Please note this is NOT a ZOOM Lecture but an in person lecture. Tickets include a complimentary glass of Devil's Botany Chocolate Absinthe.
Doors open at 6:30pm and talk starts at 7pm
Before Tutankhamen unleashed his curse and Universal Studios’ mummy shuffled on our screens, Victorian society was swept up in Egyptomania.
At the end of the nineteenth century, people were feverishly consuming novels about ancient Egyptian revenants returned from the dead to seek revenge, cursed jewellery, and haunted museums. Originally more popular than vampire fiction, for forty years the mummy fiction trend (or Egyptian Gothic) was unstoppable. But sometimes truth is stranger than fiction, and at the same time a magical secret cult formed in the galleries of the British Museum, the rich held mummy unwrapping parties, and the casual Egyptian tourist opted to bring more than a postcard back from their Thomas Cook trip.
When did we stop eating mummies? What was in mummy brown paint? Who had a secret stash of mummy penises? Did a mummy really sink the Titanic? Join Dr Jay Sullivan, author of Egyptian Gothic to unwrap the Victorians mostly-forgotten obsession with mummies.
Author bio: Jay Sullivan is a writer and researcher based in South London. She holds a PhD from the University of Roehampton and a MA in Victorian Studies from Birkbeck College. Egyptian Gothic: 1884-1920 will be released in August this year and is her first book. Her research blends museum, sensory and gothic studies with a focus on the Victorian Egyptianised Gothic genre.
Outside of research, she is a digital expert specialising in public and heritage organisations. She has been in charge of website and social media strategy for organisations such as the London Fire Brigade, Natural History Museum, and the Royal Air Force Museum.
Devil's Botany is the UK's first absinthe distillery, founded by Directors of The Last Tuesday Society's Absinthe Parlour. Celebrating spirit's connection to art, literature, magic & mixology, Devil's Botany is unleashing the future of absinthe with bold expressions for the adventurous drinkers of today.
The venue opens at 18:30. Doors will close at 19:00 to avoid disrupting the speaker. We kindly ask that all guests arrive before 19:00. Refunds are not possible for in person events with less than seven days notice in any circumstances.
