Cultural Tourism - Why Bother? Margate
This symposium has been organised by Culture Kent with the intention of promoting the county as a tourist destination with more to offer than green fields and white cliffs. So presumably the question in the event’s title will be answered fairly thoroughly by a panel that includes Jude Kelly, artistic director of the Southbank Centre, and other interested parties including James Berresford, chief exec of VisitEngland. With the Arts Council investing £3m into a new cultural destinations programme, the venture looks well timed: as industry disappears abroad, large swaths of rural England are reliant on tourism for their economic vibrancy, and it’s clear that this new income generator is being approached scientifically. Expect much blowing of England’s cultural trumpet: the nation’s soft power is essentially rooted in its disproportionate influence in the wider world, so there’s plenty at stake in its maintenance.
PH
Guardian Live: Games Of The Year, London
With a market worth more than £54bn, gaming is among the planet’s most lucrative forms of entertainment. It is also often one with vast overheads: because savvy gamers are unwilling to cough up £40 for a substandard experience, hostile reception to a single game can mean life or death for the company responsible, so developers pump eye-watering sums into their products. This is great news for consumers: 2015 saw an array of huge games that were also critical darlings. In this Guardian Live event, the Guardian’s games editor Keith Stuart joins guests to discuss some of the best, a clutch no doubt featuring clandestine sneak-and-hide-’em-up Metal Gear Solid V; fantasy monster-murder-’em-up The Witcher 3; and oppressive try-desperately-not-to-die-’em-up Bloodborne; not to mention the cream of the smaller indie titles that helped make this year such a strong one for the electronic arts.
LH
Roman Krznaric, Oxford
Roman Krznaric is a popular philosopher, speaker and founding member of Alain de Botton and Sophie Howarth’s zeitgeisty self-help institute The School Of Life. As well as advising the likes of the United Nations and Friends Of The Earth, Australia-born Krznaric has gained acclaim for his practical and innovative writings. His works include The Wonderbox (a guide to living rooted in teachings from history); 2012’s How To Find Fulfilling Work; and latest offering Empathy, in which he explores the importance of putting yourself in other people’s shoes. This event sees him team up with Five Books – the site that invites academics and authors to recommend a quintet of the best works in their field – for its live debut at Blackwell’s. Taking the premise offline, will the theorist’s selections lean more towards the great philosophers or thought from the modern era?
HD
