BMI kicks off 170th anniversary celebrations by welcoming new president
The Birmingham & Midlands Institute (BMI) is celebrating their 170th anniversary this year with the appointment of Professor Sir Paul Nurse (pictured) as the new president.
BMI was founded 170 years ago, in 1854, for the Diffusion and Advancement of Science, Literature and the Arts for all classes of people in the Midland counties. The University of Aston and the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire can trace their roots back to the Institute.
Sir Paul, who is a geneticist, former President of the Royal Society and Chief Executive and Director of the Francis Crick Institute, will be the 169th president of the institute.
He was awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, along with Leland Hartwell and Tim Hunt, for their discoveries of protein molecules that control the division of cells in the cell cycle.
He was appointed Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour (CH) in the 2022 New Year Honours for services to science and medicine in the UK and abroad. In November 2022, the King appointed him to the Order of Merit.
Sir Paul will be formally elected as 169th president at the AGM on 23 November.
Sir Pual said: “I am delighted to have the honour of becoming the 169th President of the BMI, joining the esteemed company of worthy individuals who have served over the past 170 years including most recently Professor Sir David Cannadine who is standing down following a three-year term in the post.”
Meanwhile, outgoing president professor Sir David Cannadine, has selected David Edgar to be the recipient of this year’s President’s Medal, due to his long and distinguished career as a playwright.
David Edgar has been writing plays professionally since 1971. His original plays for the Royal Shakespeare Company include Destiny (1976), Maydays (1983, Plays and Players best play award, revived in 2018) and Pentecost (1994, Evening Standard best play award).
His plays for the National Theatre include a new version of his 1985 community play for Dorchester, Entertaining Strangers (1988) The Shape of the Table (1990), Albert Speer (2000) and Playing with Fire (2005).
His RSC adaptations include a multi-award-winning adaptation of Dickens’ Nicholas Nickleby (1980-1, later Channel 4), Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1991) and A Christmas Carol (2017-2022).
In 1978 he wrote an adaptation of Mary Barnes: two Accounts of a Journey through Madness (Birmingham Rep then Royal Court).
He writes regularly for the Guardian, the London Review of Books and other periodicals. He is a past President of the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain and a theatre negotiator for the union, which presented him an Outstanding Contribution award at the 2023 WGGB awards.
In 1989, David founded Britain's first graduate playwriting course, at the University of Birmingham, and recently taught on Stephanie Dale’s writing course at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. His book about playwriting, How Plays Work, was published by Nick Hern Books in 2009 and republished in 2021.
The President’s Medal was established in 2022 by the board of directors to be awarded annually to those who have promoted the Diffusion and Advancement of Science, Literature and the Arts.
Recipients of the Medal can be anyone based in the Midland counties who has done or achieved something suitably meritorious, which the Institute sees fit to recognise and reward.
The medal is designed and made in Birmingham by Thomas Fattorini Ltd, based in the Jewellery Quarter and is 100 mm in diameter.
