann, Liza. The Life of Liza Lehmann, p. 173-4

Liza Lehmann at the Proms

When I researched the programme about fellow Edwardian suffragist composer Teresa del Riego I made an extensive list of her works performed at the Proms.
You can find that blog post here.

Liza and her mother 'A.L' had songs performed at the Proms in the same year - in 1898, 1900, 1901, 1912 - and in the same Prom in 1928.

Liza Lehmann and Amelia Lehmann* at the BBC Proms 1895-2007

Liza - 41 songs performed
Amelia – 4 songs performed -
​her songs indicated with a *

1895
Prom 11 – Irish Love-Song (Proms premiere)
Prom 14 – Come, dance the Romaika (Proms premiere)
Prom 24 - The Castilian Maid (Proms premiere)

1897
Prom 23 – When love is kind (Proms premiere)*

1898
Prom 29 – The Castilian Maid
Prom 33 - When love is kind*
Prom 40 – You and I (Proms premiere)

1899
Prom 41 – To my beloved (Proms premiere)

1900
Prom 22 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 57 – Ellen Bawn (Proms premiere)*

1901
Prom 41 - In September*
Prom 51 - In a Persian garden No 17
Prom 54 - I have a garden of my own (Proms premiere)

1902 
Prom 10 – I have a garden of my own
Prom 12 – Titania’s Cradle
Prom 26 – There’s no spring but you (Proms premiere)*
Prom 29 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 33 – Cupid and the Rose

1903 
Prom 10 – The Daisy Chain No. 8 (Proms premiere)

1904
Prom 03 – Molly’s Spinning Song
Prom 58 – The Daisy Chain No. 5

1905
Prom 11 – More Daisies No. 7
Prom 41 – More Daisies No. 7

1906
Prom 38 - The life of a rose No. 4 Lovers in the lane (Proms premiere), If I built a world for you

1907 
Prom 02 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 24 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 25 – The Vicar of Wakefield Prince Charming
Prom 60 - In a Persian garden No 10

1908
Prom 04 – The Vicar of Wakefield ‘Good people all… in Islington there was a man’
Prom 05 - The Golden Threshold (arr. composer for voice and piano) Recitative & aria 'Come to me...You flaunt your beauty' (Proms premiere)
Prom 10 – The life of a rose No. 7
Prom 25 – Love in a mist (Proms premiere)
Prom 48 - In a Persian garden No 20 and No 5

1909 
Prom 07 – Thoughts have wings
Prom 18 – The Vicar of Wakefield Prince Charming
Prom 34 - In a Persian garden No 10
Prom 47 – Bird Songs No 1 and No 3

1910
Prom 30 – The Vicar of Wakefield Recitative and aria ‘Good people all… In Islington there was a man’

1911
Prom 03 – Everybody’s secret
Prom 14 – Bird Songs No 1 and No 3
Prom 48 – 5 Little love songs No 4 and No 1

1912
Prom 11 - When love is kind*
Prom 13 – 5 Little love songs No 4 and No 1
Prom 17 – 3 Cowboy ballads (Proms premiere)
Prom 51 – 3 Cowboy ballads

1913 
Prom 17 – Prince Charming
Prom 34 – Bird Songs No 1 and No 3
Prom 46 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine

1914
Prom 05 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine

1915 
Prom 35 – ‘Tis the hour of farewell
Prom 43 - ‘Tis the hour of farewell
Prom 62 - ‘Tis the hour of farewell

1917 
Prom 05 – Fly away, pretty moth
Prom 24 – Evensong (Proms premiere), There are fairies at the bottom of our garden (Proms premiere)

1918 
Prom 01 First Night of the Proms – Evensong, Little brown brother (World premiere)
Prom 41 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine (Proms premiere)

1919 
Prom 4 – Evensong
Prom 7 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 21 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden
Prom 41 – Didn’t you know?
Prom 44 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine

1920
Prom 10 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden 
Prom 15 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine
Prom 35 – Daddy’s sweetheart

1921
Prom 11 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden
Prom 22 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine
Prom 40 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 53 – In the watches of the night (World premiere)
Prom 60 – Were I a butterfly (World premiere)

1922 
Prom 13 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 21 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden

1923
Prom 30 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden
Prom 35 – Evensong
Prom 43 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden

1924
Prom 01 - First Night of the Proms – Evensong 
Prom 18 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine
Prom 27 - There are fairies at the bottom of our garden

1925
Prom 21 - Good morning, Brother Sunshine

1926
Prom 05 – There are fairies at the bottom of our garden
Prom 13 – Evensong
Prom 17 – Good morning, Brother Sunshine

1927
Prom 23 - In a Persian garden No 20

1928
Prom 17 - In a Persian garden No 20
Prom 17 - When love is kind*

1930
Northern Proms 02 – In a Persian garden No 10

2007
Proms Chamber Music 01 – Love, if you knew the light (Proms premiere)

During the research process for the programme I found Lehmann's setting of Behind the Nightlight - and am now reviving it. For more information see this page

Recently had some sad news that playwright Kate Kerrow has died after a long illness. We were friends and colleagues for over a decade and met through the feminist production hub Scary Little Girls. As a feminist writer Kate was interested in my research into suffrage theatre, and when I created the Stage Rights! living literature walk with Scary Little Girls to promote my first edited collection of suffrage plays in 2013, it was wonderful to commission a monologue from her about the 1911 Census boycott. 

Stage Rights! A Living Literature Walk was performed across two  weekends in April 2013 and featured five extracts from plays in the edited collection, and two new monologues. The walk began in the foyer of the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, led the audience through and around Covent Garden and ended in the upper room of the Nell of Old Drury pub.  Each location and performance was carefully chosen and the route guide included points of interest related to suffrage history and theatre history. In all there were twelve performers in nine locations. 

