6th December - Talk at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

The Quakers Tea Table Overturn'd: Moral Dangers of the 18th Century Tea Party
Talk by Oliver Pickering and Liz Stainforth. Free, no booking necessary

Monday, 6 December 2010, 5.15pm Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery,University of Leeds

Come and find out about the origins of the great British institution of tea drinking. Believe it or not, the tea party was a controversial and highly debated topic throughout the 18th century, regarded by some as a sign of weakening moral standards and by others as the height of refined social intercourse. The talk includes a discussion of the unpublished 1717 poem The Quakers Tea Table Overturn'd, from a manuscript held in Special Collections at Leeds University Library. It highlights a contemporary concern that young people in Quaker families may be tempted to partake of 'worldly pleasures' through indulging in the fashion for tea parties.

The development of tea drinking is traced through observations made by such eminent contemporaries as Jane Austen, William Cobbett and Samuel Johnson. The talk is held in association with the Gallery's temporary exhibition of late 18th century tea equipage, Vanity Ware: Affordable Luxury in the Late Georgian Period.