Latest News

Committee Members

The current members of the Committee are shown here (please click on this link), together with their current roles and contact email addresses where appropriate. New members of the committee are always welcome and if you would like to know about being a committee member please contact a member of the committee.

There are currently three committee meetings a year (following changes brought about as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic and Climate Change it is planned that up to two of these meetings will be held by electronic means) and an AGM which is held in March following the annual Birthday Walk.… Continue Reading

The fourth revision to the ‘Chronological Listing of Published Letters from Edward Thomas’, including indexing the contents of the excellent ‘Comrades in letters’, has now been compiled by Fellowship member Graham Roe.

This wonderful research and general interest resource, listing the 1,119 letters from Edward Thomas that have been formally published, is available here on the Fellowship website.… Continue Reading

The Edward Thomas Fellowship is looking for a new Treasurer

Edward Thomas Fellowship – Treasurer Role

 Background

The Edward Thomas Fellowship is an unincorporated and unregistered membership organisation whose objectives are to:

• Perpetuate the memory of Edward Thomas and foster interest in his life and works
• Foster a continuing relationship with the family and descendants of Edward Thomas in such a way that contributes to the aims and objectives of the Fellowship
• Conserve the countryside known to Edward Thomas and recorded in his writings
• Assist in the preservation of places and things associated with the writer
• Keep people in touch with relevant happenings and to arrange events which extend the Fellowship

We achieve these objectives through meetings, Walks and Study Days and newsletters (a paper version currently twice a year and electronic versions as and when necessary or appropriate).… Continue Reading

In addition to books listed elsewhere on the website, there is a stock of new (at retail prices) and ‘used’ books available to purchase at the Edward Thomas Study Centre.

Please bear in mind that many of the ‘used’ and rare books are only available in single volumes and are the result of donations that have been made to the Fellowship to raise funds for the Study Centre. It may be that the copy or edition you would like has already been sold so please send an email to etsc.petersfield@outlook.com to check availability before setting your heart on it.

Thank you for supporting the Fellowship and the Study Centre.… Continue Reading

Jamie McKendrick’s report on the 2022 Edward Thomas Poetry Competition is now available and may be read in full below or through the Poetry Competition page where the winning poems are published.

On behalf of the Fellowship I would like to thank Jamie for his excellent report and also those Fellowship members who drew up the long-list of 50 from which the winners were selected.

Edward Thomas Poetry Competition 2022

Whittling the long-listed fifty poems down to twenty was a more painful process than I had imagined; then reading them all again to reach a shorter list of ten even more so.… Continue Reading

Edward Thomas Fellowship Poetry Competition 2022, the Edward Cawston Thomas prize.

The 2022 Poetry Competition winning poems, judged by Jamie McKendrick, have just been announced.

We were delighted by the quality and number of entries – over 480 – this year, and warmly thank everyone who entered.

The winning poem of the Competition is ‘Shadowland’  by James Driver.  Joint second are ‘This’ by Kathryn Bevis   and ‘Kaze no Denwa (The Wind Phone)’  by  Theresa Giffard. Highly commended were  Derek Sellen (for two poems), Bill Dodd,  Lawrence Wray, James Driver (for a second poem.)

Jamie’s report will be published here in due course but in the meantime we thought you would all like to read these wonderful poems and join us in congratulating the winners.… Continue Reading

Edward Thomas Fellowship and Charitable Status

This item is similar to the one that was circulated in a recent eBulletin but as not all members receive this it is repeated here, with an important update about potential delays to our move to Charitable Status.

Firstly, a big thank you to everyone who either mailed or emailed in with their thoughts on the proposed constitution, which was overwhelmingly approved.

The next steps are to form what will become the first Trustee Board of the new Charity and which will be proposed to and voted on by members at the AGM in March 2022.… Continue Reading

“Comrades in Letters” is a new book being published by the Edward Thomas Fellowship about the relationship between Edward Thomas and Gordon Bottomley.

Gordon Bottomley and Edward Thomas were close friends for many years, from the late 1890s until Thomas’s death.  The fact that they lived about three hundred miles apart, Bottomley in the Lake District and Thomas in the South,  meant that they only met at long intervals, and that their friendship was conducted chiefly by correspondence.

We are beneficiaries in that the many letters of Thomas to Bottomley have survived.  Those from Bottomley to Thomas are thought to have perished in the great bonfire that Thomas lit before enlisting. … Continue Reading

We are pleased to say that, where available, recordings from sessions delivered at the 2021 Edward Thomas Literary Festival are currently accessible on YouTube by following the link here.

Further sessions will be added to this link as they become available.

Access to the recordings are free. If you have enjoyed listening to them and feel you would like to make a donation towards the running costs of future Festivals you may do so via the PayPal button below. The theme for the 2022 Festival will be The Woodland Life, which is 125 years ‘young’ in October 2022.

Thank you for your interest in the work of the Edward Thomas Fellowship and the independent Petersfield Museum

 … Continue Reading