Immersed as I then was in my second year of doctoral research, the creation of this walk was an exciting public engagement opportunity and one that connected with the ideas of collaboration, creativity and education that were the tenets of the AFL. The devising process was one that that Scary Little Girls had been refining for many years across a number of literary topics and locations. For me it involved thinking carefully about how to represent the research through interactive means, bring suffrage stories and plays to life outside of a traditional theatre setting, and not assume audiences would have any prior knowledge about the suffrage movement, theatre history or Edwardian London.

The Sleepless Woman monologue is set in the morning after the 1911 Census boycott event at the Aldwych Rinkeries, a large and very popular roller skating rink nearby. I sent Kate a mixture of original sources - contemporary press reports, performance texts and some visual material from the event -  as inspiration to work with alongside her own research.

The Sleepless Women greets the audience and tells them about her experiences:

​"(She stands up tall and bellows courageously)
'This is an organized movement throughout the country by women who refuse to be numbered among the people,' Emmeline Pankhurst said, all high up on her platform.
(Sudden self pride)
Actually, I was quite like her then. Gosh, I’m rather good at it.

(She holds her flask high)
“Women are people for the purpose of being numbered, taxed and punished, but not when it comes to the rights of citizenship!”
(Sighs) Oh, she was fine. (To a woman in audience) Did your stomach feel all warm when I said that? It feels lovely, doesn’t it? Like a fire growing.

(Back to the speech) 'Until women are recognized as people in the full sense of the word, we refuse to be numbered as people!'

(With real empathy) Sometimes I look at the Anti-suffragists and I feel so sorry for them, fighting to keep themselves in obscurity. Fighting because it feels real when a person fights,
but forgetting they’re fighting to keep their cages forever locked, their voices forever silenced. Fighting for their own extinction.
Not me. Emmeline’s words crept right into my soul last night, they did. They sit there for always, that warm fire inside me.

The monologue ends with her skating away, encouraging the audience to join the suffrage movement.

The Sleepless Woman was played by me in 2013 and Sarah Annakin when we revived the walk in in 2016. I was incredibly moved when Kate sent me the first draft of the monologue - the energy and positivity and freedom of the character was immediately engaging, and performing it was exhilarating. To make such an immediate, playful, and personal connection with the audience brought the words and the story to life.

Research-wise it was also an opportunity to introduce the audience to the importance of shared experiences, camaraderie and sisterhood within the movement, the role of non-violent direct action in resistance, the popularity of vegetarianism and vegetarian restaurants among suffrage campaigners, and the Edwardian craze for roller skating.

But most of all it was fun to perform and helped challenge stereotypes of suffragettes as buttoned up, serious and formal!

The second commission was for the living literature walk A particular theatre: Shakespeare, suffragists and soldiers which was created for the 2016 Being Human Festival and performed on the 19th November 2016. 

 ​The theme of the walk was the Shakespeare Hut, which was built by the YMCA in Bloomsbury in 1916 on land owned by the Shakespeare Memorial National Theatre Committee. Intended to be the site of a monument to celebrate Shakespeare’s tercentenary and eventually to be the location of a new National Theatre, the land was offered to the YMCA as a contribution to the war effort and the Hut, which was unique in having a dedicated theatre space, was built for the use of ANZAC soldiers on leave in London. Working in collaboration with Dr Ailsa Grant Ferguson from the University of Brighton, an expert on the Hut, and Scary Little Girls we created an interactive performance walk around the site and broader area. 

"You from here? I’m looking for the Shakespeare Hut – don’t have a map but I know it’s on the corner of Gower Street and Keppel Street… Do you know the one? Where they do all the shows? I went last night, but today I had to come a different route –"

The soldier describes his experience of seeing entertainments at the Hut - from Shakespeare recitals to singalongs. At the end of the monologue he leaves the audience, wishing them well. As with The Sleepless Woman, this encounter brought one individual to life in a vivid and personal way for the audience in a piece that was embedded in research but written with a light touch.

Working with Kate on both these walks inspired me as a writer and as a performer, something that came to fruition in a subsequent living literature walk in 2017 called Women and War as part of the Vote 100 project and the Being Human Festival. She was a tireless campaigner and advocate for feminist causes, and celebrated historical women through her organisation The Heroine Collective. 

Kate's most recent book was Out of the Darkness: Greenham Voices 1981-2000, co-written with Rebecca Mordan and published by The History Press in 2021. 

I'm very fortunate and grateful to have known and worked with Kate, and am sending all love to her family, who have set up a JustGiving page to raise funds for Against Breast Cancer here: www.justgiving.com/page/katehughes?

There's more blog posts about my work with Scary Little Girls - including the online salons - in the blog topic tabs here.

​If you're interested in finding out more about the living literature walks I've done with Scary Little Girls can be found in my chapter: 'Reaching Out in Both Directions: Suffrage Theatre in the Twenty-First Century' in The Edinburgh Companion to Modernism in Contemporary Theatre, co-edited with Adrian Curtin, Nicholas Johnson and Claire Warden (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press), 2023

I'm thrilled to report that sightings of the excellent card game Suffra-Greats! have been reported most recently in the retail outlets of the Houses of Parliament, the Museum of London Docklands, and also Beamish the Living History Museum! While  the majority of Votes for Women themed merchandise is only available in the WSPU colours of purple, white, and green, Suffra-Greats! represents 18 different suffrage societies and 30 campaigners including suffragists, suffragettes, women and men.

I'm so glad that this game, created in collaboration with Clavis and Claustra and launched at the National Theatre, is still reaching new audiences.

