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Charles Lewsen In
How Pleasant to Know Mr. Lear

In July 2000 Charles Lewsen gave a performance at the Redgrave Theatre in Bristol of the solo theatre piece, How Pleasant to Know Mr. Lear, first given in 1968 at Hampstead Theatre and the Edinburgh Festival, and subsequently at venues throughout Britain, and festivals in Tel Aviv and Charleston, South Carolina.

The Bristol performance was given in aid of the Friends of the Bristol Oncology Centre, who published an illustrated Souvenir Programme with a range of poetic and scholarly insights into aspects of Lear including his epilepsy, and what is probably the only tribute to Foss by a poet other than Lear.

With Christmas approaching, visitors to the website may like to know that they can buy copies of the Programme.

The Bristol Oncology Centre cannot rely on the National Health Service for all its needs; and it would be considerably less effective without the help of the Friends, whose role is to create an environment that is welcoming and easeful for patients, to fund research, and to enable to the Centre to acquire vital equipment.

In the past the Friends have paid for the reception areas and their decoration, and for the havens of roof garden and quiet room; they have set up the Clinical Trials Unit, and provided funds for Tumour Management research; they have also enabled the Centre to acquire an MRI scanner that provides the best imaging not just in the UK but in nearly the whole world.

This year they need to find about £60,000 for salaries, £8-9,000 to send nurses and radiographers on courses and seminars, £7,000 to keep the library abreast of the rapidly changing world of cancer treatment, and £6-00 to support research into fatigue management. Their largest commitment is to raising £550,000 for a Synergy Elekta, a machine whose ability to respond to the body's constant changes brings to radiation therapy a new standard of precision and safety to surrounding tissue.

By buying a Souvenir Programme, you can make a contribution, however modest, to this vital work.

For contents of the Programme and details, click.

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