Bath Literature Festival: Searching for female stars

Polymathic arts writer Kevin Jackson, in Bath to introduce his book Constellation of Genius about the literary annus mirabilis of 1922, ran up against the feminist lobby.

Perhaps ill-advisedly, he interrupted his lecture to show a four-minute film illustrating his song on 1922 Paris. It portrayed five men (James Joyce, Ezra Pound, TS Eliot, Ernest Hemingway, F Scott Fitzgerald), plus a pretty flapper and her ditzy backing singers.

"The gender imbalance of the film has been noticed," said one woman, darkly.

"Why didn't you mention Dorothy Richardson?" said another, referring to the author of the unreadable Pilgrimage.

"I stand mortified," said Jackson, not very apologetically.