Festival Finale with LitFest Patron Sir Simon Russell Beale

Almost 100 years ago, in May 1922, five creative geniuses were guests of honour at a glittering event in a grand hotel in Paris to celebrate the first performance of Stravinsky’s Le Renard by Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. Joining the composer and the impresario at the private party were Picasso and then, in the early hours, a drunken James Joyce and, even later, a dapper Marcel Proust. The evening has been immortalised by historian Richard Davenport-Hines in his 2006 book, A Night at the Majestic: Proust and the Great Modernist Dinner Party of 1922.

The account of the occasion and its principal subject, the great French writer Proust, are dear to the heart of our patron, Sir Simon Russell Beale who, exclusively for LitFest, has recorded a series of readings, both from the book and other sources to pay homage to one of his literary heroes and the other Modernist masters at that fabled soirée. Relax, sit back and enjoy a dinner party like no other.