If you see it in the wild please do let me know - you can tag me on Instagram @naomi.paxton or on BlueSky @naomipaxton

For the full story of Suffra-Greats! see my blog post here

I was delighted to be invited by the National Army Museum to speak about the First World War and Votes for Women - a stimulating start to the year made even more enjoyable by the fact that all the tickets to attend in person sold out!

It was great to revisit the research from the What Difference Did The War Make? project I was part of in UK Parliament in 2017-2018 and to add some content from subsequent and ongoing archival explorations. I knew that the NAM had hosted a talk by Wendy Moore in 2020 about the Endell Street Military Hospital, and that she had also published recently about the life of Actresses' Franchise League and WSPU member Vera 'Jack' Holme, so I included mentions of both.

I also introduced key wartime projects by the AFL that are lesser known, such as the Women's Emergency Corps, the British Women's Hospital Fund, and the Woman's Theatre Camps Entertainments, and spoke about the presence and influence of theatrical suffragists in wartime initiatives organised by activist women including the Shakespeare Hut, and the Scottish Women's Hospital. It was great to share my research in this way, and to bust a few pervasive myths about the suffrage campaign in WW1!

On the 27th October 1915 the NY Tribune reported that suffrage workers had arranged to be present and visible in every theatre in Manhattan - and had permission to make suffrage speeches between the acts in all but three theatres. I was intrigued! 

Here's what I've found from newspaper listings so far about what was playing on Broadway that night:

The NY Tribune reported on the 28th October that:

• At the Manhattan Opera House Miss Lilian Russell sat in a box with suffrage drapings, and Dudley Field Malone spoke after the curtain went down on the last act.
• At the Playhouse there were four boxes with suffragists Mrs D Clark Balch, Miss Ann Rhodes, Mrs Belle de Rivers, and Mrs Raymond Brown of the State Suffrage Association
• At the Globe Theatre Mrs Carrie Chapman Catt was in a box with Miss Mary Garrett Hay, chairman of the Woman Suffrage party, and Miss Mary Johnston and her sister
• At the Knickerbocker Theatre Miss Alice Carpenter and Miss Sylvia Pankhurst spoke. Mrs A.J.G. Perkins, Miss Friedman, and Mrs F.H. Cabot were there, and speeches were made between the first and second acts.
• At Maxine Elliott’s Theatre there were suffrage colours in a box for Mrs Villiard with guests Mr and Mrs Harold Villiard, Miss Janet Lyle, Henry St Claire Putnam and Miss Elizabeth Putnam.
• At the Lyric Theatre Mrs William Grant Brown represented the suffragists with Mrs Albert C Bage, Mrs William Einstein, Mrs Harry Rockwell and Mrs John Ford.
• At the Candler Mrs Richard Aldrich entertained Mrs John Grainger of Australia, Percy Grainger, J.Wylee and Miss Ruth Morgan.

There was also a visible suffragist presence reported at public film screenings that night: 

• “The Birth of the Nation” – Dr Ann Moore entertained six policemen
• Vitagraph Theatre – Mrs Frank Gillette with party inc Mr and Mrs Van Vile, Mr and Mrs Fred Hilliard, Mrs E.C. Norton and Mr and Mrs R.H. Reed.
• Casino – Mrs Henry Moskowitz entertained a party of administration bachelors.

Overall, the Tribune reported that “The regular stars expressed themselves as delighted with the between-act speeches and did not begrudge one twinkle of the suffragist galaxy”

How generous! It was certainly a good show of support from the well-to-do of society, and the theatre managers, producers, and owners.

Suffs the show, written by and starring Shaina Taub, portrays events and people involved the women's suffrage movement in the USA from 1913 to 1920, and features many key campaigners including Alice Paul, Inez Milholland, and Ida B. Wells, as well as those who took part in the 27th October theatre events such as Carrie Chapman Catt and Dudley Field Malone. 
I recommend it - it's an invigorating, moving, inspiring, entertaining and educational experience that is deeply researched, beautifully designed, and performed by an incredible cast.

I was particularly struck by the final song Keep Marching which acknowledges that the story of the long fight for women's voting rights shows that "progress is possible, not guaranteed" - something that the NY suffragists in 1915 also encountered in their state-wide campaign... but more of that in another blog post.

Suffs closes on Broadway on the 5th January 2025, but it has been announced that it will be filmed for posterity - if you can see it, do! ​

 That's the first verse of The Awakening by American poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox, set to music in January 1911 by composer Teresa del Riego.
​​
​I discovered del Riego’s name when looking for histories of women composers at the Proms and cross-referencing the names with my research into the work of Edwardian theatre and entertainment professionals who supported the Votes for Women campaign. 

​

“There are probably few songs of modern times that have won a more instantaneous success than Teresa del Riego’s “O, dry those tears”; in fact it may be said to have created a record in the song-publishing world by selling to the tune of sixty thousand copies in the first six weeks after publication. It has been translated into three different languages – Italian, German, and Russian – and has been more parodied, perhaps, than any song of recent years, appearing on picture post cards, and even being reproduced in art pottery forms."

A Century of Ballads 1810-1910 by Harold Simpson
Published in 1910

"She has the gift of melody and her songs are full of harmonic colouring.
​She has also had the inestimable benefit of presenting them to the public through the medium of some of our very best singers."

"Women Song-Writers" in The Tatler, 1st January 1902

But what of The Awakening?
​The song was officially launched at an Actresses’ Franchise League meeting on the 6th January 1911 in the grand setting of the Criterion Restaurant in Piccadilly Circus. At the first performance it was sung by contralto Edith Clegg, supported by a full chorus, and accompanied by del Riego herself. This must have been a coup for the suffrage societies - a week later, the newspaper of the Women’s Freedom League announced that the song was “our new Suffrage National Anthem” and that del Riego had given it to the League (The Vote, 14 January 1911). A thousand copies of the song were immediately printed to be sold in suffrage shops.

