Wakefield Historical Society was one of the partners with Wakefield Civic Society and Wakefield Council when the Gissing Trust was set up in 1978 and the Gissing Centre in Thompson’s Yard Westgate, was established in the childhood home of George Gissing.
Interest in George Gissing’s novels is international and the Chair of the Gissing Trust, Lesley Taylor, recently attended a performance in London adapted from George Gissing’s novel ‘The Nether World’.
Read Lesley Taylor’s account:
Whenever our trustees or stewards discuss the limited interest in Gissing someone says, ”It’s a shame none of his work has been made into a TV series or film.” However Gissing has his devotees who use his novels or his life to create drama.
One long-time admirer is a writer called Christopher Douglas, whose radio series, ‘Reardon’s Week’ filled a 6.30 Radio 4 slot until fairly recently. This fictional writer has his origins in the Gissing character, Edwin Reardon, a struggling writer too, in Gissing’s most well-known novel, ‘New Grub Street’. Christopher Douglas has also adapted this Gissing novel and another, ‘The Odd Women’, for radio in recent years. The latest Gissing Journal also lists a theatre adaptation of ‘The Odd Women’ which has been performed In Philadelphia in 2007, in Edinburgh in 2011, and this year in Toronto.
Another new foray into Gissing adaptation became known to us when a young drama student from London South Bank University, Ewan Conway, urgently requested a visit to the Gissing Centre earlier this year. He told us he was to play Gissing in the final year student production of “The Nether World” adapted for theatre as “The Pleasures of the Damned’ by his drama tutor, Alex McSweeney. Ewan wanted to find out all he could about the writer. Here he sits in the Centre holding his script, looking suitably thoughtful.
Such an opportunity seemed too good to miss and so my husband, Pete, and I booked our train and theatre tickets and found ourselves in London in May. In the Edric Theatre, a flexible studio space in the University, thirteen talented students, each taking more than one part, entertained a full house. This fast-moving production worked through the full story of the novel, using film to set the scene and music hall songs from the period. Known as one of Gissing’s bleakest stories, the pace and energy of the production made for an exhilarating afternoon.
Ewan’s tutor, Alex, has since sent me a script of the play which is now in the Gissing Centre. He also mentioned that he too had visited the Gissing Centre in about 2004 when he was doing his PhD on the writer and was received there equally warmly.
More about the Gissing Trust: https://www.wakefieldhistoricalsociety.org.uk/links/the-gissing-trust/