A series of talks to accompany a current exhibition at the Sir Duncan Rice Library continues this week with two events.
On Thursday (May 30) Dr Alan Marcus from the University’s Department of Film and Visual Culture will introduce members of the public to the recent film he made in Singapore; ‘Eighty-five Miles North of the Equator’ as part of the current Wanderlust: Travel Journals and Explorers' Notes exhibition.
The film explores the contemporary city through its colonial origins and the paintings and writings of Charles Dyce, who was born and educated in Aberdeen and lived in Singapore in the 1840s.
The event will take place in the Auris Lecture Theatre, Cruickshank Building, St Machar Drive, from 6pm to 7pm.
On the same evening, a talk entitled ‘The Literature of Travel and Exploration: The Work of the Hakluyt Society’ by Roy Bridges, a University of Aberdeen Emeritus Professor of History, will be held in Special Collections Seminar Room of the Sir Duncan Rice Library.
Aberdeen University Library has a full set of the 362 volumes published by the Hakluyt Society since its foundation in 1846. Roy Bridges will explain the Society’s link with its eponymous Elizabethan forbear and the odd circumstances surrounding its beginnings. Later developments as well as some current problems will also be described.
Roy Bridges has published extensively on the history of exploration, especially in Africa. A member of the Hakluyt Society since 1964, he was its President from 2004-to 2010.
The event will take place from 7.30pm to 8.30pm.
Scott Byrne, Exhibitions & Public Programming Officer at the University’s Special Collections Centre, said: "Wanderlust demonstrates the wealth and diversity of the Special Collections and the capacity of the journals, notes and letters on display to encompass a broad range of subjects. This public programme of engaging talks and screenings reflects this diversity with fascinating insights from University of Aberdeen academics on themes including migration, ethnography, barriers and exploration."
Both events are free to attend, however booking is advised.
For further information or to book your place, please email scc.events@abdn.ac.uk