The song was championed by the Actresses' Franchise League at a variety of events during 1911. In May 1911 Ella Wheeler Wilcox was the Guest of Honour at an AFL meeting where The Awakening was sung by Muriel Terry and accompanied by del Riego. In June it was performed in London’s East End after  a speech by George Lansbury MP, in October Lily Clare sang it at the Lyceum Theatre, and in December of that year Rosa Leo sang it at an event at which Christabel Pankhurst spoke. The song received praise from across the suffrage press, and Royal Academy sculptor Sir George Frampton, famous for his statue of Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, created a tableau inspired by the piece.

The published copy I found was in the collections of The Women’s Library, and belonged to the National Union of Women Teachers. I came across it whilst researching the entertainments that were put on by the Actresses’ Franchise League for the Women’s Social and Political Union’s Christmas Fair and Festival, held in 1911 in London. This fair ran for six days, and every day featured different entertainments. The performance spaces were full of sound - in the pop up theatre, there were suffrage plays, songs, and musical recitals, whilst all female orchestras played from the bandstand in the main space, interspersed with conjurors and suffrage Punch and Judy shows.

Most of my research into suffrage theatre has focused on plays and theatrical entertainments, but there was a lot of music composed to support the suffrage cause, and even more associated with it. Books of suffrage songs were published, alternative lyrics to existing songs were printed in suffrage newspapers and pamphlets, and the popular stage saw music hall songs, comic operettas, and patter songs both for and against votes for women.
 
Curiously, perhaps the best remembered suffrage song was also first performed in January 1911 - Ethel Smyth’s March of the Women, with lyrics written by suffragist playwright and actress Cicely Hamilton. This song was also directly associated with a suffrage society - Smyth dedicated the published score to the WSPU, the group most commonly associated with the term “suffragettes”, led by Emmeline Pankhurst.
 
Both The Awakening and March of the Women encourage a spirit of optimism and the power of positive collective action.  By 1911 the campaign for Votes for Women in the UK had already been active for forty-five years, and campaigners were constantly looking for new ways to boost morale and share knowledge.
 
It's interesting that the most popular suffrage songs of the early 1900s are about sisterhood, hope and new beginnings. “Hope is waking” in Cicely Hamilton’s lyrics for March of the Women. She tells us to open our eyes “to the blaze of day”. Florence MacAuley’s lyrics to the Women’s Marseillaise, the official anthem of the WSPU, exhort the daughters of the land to turn their faces “to the dawn”, and Wilcox and del Riego in The Awakening also rouse us out of sleep alongside women around the world “throwing wide their windows to the sun” eager to get on with the work of changing the world for the better. All three of these songs were initially performed with a large chorus – a visible and powerful symbol of the suffragist sisterhood taking up space and making themselves heard.

1911 was also the founding year of the Society of Women Musicians, which although it included many musicians, performers, and composers who were in support of the suffrage movement was not a suffrage organisation. The first President was composer Liza Lehmann, and the list of names associated with the organisation across its 60 year history include Ethel Smyth, Imogen Holst, and Elizabeth Maconchy. 
​
In 1914 del Riego write some advice on The Interpretation of Songs:

To me, no voice, however brilliant, large, or well-produced, is ever beautiful unless the singer interprets well and intelligently, and also has charm and individuality!

​Lose yourself in your song as much as possible, and you will find the vocalisation easier, and the spirit more distinguishable to the audience. Does one not know the delightful and exhilarating feeling of listening to an artist who takes one into another sphere for the moment by his or her singing? It is the interpretation, the colouring of the picture, the entering into the spirit of the music that carries one away. It is not only the composition, or only the voice, or only the bald combination of the two, it is in face the music perfectly rendered that makes the perfect whole.

The Musical Herald, ​1914

​During the First World War, in which her husband was killed in action, Teresa del Riego devoted herself to charity concerts and fundraising, and wrote patriotic music for Armistice commemorations. Her songs remained popular in both print and recordings throughout the 1920s and 30s, and she became an Honorary Vice President of the Society of Women Musicians in the 1940s. In April 1954, the day after her 78th birthday, the BBC Home Service celebrated her legacy in a programme called Sixty Years of Song, with contralto Janet Howe, tenor John Hanson, and the BBC Chorus and BBC Concert Orchestra conducted by Michael Collins.

Teresa del Riego died in 1968 at the age of 91. Her work may not have appeared at the Proms for nearly a century, but a suffrage song still features prominently there every year. Hubert Parry’s setting of Jerusalem was known as the Women Voter’s Hymn after it was sung at a Suffrage Demonstration concert in 1918. Parry was openly supportive of Votes for Women and friends with Millicent Garret Fawcett, the leader of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, the oldest and largest campaigning organisation for women’s suffrage in the UK. Parry gave copyright of the song to Fawcett’s society, and it was subsequently passed to the Women’s Institute. It has been played at every Last Night of the Proms since 1953.

Recordings of del Riego’s songs – on shellac, vinyl, and cd – have been made and sold since 1908, so I assumed that The Awakening was amongst them, but was totally wrong. I couldn't find any recordings of the song, or much mention of it outside of suffrage newspapers.
I'm delighted to have written an episode of BBC Radio 3's The Essay about it, and to have it recorded for what seems to be the first time.

You can hear the Suffrage National Anthem on BBC Radio 3's The Essay on the 23rd September 2024 at 9.45pm - sung by Lucy Stevens with accompaniment by Elizabeth Marcus. 

