*[I know… and I’m sorry. I could have spent longer trying to come up with a better “-ing” here, but decided to just hope you’ll forgive the clunkiness! Anyway…]

Gosh - we’re practically at the end of term. How did that happen?!

We’ve had a wonderful 2023 so far, and hope that you have too, regardless of whether you’ve joined us at Wrightington Towers yet!

As the new term looms on the horizon, we thought that an update might be in order.

First up, inspired by yesterday's release of the first official portrait of Charles qua King Charles III, we’d like to remind you of Wright History’s imminent homage to things regal and coronational.*

*[I know… “coronational” would have (rightly) raised an essay-marking eyebrow in my former life, but to my ex-students who see this: you know what I mean, and this isn’t an essay. Remember what I said about context and literary register…?)]

It’s a truth universally acknowledged that the ways in which a monarch is officially portrayed say something fundamentally important about a society. Some may draw conclusions about the portrayed monarch’s personality, others about their fitness for royal authority, others still about the futility of monarchy.*

*[We rejoice in the fact that Wrightington Towers is a broad church in this, as in so many other things which are divisive in other contexts. Where did it all go so right?!]

A royal portrait is not an off-the-cuff selfie. It always entails artistic choices (made, variously, by the artist, the monarch, the monarch’s advisors, or a mixture thereof). It exists in a culturally-loaded space where message and intended reception seek to resonate with what “the public” wants or needs to hear.

As a professional medieval historian, I spent many years asking questions about this sort of culturally-loaded space, often in the context of how specific monarchs were portrayed. It’s fascinating to see the ways in which Charles’s kingship is being shaped. What conclusions are we expected to draw from, for example, the choice of artist or the focus in immediate press coverage of the provenance of Charles’s suit and bracelet in terms of who “we” are? How is Charles’s kingship being presented as the right sort of kingship, for us, right now?

And it was, of course ever thus - which is why we couldn’t resist offering The Royal Painters at this particular time. We’d love to offer you some fascinating historical examples of what was deemed important about royalty, to enhance your appreciation of May 6th’s spectacle - whether you’ll be celebrating it or taking a holiday abroad to avoid it! Either way, it would be remiss of me to not highlight its relevance just now, non?! This leads me to the first piece of news….

There is still time to join us for the course, which starts this Saturday. But also… given said relevance of this course in particular, and in the light of emails from several of you who’ve said you’d like to do it but can’t because of scheduling and Easter/bank holiday commitments, I’m pleased to announce that catch-up recordings of The Royal Painters will be available beyond the standard two weeks from “broadcast”. We can keep them live until the end of May (longer if necessary - just let me know if that would be useful).*

*[NB For those of you who’ve not used our catch-up recordings before, please note that in order to comply with privacy laws, they are edited to exclude all discussion and Q&A sections.]

We’ll keep registration for this open until the end of May, so if you find that the coronation whets your appetite for things regal, you know where to come!

I’m also pleased to announce that we have two newly available “unplugged” (i.e. in bricks-and-mortar venues) courses, featuring adventures in far-flung fields!

First, for those of you who are York-based, we have a day school at Guppy’s which will spirit you back to China’s first cradle of civilization, with

The Mandate of Heaven: Ancient China

Fingers crossed that the weather and transport connections are kinder for this than they were for our course at Guppy’s in January!

Next up, we offer unto the Denizens of Pickering and its environs seven weeks’ exploration of lost worlds and vanished lives throughout the globe, with

Lost Worlds

This leads us to our next bit of news…

We know that many of our Pickering Denizens are especially busy over the spring and summer months. But fear not - we have a solution! We have deliberately chosen to run this course online at the same time as in Pickering. Therefore should you need to miss a session, you will be able to watch the catch-up recording of the online version. For those of you who have yet to venture into online courses with us, don’t worry - it’s ridiculously easy to do. Simply let me know when you’d like to do this, follow the link I’ll send you and you can sit back and enjoy Robert’s pearls of wisdom as if it were your own private television channel!!

This is an experiment, which we’ll try to repeat if it proves to be useful. Do please keep us posted!

Finally, the sharper-eyed amongst you may have noticed some changes to our website over the last couple of months - and still more are in the pipeline.

Most obviously at this stage, I’ve rejigged the menu at the top of each page. I’ve done so with a view to making it easier for you to navigate our website, but of course the proof of the pudding is always in the eating! Do please let me know if I’ve inadvertently made things less elegant for how you use our site!

You may also notice that there’s a new page, under the banner of Curious, but not yet convinced? This is a kind of FAQs page, for those who are still wondering whether they would enjoy Robertian pearls of wisdom (which includes the first 5 minutes or so of Cezanne, so anyone can see what a Wright History course looks like). Should you have any friends or family who remain unsure, we’d be really grateful if you’d direct them to this.

Speaking of Spreading the Wright History Word … we’re extending our experimental promotion of a 15% discount for anyone booking their first course with us (and, indeed, a little thank you to whoever recommended said new “recruit”) to cover all registrations made throughout April. We thought long and hard as to whether to do this - we don’t want to look like a certain furniture company that is, apparently, always having its “BEST EVER SALE!!" But we do want and need to recruit more Denizens, so we’re giving it a bit longer. Here’s hoping!

And finally finally, if you haven’t yet booked your fix of Wright History for April and beyond, and would like a reminder of what we have in store, you’ll find one here.

If we won’t be seeing you for The Royal Painters beforehand, we wish you Happy Easter, and look forward to seeing those of you who are joining us next term soon!