Reading

Let's read Modern Standard Arabic together and help each other. This get-together continues weekly. Please disregard attendee numbers, as most members come without registering here. There is no charge for this time together.

Dive into a meaningful **in-person discussion** at the Literature & Theology Reading Group's next meetup as we explore 'The Journalist and the Murderer' by Janet Malcolm. The great long form journalist and essayist Janet Malcolm here turns her attention to the ethics of writing and journalism itself. She tells the story of Joe McGinniss: a journalist who documents the trial of an army doctor who claimed to have been wrongfully convicted for the murder of his wife. **Each session is accompanied by a lecture** from Dr Aidan Cottrell-Boyce, exploring its spiritual and theological significance. Please make sure you have **[sign up for this session](https://londonjesuitcentre.churchsuite.com/events/5oleyadc)** on our online portal. If you cannot attend in person, you can also [join us online](https://londonjesuitcentre.churchsuite.com/events/rtctcwnn) on 22nd April. All are welcome to be a part of this vibrant community dedicated to exploring the intersection of faith and literature!

Online Personal Tarot Readings to be booked via my website: www.mapitarot.com. Please check for any other available dates and times if this event doesn't suit you.

**It's time to delve back into the world of comics, and this year our pick is the critically acclaimed My Favourite Thing is Monsters. Please make sure you read Volume 1 (if we like it enough we may one day return to Volume 2!).** Here’s the summary from Goodreads: Set against the tumultuous political backdrop of late ’60s Chicago, *My Favorite Thing Is Monsters* is the fictional graphic diary of 10-year-old Karen Reyes, filled with B-movie horror and pulp monster magazines iconography. Karen Reyes tries to solve the murder of her enigmatic upstairs neighbor, Anka Silverberg, a holocaust survivor, while the interconnected stories of those around her unfold. When Karen’s investigation takes us back to Anka’s life in Nazi Germany, the reader discovers how the personal, the political, the past, and the present converge The meeting will start at 7pm and finish between 9.00 and 10pm (BST), with breaks in between. Just a reminder that the pub lets us to use the room at no charge so please do purchase drinks/food from the bar. Bringing in your own food from outside the pub is not allowed!

Join to us to talk about Chinua Achebe's "Things Fall Apart" (1958) chronicles the life of Okonkwo, a proud, influential Igbo leader in colonial Nigeria whose life and community are torn apart by British colonialism and Christianity.