Lucy Stevens is an actor, singer and theatre maker who has created shows about the lives of Ethel Smyth, Virginia Woolf, Gertrude Lawrence and Kathleen Ferrier. Elizabeth Marcus studied at the Guildhall School where she now works as a vocal coach, accompanist, and professor of harpsichord.

For more info and to listen live or again on BBC Sounds click here:
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00230gr

Here are the pieces by Teresa del Riego programmed at the BBC Proms from 1899-1926 collated from the data at www.bbc.co.uk/proms/events/composers/9b182cb6-76ab-41b8-9f5c-daeb0f7929b4/works
 
1899
Prom 45 – Love is a bird (proms premiere)
 
1901
Prom 19 - Slave song
 
1902
Prom 19 – A song of life
Prom 61 - Slave song
 
1903
Prom 25 – A Land of Roses (proms premiere)
Prom 41 - Slave song
Prom 42 – The waking of spring (proms premiere)
 
1904
Prom 16 - Slave song
Prom 33 – Life’s recompense
 
1905
Prom 12 – Look up, O heart (proms premiere)
Prom 39 – My gentle child (proms premiere)
Prom 43 – L’amour (proms premiere)
Prom 48 – A song of gladness (proms premiere)
 
1906
Prom 13 – Thou little tender flower; Look up, O heart
Prom 45 – Les larmes
Prom 48 - Slave song
Prom 49 – The bell
Prom 51 – Happy song (proms premiere)
Prom 53 – Brown eyes (proms premiere)
 
1907
Prom 38 – Brown eyes
Prom 52 - Happy song
 
1909
Prom 06 – Outward bound (proms premiere)
Prom 27 - Happy song
Prom 41 – Outward bound
Prom 43 – A song of life
 
1910
Prom 18 – I lay my laurels at your feet (proms premiere)
Prom 36 – Slave song
 
1911
Prom 03 – Hayfields and butterflies
Prom 34 – Children’s pictures (Shadow march; Where go the boats?)
 
1912
Prom 54 – Sink, red sun
 
1913
Prom 07 – The reason
Prom 41 - Happy song
Prom 43 - The reason
Prom 53 - Children’s pictures (Shadow march)
 
1914
Prom 34 - Sink, red sun
Prom 55 - Sink, red sun
 
1915
Prom 02 - Sink, red sun
Prom 04 – Rest thee, sad heart; Happy song
Prom 12 – Harvest
Prom 16 - The reason
Prom 21 - Sink, red sun
Prom 29 - Harvest
Prom 37 – England mine
Prom 40 – Thank God for a garden
Prom 43 - Happy song
Prom 48 – The book
Prom 52 - The reason
Prom 54 - Thank God for a garden
 
1916
Prom 4 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 23 - The reason
Prom 28 - Sink, red sun
Prom 29 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 47 – In exile (proms premiere)
 
1917
Prom 15 - Sink, red sun
Prom 28 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 42 – Some other day
 
1918
Prom 09 – Homing (proms premiere)
Prom 14 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 18 – Homing
Prom 40 - Sink, red sun
Prom 58 - Homing
 
1919
Prom 01 – First night of the Proms 1919 – Homing
Prom 23 – Homing
Prom 28 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 30 - Homing
Prom 32 - Happy song
 
1920
Prom 14 – The merry heart (world premiere)
Prom 22 – Reconciliation (world premiere)
Prom 37 - Reconciliation
Prom 47 – The merry heart
 
1921
Prom 10 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 23 – Homing
Prom 51 - Sink, red sun
Prom 56 – Homing
 
1922
Prom 04 – Homing
Prom 25 - Sink, red sun
Prom 56 – Homing
 
1923
Prom 13 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 26 – Homing
Prom 34 - Sink, red sun
Prom 40 - Dolores (world premiere)
 
1924
Prom 04 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 20 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 58 – In the presence of Their Majesties King George V and Queen Mary – Homing
 
1925
Prom 10 – Brown eyes
Prom 16 – Homing
Prom 31 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 48 – Some day when the song-bird seeks its nest
Prom 54 – If any little song of mine ;The little blue bay
 
1926
Prom 14 – My ship (world premiere)
Prom 19 – Homing
Prom 20 - Thank God for a garden
Prom 23 – If any little song of mine; Happy song
Prom 26 – Life is a caravan (world premiere)
Prom 41 – My ship
Prom 45 – Homing
Prom 46 - Sink, red sun
Prom 53 – Life is a caravan
Prom 55 – Last night of the Proms 1926 – The night has a thousand eyes

Ernest Hutchinson's 1913 short play Votes for Children has intrigued me since I first read the manuscript in the LCP Collection at the British Library.  Described with some glee in the LCO Readers Report as "a lively skit upon the agitation of female militants for votes", the piece is set in the offices of the fictional CSPU - the Children's Social and Political Union - and requires a mixed cast of children and adults. Hutchinson subtitles the play "A Comedy of the Future", and in this futuristic world children are campaigning for the right to vote at age six, the Prime Minister is a woman, and her husband who is the Home Secretary has been kidnapped by the leader of the CSPU, their daughter Rosabel. ​

Hutchinson's next play was Votes for Children, produced by Conti at the Little Theatre on the 18th November 1913, reviewed in The Queen, The Lady's Newspaper as "very amusing, and smartly written and acted." (The Queen, 6 December 1913). The play was given as one of three afternoon charity matinees produced by Conti to showcase her pupils, and under the patronage of Princess Louise with proceeds given to the Victoria Hospital for Children (Globe, 24 November 1913, London Evening Standard, 25 November 1913). By taking a playful approach to political issues and activism for an audience that not only included the young performers but also their friends and families supporting in the audience, Conti’s decision to stage Votes for Children shows that she was unafraid bring her suffragist sympathies into her professional work as an educator. She was also introducing her students to the stage as a place to engage directly and confidently with political ideas. 

