The Gillian Rose Memorial Lecture Conference 2025 – Swedenborg Hall, London, 18-19 June 2025

‘Keep your mind in hell, and despair not’ – Rose’s discovery of Silouan the Athonite’s maxim provided the occasion for Love’s Work and guided its weaving journey along the quotidian verges of hell and despair. Whether passing through the three cities of death or across the thresholds of stormed paradises, Rose’s work refuses any alleviation of the state of perdition. For her, trying to keep the mind out of hell is the real council of despair. And yet the promise that sustains her season in hell is not the humility of Christian hope taught by the Athonite nor the pride of Stephen Daedalus evoked throughout Love’s Work, but one of divine comedy or fidelity to the movements of the bacchanalian revel and repose in its sin. The Gillian Rose Memorial Lecture conference this year departs from Love’s Work in an exploration of the play of promise and perdition throughout the full range of Rose’s philosophical writing.