Environment

David Howe

Extraction to Extinction: Rethinking our Relationship with the Earth’s Natural Resources
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 2:00pm Sat 26 Saturday, 26 March 2022 See this event
Fred Pearce

A Trillion Trees: How We Can Reforest Our World
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 10:00am Sun 27 Sunday, 27 March 2022 See this event
Nicola Chester Interviewed by Melissa Harrison

On Gallows Down: Place, Protest, and Belonging
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 4:00pm Sun 27 Sunday, 27 March 2022 See this event
Peter Stott

Hot Air: The Inside Story of the Battle Against Climate Change Denial
St Cross College 2:00pm Tue 29 Tuesday, 29 March 2022 See this event
Patrick Curry

Enchantment: Wonder in Modern Life
St Cross College 4:00pm Tue 29 Mar Tuesday, 29 March 2022 See this event
Nick Higham

The Mercenary River. Private Greed, Public Good: A History of London’s Water
Weston Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Thu 31 Thursday, 31 March 2022 See this event
Alison Richard

The Sloth Lemur’s Song: Madagascar from the Deep Past to the Uncertain Present
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 12:00pm Thu 31 Thursday, 31 March 2022 See this event
Philip Lymbery Interviewed by Nick Higham

Dead Zone: Where the Wild Things Were
Blackwell’s bookshop 12:00pm Fri 1 Friday, 1 April 2022 See this event
Duncan Minshull and Will Self

Where My Feet Fall: Going for A Walk in Twenty Stories SOLD OUT
Blackwell’s bookshop 6:00pm Fri 1 Friday, 1 April 2022 See this event
Joanna Lumley Interviewed by Philip Lymbery

The True Meaning of Compassion: The Peter Roberts Memorial Lecture
Sheldonian Theatre 12:00pm Sat 2 Saturday, 2 April 2022 See this event
Christopher Lloyd

It’s Up to Us: A Children’s Terra Carta for Nature, People and the Planet
Weston Lecture Theatre 4:00pm Sun 3 Sunday, 3 April 2022 See this event
Philip Lymbery and Deborah Meaden by Matthew Stadlen

Sixty Harvests Left: How to Reach a Nature-Friendly Future
Sheldonian Theatre 6:00pm Fri 16 Friday, 16 September 2022 See this event

Festival information:

Every literary festival stays in an author’s mind for slightly individual reasons. I shall remember the Oxford festival for: - the size of the audience: at the top end of the range - their intelligence – this makes a huge difference for a speaker. In the Oxford audience I encountered many experts in the field my book covered and even one of the ambassadors I’d quoted - the beauty and the grace of the place itself – incomparable - the willingness of my hearers to buy books afterwards; I’ve never sold more.

The Oxford festival is the most elegant and atmospheric of literary festivals. It’s a pleasure to both attend and perform there.

I loved the whole atmosphere of the Oxford Literary Festival. From breakfast, alongside some of the attendees, who were talking books with each other a mile a minute, to the public event at The Sheldonian where everyone was lively and engaged – I felt I had arrived in a kind of literary heaven.

It was a privilege for me to visit the festival to receive the Bodley Medal. As an incidental blessing I saw Oxford at its most mysterious and atmospheric. It was a day of piercing cold and as I walked through the twilight from the Sheldonian to Christ Church, the streets were empty and the whole city was shutting itself away. Christ Church was silent except for the footfall of unseen persons around corners and the sounds of evensong creeping from behind closed doors. For the first time I understood thoroughly the power of college ghost stories.

The Oxford Literary Festival has in my mind become the leading literary festival of the year. The organisation, the roster of speakers, the ambience and the sheer quality of it all is superb. May it now go from strength to strength each year stretching its ambition more and more. I believe it will.

The night in Oxford was the most beautiful event I have ever done. Not just the spectacular setting (of the Sheldonian), but an unforgettable evening.

Often as an author, I only occasionally get to meet the public who buy and read my books. The Oxford Literary Festival was a special opportunity for me and certainly one of the highlights of my career – it was an honour I will never forget.