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For music lovers who are not necessarily musicians, the library presents a series of sessions aiming at illustrating  the heritage of English Classical Music in its most specific and beautiful forms, mainly vocal music. Each session will focus on a composer, with a short presentation of the work and the composer, followed by the listening of selected pieces through  selected  videos, often with different interpretations. The point is to share comments and criticism with the group members.

These sessions are free and open to the public. For more information or to sign up please email the group leader here.

The Saturday Reading Group is for anyone who loves to read, socialize in English, and meet new people.

The March read for the group is « On the Road » by Jack Kerouac. A fictionalized account of his own journeys across America with his friend Neal Cassady, Kerouac’s beatnik odyssey captured the soul of a generation and changed the landscape of American fiction forever.

Leaving a broken marriage behind him, Sal Paradise (Kerouac) joins Dean Moriarty (Cassady), a tearaway and former reform school boy, on a series of journeys that takes them from New York to San Francisco, then south to Mexico. Hitching rides and boarding buses, they enter a world of hobos and drifters, fruit-pickers and migrant families, small towns and wide horizons. Adrift from conventional society, they experience America in the raw: a place where living is hard, but ‘life is holy and every moment is precious’. Now acknowledged as a modern classic, On the Road remains a thrilling and poignant story of the road less traveled.

The group will also be discussing the 2012 film adaptation starring Sam Riley, Garrett Hedlund, Kristen Stewart and Amy Adam. Shaken by the death of his father and discouraged by his stalled career, writer Sal Paradise goes on a road trip hoping for inspiration. While traveling, he is befriended by charismatic and fearless Dean Moriarty and Moriarty’s free-spirited and seductive young wife, Marylou. Traveling across the American southwest together, they strive to break from conformity and and search the unknown, and their decisions change the very course of their lives.

When and where: Meetings will be held in the library once a month on Saturday afternoons starting at 3:00. Cost: FREE to all members of the library. To join: Please contact Anne Kaar at bookgroup@ellia.org

Treat yourself to an afternoon of a collective reading of Shakespeare’s « Taming of the Shrew ». This activity consists of watching a BBC production on DVD and then reading relative scenes. This is a great activity for lovers of language and fans of the great wit. The activity is free for library members. Please sign-up by emailing group leader John Barritt here.

Come along and bring your knitting,

Have a natter while you’re sitting,

Or learn to knit with wool provided,

Needles loaned and stitches guided.

Knitted garments are très chic,

So be in vogue and start this week.

Knit and Natter is a free activity, open to all library members. No need to reserve, just come and enjoy! If anyone has some extra wool please bring it in. The Knitting group has a project knitting twiddle muffs and are looking for bits and pieces of washable wool.

This is a special moment when the community comes together to talk about anything and everything (in English of course!) over a cup of coffee or tea. Coffee House is free and open to all library members. Just drop by, no need to reserve!

« Books and Tea » is a monthly meeting for bookworms and tea drinkers. Bring a book you’ve really enjoyed, talk about it and pass it on! The group meets from 2 to 3:30 at the tea shop in town called « Les Casse-Croûte de Suzy ». No need to sign up, just come and enjoy!

Come join the Photography Club, share and exchange with other aspiring photographers and even go on photo shoots together. Meetings are once a month on Thursday afternoons from 2 to 4 pm, either at the library or at a predetermined photo shoot location. Please attend regularly on the following dates: March 28th, April 25th (May and June dates to be determined). This activity is led by Pol Corvez, professional photographer and library volunteer, along with Peter Bolos, photographer and member of staff. It’s free for library members, please sign-up at the front desk.

Time to get outside! Get on those hiking boots and take some time to revel in the great outdoors! The idea is to organise an easy walk once a month – approximately 10 km, 4 hours, in the afternoon – in order to discover or re-discover the beautiful hiking paths of the Maine-et-Loire. Come along with good walking shoes, protection against rain, cold or heat according to the season…. a bottle of water and a little « en-cas » to keep you going ! Maximum group is 20 so make sure to sign up!

Sign up by sending your name, email address and phone numbers (preferably cell phone) to this email address. You will be sent full details of the walk in due time.

The March read for the bookclub is « I Married a Communist » by Philip Roth .

The second novel of Roth’s eloquent American trilogy, set in the tempestuous McCarthy era – a brilliant successor to American Pastoral, I Married a Communist charts the rise and fall of Ira Ringold, an American roughneck who begins life as a ditch digger in 1930s New Jersey, becoming a big-time radio hotshot in the 1940s. In his heyday as a star – and as a zealous, bullying supporter of ‘progressive’ political causes – Ira marries Hollywood’s beloved leading lady, Eve Frame. Their glamorous honeymoon is short-lived, however, and it is the publication of Eve’s scandalous bestselling expose that identifies Ira as ‘an American taking his orders from Moscow’.

In this story of cruelty, betrayal, and savage revenge, anti-Communist fever pollutes national politics and infects the relationships of ordinary Americans; friends become deadly enemies, parents and children tragically estranged, lovers blacklisted and felled from vertiginous heights.

For any inquiries about joining the book club please send an email by clicking here.