March 31

Peter McCullough

‘Jesus Wept’: A Sermon by John Donne
Lincoln College: Chapel 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Alexandra Harris and Hermione Lee

Writing Lives, Shaping Books
Bodleian: Convocation House 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Diarmaid MacCulloch talks to Jane Shaw

Lower than the Angels: A History of Sex and Christianity
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
John S Tregoning

Live Forever? A Curious Scientist’s Guide to Wellness, Ageing and Death
Department for Continuing Education: Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Simon Park

Wreckers: Disaster in the Age of Discovery
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Clare Chambers talks to Lucy Atkins

Shy Creatures
Pusey House: Chapel 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Jem Poster and Sarah Burton

Couldn’t Put it Down: How Writers Keep Readers Reading
Trinity College: Garden Room Levine Building 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Daisy Dunn

The Missing Thread: A New History of the Ancient World Through the Women Who Shaped It
Bodleian: Convocation House 2:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Andrew Blick

Could it Happen Here: The Day a Prime Minister Refuses to Resign
Pusey House: Chapel 2:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Dani Robertson

All Through the Night: How Dark Skies Can Save Our World
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 2:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Nigel Shadbolt

As if Human: Ethics and Artificial Intelligence
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 2:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Susana Monsó

Playing Possum: How Animals Understand Death
Department for Continuing Education: Lecture Theatre 2:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Martin Gayford

How Painting Happens (and Why it Matters)
Weston Lecture Theatre 4:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Tim Birkhead

The Great Auk: Its Extraordinary Life, Hideous Death and Mysterious Afterlife
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 4:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Peter Lamont

Radical Thinking: How to see the Bigger Picture – with Magic
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 4:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
James Crossland

Fighting Bolsheviks, Fooling Nazis and Making History: the Extraordinary Life of Robert Bruce Lockhart
Weston Lecture Theatre 6:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Sinclair McKay

Saint Petersburg: Sacrifice and Redemption in the City That Defied Hitler
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 6:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Vernon Bogdanor talks to Andrew Blick

Making the Weather: Six Politicians Who Changed Modern Britain
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 6:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Timothy Garton Ash talks to Chris Patten

Lord Patten Free Speech Lecture: Freedom of Expression is our Lifeblood
Sheldonian Theatre 6:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Diana Janney

A Man of Understanding
Trinity College: Garden Room Levine Building 6:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event

Festival information:

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

I came away buzzing and reassured that we still have in this century a wide ranging community fascinated not just by famous authors (I’ve rarely seen so many concentrated in one place) but by challenging ideas and questions.

The Oxford Literary Festival is intellectual Viagra.

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.

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.

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.

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.