​Children were regular participants in suffrage entertainments, and suffrage societies specifically for children and young people included the Drummers Union, founded in 1909 by four members of the WSPU Drum and Fife Band, which welcomed girls and boys from ages 6 to 21 "to join with others in doing something, however small, towards breaking down sex and class prejudice" (Drummers Union pamphlet, 1909). Children performed as dancers, as musicians, as newspaper sellers, and performances of new suffrage plays were written and staged for and by the members of the Drummers Union and the Young Purple, White and Green Club, which were both affiliated with the WSPU. ​

We recorded an extract from his 1913 play as part of my collaboration with feminist production hub Scary Little Girls for the fourth season of their Salon de la Vie project in June and July 2021.
The first Salon was entitled Votes for Children and explored the young people who supported the suffrage movement and found their own voice in the process.

The full episode is below - with performances by Gemma Bond, Maroussia Frank, Sajeela Kershi, and Jamie Newall.

Hutchinson's next play was produced at by Annie Horniman at the Gaiety in Manchester in October 1914, another short piece called Complaints described as " a one-act Lancashire comedy" (Manchester Courier, 24 October 1914) about the cotton trade. It was written in Lancashire dialect. War service followed in France and Belguim with the Royal Field Artillery and the Royal Horse Artillery until he was invalided home from the front in 1916. He then worked in the War Office contract department where his expertise in the cotton industry was useful. (https://www.apigintime.net/post/put-your-pig-in-his-place)

After the war Hutchinson moved to live near the Little Theatre on Adam Street. He had two more plays produced - The Home Wind (1917) in Bolton and The Right to Strike (1920) at the Garrick Theatre in the West End. The play was a success, and working with writer and adaptor George Goodchild, Hutchinson turned it into a novel of the same name, published in 1921.

Hutchinson died in November 1921 at the age of 36 from heart failure after an operation. His obituaries stated that The Right to Strike had had a successful production in New York in October 1921, and that when he died he had a full length play in pre-production with a London management (The Stage, 10 November 1921; Nottingham Journal, 8 November 1921). The Right to Strike was produced as a silent film in 1923.

It's clear that Hutchinson had a passion for playwriting, the financial means to support himself, and an interest and close connection with politics and industry. Italia Conti gave him his first break into the theatre industry and nurtured his talent - enabling his work to go from a staircase in London to professional stages in London, Manchester, and on Broadway. Curiously enough and in a neat coincidence with the Little Theatre in London, the Comedy Theatre in New York where his play was produced in 1921 had been the venue for a run of Shaw's Fanny's First Play from 1912-1913, as well as Scottish suffragist playwright Graham Moffat's Bunty Pulls The Strings in 1911. I do hope he was a supporter of Votes for Women, given his connections!

​ 

• On the main explore.bl.uk page click the Request Other Items tab, then log in
• Scroll down and select ‘Western Manuscripts Collection’
• You'll need to use the right reference for what you want - here are the categories from the BL website​
• Put the correct ref in the ref box - for example 'LCP 1913/40 Votes for Children’ and then click either request for today or add to basket.
• Items requested and brought to the reading room will be held there for 3 days, so you can order in advance. If you’re ordering on the day, or while you are in the BL then the request time is normally 70 minutes. It can be much faster, depending on the time of day, so it's always worth checking back in online to 'My Reading Room Requests' to see the status of your request. It may arrive and be ready for collection much sooner than 70 minutes if you are lucky.

I hope this is useful! If I've missed anything - or if you have any additional questions then do comment below. Happy researching!

In April 2022 I was in the University of Bristol Theatre Collection researching the London cabaret scene of the early to mid twentieth century when I saw this face peeking out at me from an open folder of programmes and cuttings. I was immediately intrigued! The full picture was, I assumed, a publicity shot for a cabaret act, a play, or perhaps even a film.

Cut to nearly a year later and I'm in the Manuscripts Reading Room of the British Library in London looking for a play from April 1913 in the Lord Chamberlain's Plays Collection, when I come across the script for The Tik-Tok Man of Oz, described as  "A Musical Comedy in a Prelude and Six".  The Reader's Report is from the 12th March 1913, and by by the Examiner of Plays Charles Brookfield, who had been a successful actor and was a writer himself of plays and musical comedy. In his Report he tries to describe the  "vague and meandering" story of The Tik-Tok Man of Oz in some detail, ending with "If this synopsis appears somewhat incoherent, it is the author who should be blamed not the patient reader". Pronouncing the piece "Quite harmless" he recommends it for License. There is a handwritten addendum by Brookfield to the report dated 14th April to say that the songs for the piece have been submitted and they "appear perfectly in order". The scores for the songs are attached to the end of the script in the LCP Collection, and are in their published form just as the picture below:

Much has been written about the show by Oz fans - here's an example if you want to find out more about its production history and here's the Wikipedia page about it. Here's a presentation on youtube from Eric Shanower who has a book coming out about the making of The Tik-Tok Man of Oz next month. You can find out more about it here.

Amongst the various online listings for the 1913 productions of the musical - including Shanower's extensive and detailed listing of the USA productions in 1913 - I can't find a London production mentioned, but according to Allardyce Nicoll's Hand-List of Plays it was performed or at least licensed to be performed at the Lyric Theatre in London on 30th April 1913, just a month after the production first opened in Los Angeles. (Allardyce Nicoll, English Drama 1900-1930 The Beginnings of the Modern Period, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973, p. 500)

Seeing the long eared beast on the front of the songsheets and reading in Brookfield's report about the character of “Betsy Baker a mortal who has been shipwrecked on the shore of the Rose Kingdom, with her favourite mule Hank”, I immediately remembered that photo from Bristol Theatre Collection! Surely there had to be some relation between the two?