Welcome back to *No, Really: What Is to be Done?*, our deep-dive series on Lenin, Leninism, and the theory of the revolutionary party. You may be wondering when and if we're ever actually going to read WITBD itself, the actual text. Rest assured we will. For now, we're going to keep on psyching ourselves up with another one of the foundational documents of Leninism, one which feels grimly relevant right now: *Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism.* Find the text here: [https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/) Feel free to read as much as you like, but we'll focus on the **Preface and Chapters 1, 3, 6, 7 and 8. These are:** [I. CONCENTRATION OF PRODUCTION AND MONOPOLIES](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch01.htm) [III. FINANCE CAPITAL AND THE FINANCIAL OLIGARCHY](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch03.htm) [VI. DIVISION OF THE WORLD AMONG THE GREAT POWERS](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch06.htm) [VII. IMPERIALISM AS A SPECIAL STAGE OF CAPITALISM](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch07.htm) [VIII. PARASITISM AND DECAY OF CAPITALISM](https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch08.htm) It's often claimed that Lenin's identification of imperialism as capitalism's "highest stage" is a textbook example of Marxist hubris. How can capitalism have reached its highest stage in the year 1916, when Lenin was writing? Surely technofeudalism, or neocolonialism, or monopoly corporatism - take your pick - represents a higher stage? Without giving too much away, let's say this much, at least by way of starting a debate: the confronting truth is that capitalism did indeed reach its highest stage with the exact kind of monopolist, oligarchic, feudalistic (when *Imperialism* was published, literal crowned heads still ruled much of Europe by decree), militarised imperialism Lenin describes in this work. If that suggests that nothing has really changed in the 100+ years since, except perhaps to get worse, it's because nothing has. A century of "progress" and we haven't progressed at all. Still wage slaves, still debt peons, still cattle for a rapist ruling class. And it all still runs on the blood and oil of the Global South. So let's not kid ourselves: *Imperialism* is as relevant today as when it was written. Don't believe me? Join us and see for yourself! We'll discuss Lenin's framework of analysis, his concrete conclusions and strategic recommendations and break down whether we think these insights are applicable to our times in all their brutality. Take care and happy reading! \-\-\-\- A bit about the *NRWITBD* series: [Fade in] The year is 2026. Picture this: industrial-scale war on multiple continents. Cities in ruins, millions dead and millions more made refugees - starvation, disease, mutilations, deportations, pogroms, genocides, dispossessions. Across every land, a working class on its knees before an ever-shrinking class of oligarchs with an ever-growing pile of treasure, weapons and slaves - determined to pit brother against brother in endless wars for resources that can only end when the whole earth is a toxic wasteland. And what they call "peace" is not much better. This is the brutal present, a [Second Gilded Age,](https://fortune.com/article/gilded-age-coming-back-layoffs-pay-inequality-labor-unions-ceos-billionaires-worker-pay/) but we could travel back a hundred years and describe more or less the exact same scene. In the century since Lenin lived and walked the earth, less has changed than the eternal optimists - Panglossian techno-liberals like Steven Pinker and the other intellectuals of the Epstein class - would like us to think. Really, we're back where it all began in the *First* Gilded Age of the late 19th and early 20th century: on the outside looking in, asking the age-old question: what is to be done? Things are really getting quite bad. No, really - what is to be done!!? In our gatherings of late, we've been tinkering around the edges of a few answers. Prior Lenin readings as well as our exploration of the Yan'an Forum and our whistle-stop tour through the last twenty years of street protests with Vincent Bevins have given us some things to chew on. Now there's been a clamour from plenty of regulars, as well as a few newcomers, that we continue to pull at the vital thread that seems to be running through all our discussions and see where it might lead us: namely, the revolutionary theories of Lenin. This will be a series of readings running every other Thursday night in Whitechapel. With *No, Really: What is to be done?,* we'll be taking a deep dive into revolutionary Marxism with a read-through of texts like Lars Lih's *Lenin rediscovered: what is to be done? in Context,* non-standard biographies like Carter Ellwood's *Non-Geometric Lenin: Essays on the Development of the Bolshevik Party 1910-1914* as well as some articles, essays and discussion prompts which most readers likely won't have encountered before.

Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission, and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish. Except that right now, he doesnt know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it. All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company. His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it’s up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery, and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species. And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he’s got to do it all alone. Or does he? ————————————— Join us at Canova Hall to discuss Project Hail Mary over a coffee!

This month, we're reading The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry — a timeless classic first published in 1943 that continues to captivate readers of all ages. At first glance, it's a simple tale: a stranded pilot in the desert meets a mysterious young prince who has traveled from a tiny asteroid. But as the Little Prince recounts his journeys to ditterent planets, the story unfolds into a profound meditation on love, loss, loneliness, friendship, and what truly matters in life. We are meeting on the 11th of April at 2 p.m. to discuss it. English pdf : https://blogs.ubc.ca/edcp508/files/2016/02/TheLittlePrince.pdf English hard copy : https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=L&ai=DChsSEwjYrKCA0eaSAxXtlFAGHYqoIRYYACICCAEQFRoCZGc&co=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiAhtvMBhDBARIsAL26pjHG-Ux-ABSpcSWUAnzF0CEZzD1x5aip-AASlorEmxGd9pPosXLBeaEaAoj5EALw_wcB&sph=&cid=CAASJeRo1RfljFGkVMfgeduMBtdNSysXyN5iHxeiNf0sdNchxZCWzAU&cce=1&sig=AOD64_0Pe-mKdp7EB3PMMUhSSt48WmAcDA&ctype=70&q=&ved=2ahUKEwiw9pqA0eaSAxXWQUEAHdVOC4YQwg8oAHoECA0QEw&nis=8&ch=1&adurl= Arabic hard copy :https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=L&ai=DChsSEwiOnejs0eaSAxVyl1AGHXB2MPYYACICCAEQBBoCZGc&co=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiAhtvMBhDBARIsAL26pjH4x2tN3JSWiLgOKxmiiXjSkGHNdau50i5CZ3grkl-JFfQj1-KhhxIaAhhcEALw_wcB&cce=1&sig=AOD64_1IKvySfya2iAdKQ3syeYpcOr1tgg&cty Arabic Pdf : https://www.bookleaks.com/files/ketab/ketab2/924.pdf Interesting podcast about the book and its author: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3csyx46?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile

