Gary-francione
Gary Francione
Kate-levey
Kate Levey
Richard-canning
Richard Canning
Gerri-kimber
Gerri Kimber

Remembering Brigid Brophy: Visionary Writer, Feminist and Animal rights Campaigner

Gary Francione, Kate Levey, Richard Canning and Gerri Kimber chaired by Michael Caines

Wednesday, 20 March 2024

4:00pm

1 hour

Bodleian: Divinity School

£7 - £13.50

Law and philosophy professor Gary Francione, Brigid Brophy experts Professor Richard Canning and Dr Gerri Kimber and Brophy’s daughter Kate Levey discuss the life and work of the novelist, essayist, feminist, and animal rights campaigner Brigid Brophy.

Brophy was an Anglo-Irish writer and polemicist who campaigned on many fronts including vegetarianism, humanism, feminism, gay rights and animal rights. She is particularly known for igniting the debate about animal rights.

Francione, a world- leading authority on animal rights and the first academic to teach animal rights theory in an American law school, says Brophy was ahead of her time on animal rights and deserves to be better known. Her thinking, expressed in a series of essays in the 1960s and 1970s, laid the seeds of animal rights theory but was ignored or erased by contemporary and mainly male philosophers. Francione is author with his wife Anna Charlton of Eat Like You Care: An Examination of the Morality of Eating Animals.

Canning, a professor of British and American literature, and Kimber, visiting professor in English at the University of Northampton, are editors of the recent book Brigid Brophy: Avant-Garde Writer, Critic, Activist. The book explores the whole of Brophy’s literary career and includes contributions on animal rights, vegetarianism, anti-vivisectionism, humanism, feminism and sexual politics. It includes contributions from Brophy herself, literary critics, animal rights activists and her daughter, Kate Levey. Levey is a retired primary teacher who now dedicates herself to perpetuating her mother’s legacy.

Discussions are chaired by Michael Caines, an editor at the Times Literary Supplement and co-editor of the Brixton Review of Books. He is the author of Shakespeare and the Eighteenth Century.

Part of the festival’s programme of Irish literature and culture.

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The Oxford Literary Festival sponsors, donors & partners

The Telegraph Festival media partner University of Oxford European Union Supported by the Delegation of the European Union to the UK Cultural Relations Platform Supporter of the festival's Voices of Europe programme Bodleian Libraries Festival cultural partner Oxford Martin School Festival ideas partner Oxford Mathematics Spanish Embassy The Spanish Embassy: supporters of the programme of Spanish literature and culture Cervantes Institute, London The Cervantes Institute, London Blackwell’s Festival on-site and online bookseller Symington Wines of the Douro Valley Compassion in World Farming Pasture to Plate Oxford Business College Where learning meets opportunity: education partners of the festival Old Bank Hotel Five-star hotel partners of The Oxford Collection Old Parsonage Hotel Five-star hotel partners of The Oxford Collection Oxford Brookes University Oxford International Centre for Publishing Critchleys Accountants to the festival Confucius Institute Voltaire Foundation Felicity Bryan Associates Goldmoney Properties Princeton University Press Prestige publishing partner. Celebrating 25 years in Europe in 2024 Oxford University Department for Continuing Education Jewish Book Week Partner of Oxford Literary Festival Jim Mellon Miles Young Tim and Marion Stevenson Martin and Elise Becket Smith Ian and Carol Sellars David Isaac Mary and Cecil Quillen Supporters of the programme of American literature and culture Other donors Yale University Press London New College New College founded 1379 Exeter College Exeter College: college home of the festival. Founded 1314 Worcester College Worcester College founded 1714 Trinity College Trinity College founded 1555 Magdalen College Magdalen College founded 1458 Reuben College Reuben College founded in 2019 Pusey House Brasenose College Brasenose College founded in 1512 New Dutch Writing Human Ecology Project MACROVegan Bear Ram Elk Festival Digital Strategy & Web Design Racalia Olive Oil Olive oil from Sicily Paul Bloomfield Ltd University of Oxford Alumni Office Alumni Office The Sheldonian Theatre Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies Oxford University Images Oxford University Images CAV Oxford The Litmus Partnership Schoolreaders Windrush Group The Oxford Times BBC Radio Oxford Local radio partner Conference Oxford Ox in a Box OX magazine