April 05

Gary Francione, Anna Charlton, Bill Tara and Marlene Watson-Tara

Why Vegan? Creating a Healthy Future for Human and Non-Human Life
Reuben College 9:30am Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Richard Coles talks to Triona Adams

Murder under the Mistletoe
Sheldonian Theatre 10:00am Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Ashley Jackson

Oxford’s War 1939-1945
Weston Lecture Theatre 10:00am Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Isabel Thomas

The Bedtime Book of Even More Impossible Questions CANCELLED
Pusey House: Chapel 10:00am Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Matt Bothwell introduced by Francesca MacLennan

Astrophysics for Supervillains: The Great Alien Hunt SOLD OUT
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 3 10:00am Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Anthony Seldon, Paul Johnson, Meg Russell and John Kampfner

The Conservative Effect, 2010–2024. 14 Wasted Years?
Sheldonian Theatre 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Tracy Chevalier talks to Ben Lawrence

The Glassmaker SOLD OUT
Pusey House: Chapel 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Kelly Grovier

How Banksy Saved Art History
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Darrin McMahon introduced by Miles Young

Equality: The History of Elusive Idea
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Saqib Qureshi

Being Muslim Today: Reclaiming the Faith from Orthodoxy and Islamophobia
Weston Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Rob Biddulph

Draw with Rob: Vehicles
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 1 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Michel Brahic talks to

Power of Prions: The Proteins That Can Cause Alzheimer’s and Other Diseases
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 3 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Simon Armitage in conversation with Rebecca Jones

An Audience with Poet Laureate Simon Armitage
Sheldonian Theatre 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Tony Juniper talks to Tom Heap

Just Earth: How a Fairer World will save the Planet
Pusey House: Chapel 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Irenosen Okojie talks to Ellah P Wakatama

Curandera
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Alastair Lack

Literary Oxford with Alastair Lack SOLD OUT
Meet outside St John’s College Lodge (main entrance), St Giles 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Jordi Pigem talks to Iain McGilchrist

Consciousness or Collapse
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Shannon Monaghan

To Die with Such Men: Frontline Stories from Ukraine’s International Legion
Weston Lecture Theatre 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Korky Paul and Lucy Findlay

Winnie and Wilbur
Weston Library: Blackwell Hall 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
David Goodhart

The Care Dilemma: How to Care Enough in the Age of Sex Equality
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 3 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Neill Cameron, Gary Northfield and Abby Bulmer

The Phoenix: The Great Comic Book Draw Off
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 1 2:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Louisa Treger Suzi Feay

The Paris Muse
Pusey House: Chapel 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
John Kampfner

The UK and Germany: Our Changing Relationship
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, Nigel Biggar and Richard Sanders chaired by Gary Francione

Oxford Debates. Woke and Free Speech: Universities and Beyond
Sheldonian Theatre 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Katherine Woodfine, Sufiya Ahmed and Patrice Lawrence chaired by Rachel Chivers Khoo

The Joy of Mystery
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 3 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Graham Brady talks to Anthony Seldon

Kingmaker: Secrets, Lies, and the Truth about Five Prime Ministers
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 1 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Masud Husain

Our Brains, Our Selves: What a Neurologist’s Patients Taught Him About the Brain
Weston Lecture Theatre 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Carlo Greppi talks to Lucian Hudson

A Man of Few Words: The Bricklayer of Auschwitz who Saved Primo Levi
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 4:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Ian Goldin

The Shortest History of Migration
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Robert D Kaplan

The American Lecture. Wasteland: A World in Permanent Crisis
Sheldonian Theatre 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Tom Heap talks to Christoph Warrack

Land Smart: How to Give People and Nature the Space to Thrive
Weston Lecture Theatre 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Daniel Light and Mick Conefrey chaired by Stephen Law

Triumph and Tragedy: The Lure of the Mountains
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 1 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Georgina Howard

In the Footsteps of Smugglers: My Life on a Basque Mountain
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Liz Hyder and Tom de Freston chaired by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

The Twelve
Oxford University Mathematical Institute: Lecture Theatre 3 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Samantha Shannon in conversation with Kate Dylan

Crafting Immersive Worlds
Pusey House: Chapel 6:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Marlene Watson-Tara

Closing Dinner. Guest Speaker His Excellency Pedro Serrano European Union Ambassador to the United Kingdom SOLD OUT
Exeter College: Hall 7:30pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event

Festival information:

The Oxford Literary Festival is intellectual Viagra.

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.

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 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.

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.