​A bit of online research later revealed that the recalcitrant looking mule from the photo was indeed the same one from The Tik-Tok Man of Oz. 

Frank Woodward later developed the character as a vaudeville and cabaret act, which he brought to London in early 1926 with his wife performing alongside Hank as his trainer. The Daily Mirror announced his arrival on the London stage on 1st February 1926: "Hank the Mule, a new and strange stage animal...will make his first appearance on the variety stage on this side of the Atlantic at the Coliseum to-day. With him is his trainer, Miss Nina Woodward". 

The Hank act was positively reviewed  as part of "Playtime" at the Piccadilly as few days later in the theatrical newspaper The Stage.

"Hank is one of the weirdest, drollest creatures ever conceived by an artist in fantasy. His chief business in life seems to be flirting with the lady members of his audiences, although he finds time to show a keen interest in the “eats” and drinks. At the request of his trainer he is liable to break into a dance, and as a vocalist he is not far behind the average chorus. How Hank will go when he arrives at the greater and less intimate surroundings of vaudeville, it is difficult to say, but there can be no doubt of his success at the Piccadilly; and the Woodwards are to be congratulated.” (4th February 1926, p. 14)

A reviewer from Gentlewoman & Modern Life was similarly impressed: 

“… a turn called “Hank the Mule” stood out vividly. A more preposterous mule, with stubborn and intensely cynical expression, I never did see, and the way it (or he) meandered round the tables and shoved his nose into parties, especially where the ladies were the prettiest, was most amusing. Mr Woodward and his keeper Miss Morrisey have devised something new." (6 February 1926, p. 212)

​For more about Hank the Mule as a cabaret act, see this blog and this astonishing video from 1926!  

​It's easy to see why the anonymous writer wrote on the back of the photo "One of the few really novel acts seen in London cabaret". As someone who performs on the London cabaret scene as Ada Campe, I know this act would definitely steal every show if it was revived!

Fred continued to perform as Hank regularly in the UK and Europe as well as in the USA - there was an incident that got some press attention involving a letter sent by air mail from London to him at a cabaret venue in Oslo in 1930 that was redirected to Berlin, Paris, the South of France, then Oslo, then Paris again, before finally being returned to sender in London two years later covered in postage marks and stamps. (The Daily Mirror, 15th November 1932, p. 5)

Reviews and articles reveal he was in London in the 194os performing well into his 60s in variety shows and cabarets, and in the pantomime Mother Goose in Glasgow in 1946 and Newcastle in 1947. You can find out more about his later career here.

I think it's fascinating that such a long standing, unique, and internationally successful cabaret act came out of a fairly unsuccessful musical comedy - albeit one that was part of a larger portfolio of stories about Oz on stage and on film. Good for Fred and his partners!

It's also fun to find unexpected treats during periods of archival research - even if you can't quite make sense of them when you first find them.

This sketch, or "phantasy", was written by Aliph Cheem, a pseudonym used by poet and author Walter Yeldham. It ran for a week at the Lewisham Hippodrome - on a packed bill that included the "Prime Minister of Mirth" George Robey, Nora Delaney "the girl in uniform", Arthur Aiston the Hebrew Comedian, and exhibition swimming family The Finneys. 

It's always interesting to find topical references to suffrage militancy in sketches and variety entertainments - and unless something suffrage-sounding is in the title or you are following up a lead from a review or listing in a contemporary newspaper like The Era, I've only ever found them by chance. When I first started researching suffrage plays in the LCP Collection, each play was bound in a huge volume with the other pieces that were submitted for license around the same date - a fantastic snapshot of the variety of work being produced on stages across the UK.

Some playscripts are typed up by either professional typing agencies or by the writers themselves, others are in an existing published form, and some are handwritten in notebooks. The Reader's Reports used to be kept separately - you can still look for them in the LCP Correspondence index files - but are now placed at the front of the scripts. This means when you look through these big volumes you see a precis or synopsis of each play, and therefore get an idea of whether it is worth looking through the script for suffrage references! That's what happened in this case - there was nothing in the title The Devil Himself  to suggest a possible suffrage moment, but the first lines of the Reader's Report piqued my interest:
 
"A satirical trifle introducing a Mephistopheles who with his wife is waiting outside an Underground Tube Station for their midnight return to Hades. In his character of Devil the husband makes a series of topical illusions [sic] to his influence in Piccadilly, in Parliament upon incendiary Suffragettes and so forth..."

I immediately looked through the script and found this conversation between the Policeman and the Devil. The latter has just been talking to the audience when the Policeman enters:

This bit of business is the main practical effect - and the most action that happens - in the whole piece. The implication that the Devil is responsible for the destructive direct action of militant suffragettes, and the criticism of their relationship with the police is  predictable and not very original, but it is interesting that the writer included the scene. The suffragette was presumably played by the actress playing the Devil's wife, as she is offstage for quite a while before this scene begins. She re-enters after the Policeman exits, back in her disguise as a Folly, complaining that the Refreshment Bar in the station waiting room is closed. The Devil then says "That's very said, particularly when you're not Hunger-striking". I haven't found anything to suggest that Yeldham was known as an anti-suffragist - The Devil Himself  is mostly a showcase for his satirical writing in verse so it seems that the inclusion of the suffrage content was a way to make it topical for contemporary audiences, to jump on the popular bandwagon of negative and reductive portrayals of militancy, and to add some pace to the piece.

