When Anthony Burgess sailed from Southampton as a colonial civil servant in August 1954, he had little idea about the change that lay ahead. Five weeks later, he was installed in his new post as an English teacher at the Malay College in Kuala Kangsar, a provincial town in the state of Perak. The college was then known as the ‘Eton of the East’.

This brand new exhibition explores the impact of Burgess’s experiences in Malaya on his literary work, especially his three Malayan novels Time for a Tiger (1956), The Enemy in the Blanket (1958) and Beds in the East (1959).

“I was being interviewed for a job in a Malayan college, which I denied ever having applied for. But gradually I became reconciled to the idea of going to this particular place, went to the East, fell in love with it, and have been there ever since.” Anthony Burgess (1959)

The exhibition will be launched at 7pm on 9 December 2016. There will be wine, seasonal treats and a talk by the exhibition’s curator Dr Graham Foster. Places are limited – register here now.