George Eliot’s house to be converted into Arabic school

GEORGE ELIOT’S Coventry home is to be converted into an Arabic school – just as news broke that the city has been named the UK’S next City of Culture.

Eliot, the pen name for Mary Anne Evans, lived at Bird Grove house from the mid-1800s. However, there are plans to convert the whitewashed house, in a road named after the author, into the Al Amal Arabic School. Signs outside the home, which is owned by four people, including Rois Ali, a Labour councillor for Coventry City Council, and three members of the Coventry Bangladesh Centre, detail the plans.

But campaigners from the George Eliot Fellowship are furious. John Burton, 74, its chairman, said: “When I heard about the plans to convert the house into an Arabic school, I was absolutely outraged. This is certainly not the way that we should be recognising one of this nation’s great authors.”

The building that housed the Bangladeshi Community Centre from 2003 to 2016 is empty and has fallen into disrepair. A plaque displaying its literary provenance has been removed. It was while living at the Grade Ii-listed property in Foleshill that Eliot wrote her first major work, The Life of Jesus.

Mr Burton said the building should be turned into a George Eliot museum.

“I think it’s incredibly ironic that Coventry was running to be City of Culture for 2021, and yet nothing is being done to remember one of our cultural icons,” he added.

A spokesperson for Coventry City Council said: “We have not been formally notified of any plans but we will monitor the situation.”