Athlete Jessica Ennis-Hill and actor Toby Jones join Oxford festival line-up

Athlete Jessica Ennis-Hill and actor Toby Jones join Oxford festiv

London Olympic gold medal winner and popular athlete Jessica Ennis-Hill and leading screen actor Toby Jones – star of the recent Dad’s Army film and the latest BBC series of Sherlock – have joined this year’s festival line-up.

Ennis-Hill, pictured right, launches her new series of children’s books, Evie’s Magic Bracelet, while Jones, pictured below left, talks about his life and about how he interprets the written word in his performances.

Other major events added to the line-up include two of the world’s leading experts on terrorism, Professor Richard English and the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford Professor Louise Richardson, looking at the history of terrorism and asking whether it actually works.

Bestselling US author Paul Auster appears at a preview event on Wednesday, March 8, to talk about his first novel in seven years, 4 3 2 1.

Tickets are already selling fast for the festival, which includes appearances by novelists Hilary Mantel, Vikram Seth, Alexander McCall Smith and William Boyd, poet Simon Armitage; Nobel-winning scientist Paul Nurse, international cellist Steven Isserlis, and actor Simon Callow.

The 2017 festival takes place between Saturday March 25 and Sunday April 2. You can book online on this website, at our new telephone box office on 0333 666 3366*, or in person at Oxford Visitor Information Centre*, Broad Street, Oxford.

* A £1.50 agent’s booking fee applies to all bookings made by phone and at the visitor information centre.