Welcome, readers! Our April read is **_Martyr!_ by Kaveh Akbar.** The story follows a young Iranian American poet grappling with grief, addiction, and the aching question of what makes a life meaningful. Drawn into an unexpected friendship with a terminally ill artist, he begins to confront faith, love, and the seduction of self-destruction. Lyrical, darkly funny, and emotionally piercing, the novel wrestles with beauty and despair in equal measure. It’s a story about longing—to be seen, to be forgiven, and to matter. Looking forward to discussing with everyone! We will meet at Zaftig Brewing Co in their event room in the back. We are welcome to bring in our own food, but **drinks must be purchased at the bar.** Happy reading! 📖

Welcome, readers! Our May read is **_Kindred_ by Octavia E. Butler.** The story follows Dana, a Black woman living in 1976 California, who is suddenly pulled back to a Maryland plantation before the Civil War. She learns her survival is tied to a white slaveholder’s son. Forced to move between centuries, she must endure the brutal realities of slavery while fighting to hold on to her identity. Tense, intimate, and unforgettable, Kindred explores how the past refuses to stay buried. Looking forward to discussing with everyone! We will meet at Zaftig Brewing Co in their event room in the back. We are welcome to bring in our own food, but **drinks must be purchased at the bar.** Happy reading! 📖

Join us for lunch/tea at Asterisk Supper Club to discuss our May book "Under the Oak Tree" by Suji Kim Lady Maximilian is the daughter of the powerful Duke Croyso, but she is rarely allowed outside her family’s sprawling castle for fear that her stutter will tarnish their noble name. When she is forced to marry Sir Riftan, a lowborn knight caught in one of her father’s schemes, Maxi doesn’t dare hope for happiness, let alone love. Her stumbling communication and his gruff manner sour their relationship before it can begin, and Riftan leaves without a word the morning after their vows are exchanged. Now, three years after their disastrous wedding night, Riftan has returned as a war hero. To Maxi’s surprise, despite rumors that he was offered marriage to Princess Agnes, a beautiful and renowned sorceress, Riftan still wants Maxi for his wife. And when he comes to claim her, his longing becomes a desire that bewilders Maxi, even as she is overcome by the scorching heat that Riftan’s presence ignites within her. As she learns to navigate the intricacies of her new life, Maxi will find herself and her courage, and discover that she is anything but powerless.

Calling all founders, CEOs, lawyers, doctors, and entrepreneurs to join our special *Founder Edition* of Sip & Read meetup event. Let's sip on fine wine and discuss our first book **The 5AM Club- Own Your Morning Elevate Your Life, by Robin Sharma**. We will pair this book with our favorite wine at **Wine on High** and engage in thought-provoking discussions on startup businesses and entrepreneurship, and network with like-minded individuals in a cozy book club setting. Come prepared to discuss this month's book. At the end of each book club meeting, we will take next book and venue suggestions from the participants for the next meeting. Whether you are a book lover, women entrepreneur, or a content creator, this event is perfect for sharing ideas and insights with other funders and founders in the entrepreneurial world. Don't miss out on this unique opportunity to connect, learn, and grow together. Sign up now to reserve your spot! *Fun fact! This meetup was established in 2015 and had over 1,000 members. I had to shut down operations while attending law school, but we're back!!*