POET and outspoken critic Tom Paulin will be giving his first lecture in the Faithful City to mark the 10th anniversary of the death of Worcester's most famous historian.

Paulin, who is a regular on BBC 2's Newsnight Review, will be giving this year's E P Thompson Memorial Lecture.

Edward Thompson is regarded as one of the great historians of his generation as well as a leading campaigner against nuclear weapons and leader of peace movements in the UK and Europe.

His most famous work The Making of the English Working Class also celebrates it 40th anniversary this year.

Paulin's first lecture in Worcester will be in honour of the man he describes as a "a great historian and a great visionary."

"I've known his work for about 37 years," said Paulin, who lectures in English Literature at Oxford's Hertford College.

"I remember back in the 60s when I was at school my parents bought a copy of The Making of the English Working Class.

"I never met him, sadly, but he was a great inspiration,"

"I did hear him lecture once at Oxford but the great experience was when he wrote to me about something I had written about Philip Larkin."

Temperament

Paulin, who had studied at Hull University while Larkin had been librarian there, wrote a piece in the Times Literary Supplement about the temperament of the poet.

A few months before Thompson died in 1993 he wrote to Paulin.

"He (EP Thompson) said he agreed with me and said didn't like Larkin's poetry very much," said Paulin.

"I admire Larkin's poetry very much, the piece was more about his character."

Paulin's subject for this year's EP Thompson Memorial Lecture will be a little known work by essayist William Hazlitt called The Eloquence of the British Senate first printed in 1808.

Published in two volumes the work is a collection of the best speeches made in Parliament from the beginning of the reign of Charles I in 1625 until 1808.

"The lecture is about the British idea of free speech," said the critic.

"It is a very interesting work and very neglected. I've only recently gone through it in detail."

The lecture organised by the Friends of E P Thompson will be held on Thursday, June 5 between 6.30pm and 9pm in the Baptist Church Rooms, Sansome Walk in Worcester.

Tickets are £3, £2 concessions from 01886 821155.