By looking through the LCP volumes over the years I've found all sorts of surprise pop up suffragettes in pre WW1 content for the professional stage, often in variety sketches or revues. These pieces show us that audiences across the UK would have been familiar with the visibility and actions of militant suffrage campaigners, and in many cases the names of prominent militants too. While these characters are predominantly portrayed as disagreeable, ugly, loud, and wild - familiar stereotypes of suffragettes from this period - they are always active. They stand out. There are also however often negative allusions made to women in general in public space or in the workplace - women working in factories, selling produce on the street, type-writing in offices, or working as telephonists.

An example of the latter is another play from 1913 that I found in the LCP Collection whilst browsing through a volume. Alice Up-To-Date, "A Revue in One Act and Five Scenes" was performed at the Liverpool Empire in November of that year. The piece follows the experiences of Alice and the White Rabbit (characters from Lewis Carroll's 1865 book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) on a journey into central London, including a tunnel to "Prehistoric Piccadilly". Scene IV is set in "The Telephone Exchange" - the LCP Reader wrote "it's funniest passage is that which caricatures, without much exaggeration, the trials of telephone users under their neglect by chatty telephone girls". There's also a song in Alice Up-To-Date about the novelty of women wearing pyjamas, which ends:

The Actresses’ Franchise League (AFL) was founded in November 1908 by theatre professionals who wanted support the Votes for Women cause through their work. Any woman who was or had been in the profession was eligible to join, and the broad membership included many of the most famous actresses of the early twentieth century including Ellen Terry, Lily Langtry, Madge Kendal, as well as those who would go on to become well known after WW1, including May Whitty, Athene Seyler and Sybil Thorndike. The membership also included writers Gertrude Jennings and Cicely Hamilton, musicians Ethel Smyth and Liza Lehmann, theatre managers and producers Lena Ashwell, Edith Craig and Gertrude Kingston, singers Yvette Guilbert and Marie Brema, dancers Margaret Morris and Italia Conti, and music hall artistes Marie Lloyd and Kitty Marion. American actress Gertrude Elliot, the wife of suffragist actor-manager Johnston Forbes-Robertson, was the President of the League. By 1914 there were nearly a thousand members of the AFL, provincial secretaries in cities across the UK, an affiliated Men’s Group and over 100 Patrons, including Christabel Pankhurst. The League's sister society, the Women Writers' Suffrage League, was also founded in 1908.

The Actresses’ Franchise League worked with all the other suffrage societies - militant and non-militant - and was present for all of the most prominent events in the suffrage campaign between 1908 and 1914, organising performances at suffrage exhibitions and fairs, training and providing speakers for meetings and demonstrations, marching in processions, and putting on entertainments in theatres, restaurants, meeting rooms and even skating rinks. The AFL commissioned and published new writing, campaigned directly as an activist group alongside other suffrage societies and used the unique visibility and profile of its membership to gain press attention for the cause. Believing strongly in the power of theatre, propaganda and storytelling, the League’s output was ambitious, bold and hugely varied.

In 1913, the AFL founded The Woman’s Theatre, designed to open up opportunities for women to be part of the business of theatre and to participate at every level, on and off stage. After a very successful first season, plans for a second had to be postponed due to the outbreak of the First World War. League members threw themselves into war work – founding the Women’s Emergency Corps and the British Women’s Hospital Fund, and restoring the original Star and Garter home in Richmond for disabled servicemen. The Woman’s Theatre became the Woman’s Theatre Camps Entertainments, taking variety shows that included short one-act comedies by suffragist playwrights to army camps in the UK and abroad. After the war, the League continued to work for equal suffrage, and the organisation remained actively involved with and supportive of a variety of campaigns until it was wound up in 1958.

The League’s legacy is an inspiring one for scholars of feminist theatre, political theatre, theatre history and women’s history, as well as for current theatre professionals. Many of the issues around equality of opportunity within the industry are still pertinent today – and the AFL’s confident, clever, passionate and creative work and story still resonates with performers, audiences and activists.

All images by Jacky Fleming

I'm collaborating with Scary Little Girls for the fourth season of their Salon de la Vie project - on everything you didn’t know about the suffragettes and their creative campaigning!  We’ll combine recorded extracts, songs, special guests and live shows in this season to celebrate the wild, wonderful, wise and witty women of the first wave.  

Join us for…

June 2nd, Votes for Children!
A look at the young people who supported the suffrage movement and found their own voice in the process.

June 16th, Birds of a Feather.
We will hear about plans to fill Parliament with suffragette parrots, talk about how the movement campaigned not just for votes for women but to end vivisection, and explore the links between vegetarianism and suffrage.

June 30th, Nobody Expects the Suffragettes!
Site specific, pop up and random acts of activism all characterised the creative shenanigans of suffragists in the theatre and entertainment industries, and in this Salon we celebrate some of the most unexpected!

July 14th, The Woman’s Theatre.
Here we will look at the way suffrage campaigners imagined a theatre they could be part of, including female producers and playwrights, crèches, and an end to the casting couch… so much to admire and yet to apply to the modern mainstream…

July 28th, Taking the Stage!
Our all live season finale bringing the work of Elizabeth Robins, Evelyn Glover and Cicely Hamilton to life before your very eyes!  Expect digital mayhem, songs, short scenes and feminist fun for all!  Tickets for this £5, the only Salon of the season we’re charging for and we are super grateful for your support!

About Salon de la Vie 

Now coming up to its fourth season, Salon de la Vie is our fortnightly series of 15 – 20 minute extravaganzas of songs, storytelling, merriment and conversation. Focusing each time on an awe-inspiring, remarkable and brave human from the world of film, music, literature and history, and drawing parallels with the achievements of activists today, we celebrate how people positively embody the change they want to see in the world, for themselves and for others.