Frances "Fanny" Burney: An illustrated talk by Karin Fernald, 19th August.

Novelist and diarist Frances Burney (1752-1840), known as Fanny,  was a member of an active musical family living just off Leicester Square  in the later l8th century.  As a child  Frances watched performances from David Garrick’s box at Drury Lane; both he and Joshua Reynolds were friends of her father’s, the energetic and sociable Dr. Charles Burney MD.  Later Frances would make a great personal friend of Samuel Johnson. In her lifetime Frances  was celebrated for her 4 novels, in particular her first, Evelina.  Today she is best known  for her  vivid and highly personal diaries, not least those she kept at court during the illness of King George lll, when she served five years as lady-in-waiting to Queen Charlotte. Of Local interest to Sherborne is the fact that during those years she became close to another courtier,  grieving widower Stephen Digby.  (There are unanswered questions regarding this relationship, which ended with  rancour on Burney’s side.)   She then married Alexandre D’Arblay, a moderate French revolutionary and follower of Lafayette. Her years in France are brought to vivid life in her diaries.

 Not long after her death in l840  her diaries, edited by her niece, would  become deservedly well known. In 1958 the Canadian scholar Joyce Hemlow wrote a ground breaking biography; this led to many more studies, to another  best-selling biography by Kate Chisholm,  and to today’s lively Burney Society.

Karin Fernald is an actor, writer and speaker who researches, and aims to create, a vivid picture of a historical character and period. All her subjects are connected with the fine arts; some  are artists themselves. Karin's lectures and shows are illustrated with a wide variety of pictures, portraits and caricatures of the day. She has taken them round the world.

Karin began in the theatre, where she played roles ranging from Sally Bowles in Cabaret to the Dormouse in Alice in Wonderland. On TV she played Anne Forsyte in The Forsyte Saga. She compiled and performed  a show on Frances Burney (1752-1840), The Famous Miss Burney, and performed it over a number of years in the UK and abroad.  Her children's book on the youth of Queen Victoria, illustrated by Sophie Foster,  was published by Frances Lincoln Children's Books, shortlisted for a Young Quills award,  and can be found on the English Heritage website.

This is a joint event organised by Sherborne Literary Society and The Arts Society, Sherborne.

• Event: Frances "Fanny" Burney, novelist, diarist, playwright.

• Venue: The Digby Hall, Hound St, Sherborne DT9 3AA (next to the Library)

• Date: Weds 19th August

• Time: 6.30 for 7pm

• Cost: £10 SLS Members and Members of TASS / £15 Non-Members

• Tickets: Available from Winstones, Sherborne or via Ticketsource here: https://www.sherborneliterarysociety.com/event-tickets

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