List of In Our Time programmes

In Our Time is a radio discussion programme exploring a wide variety of historical topics, broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in the United Kingdom since 1998 and hosted by Melvyn Bragg. Since 2011, all episodes have been available to download as individual podcasts.[1]

Programmes

1998-1999

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
15 October 1998 War in the 20th Century Michael Ignatieff, writer, broadcaster and biographer of Isaiah Berlin
Michael Howard, formerly Regius Professor of History, Oxford University and joint editor of the new Oxford History of the Twentieth Century
22 October 1998 Politics in the 20th Century Gore Vidal, American writer, commentator and author of The Smithsonian Institution
Alan Clark, historian, politician and author of The Tories: Conservatives and the Nation State, 1922–97
29 October 1998 Science's Revelations Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist, reader in Zoology and Fellow of New College, Oxford
Charles Simonyi Chair of Public Understanding of Science, Oxford University and author of Unweaving The Rainbow: Science, Delusion and The Appetite For Wonder
Ian McEwan, novelist, and author of the Booker Prize-winning novel Amsterdam
5 November 1998 Science in the 20th century John Gribbin, Visiting Fellow in Astronomy, University of Sussex and consultant to New Scientist
Mary Midgley, moral philosopher and former Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University of Newcastle
12 November 1998 The City in the 20th Century Peter Hall, Professor of Planning at the Bartlett School of Architecture and Planning, University College, London, Fellow of the British Academy and a member of the Academia Europaea
Doreen Massey, Professor of Geography, Faculty of Social Sciences, Open University and recipient of the Vautrin Lud International Geography Prize and the Victoria Medal of the Royal Geographical Society
19 November 1998 The Brain and Consciousness Steven Rose, Professor of Biology and Director of the Brain and Behaviour Research Group, Open University
Dan Robinson, Distinguished Research Professor, Georgetown University and visiting lecturer in Philosophy and Senior Member of Linacre College, Oxford
26 November 1998 Work in the 20th Century Richard Sennett, visiting professor, London School of Economics and author of The Corrosion of Character – the Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism
Theodore Zeldin, historian and Fellow of St Antony's College, Oxford
Melanie Phillips, columnist on The Sunday Times and currently working on a book about The Sex Change State
3 December 1998 History's relevance in the 20th century Simon Schama, Old Dominion Professor of Humanities, Columbia University in New York and currently filming a 16-part series for BBC Television on the history of Britain
Lady Antonia Fraser, historian, writer and author of biographies of Mary Queen of Scots, Cromwell and Charles II
10 December 1998 Cultural rights in the 20th Century Homi Bhabha, Professor in English Literature and Art, Chicago University, and Visiting Professor of the Humanities, University College London
John N. Gray, Professor of European Thought, London School of Economics
17 December 1998 The American Century Harry Evans, former editor of The Sunday Times and author of The American Century
John Lloyd, associate editor of the New Statesman and former Times correspondent in Moscow and East European Editor of the Financial Times
24 December 1998 Neuroscience in the 20th Century Susan Greenfield, director of the Royal Institution, Professor of Pharmacology, Oxford University and Professor of Physics at Gresham College
Vilayanur S. Ramachandran, Professor of Neuroscience and Psychology, Director of the Brain Perception Laboratory, University of California, San Diego and Professor at the Salk Institute
31 December 1998 The British Empire's Legacy Catherine Hall, Professor Modern British Social and Cultural History, University College, London
Linda Colley, currently holder of the Leverhulme Research Professorship at the London School of Economics and former Professor of History, Yale University
7 January 1999 Feminism Helena Cronin, Co-director of the Centre for the Philosophy of the Natural and Social Sciences, London School of Economics
Germaine Greer, Professor of English and Comparative Studies, Warwick University
14 January 1999 Genetic Engineering Grahame Bulfield, geneticist, honorary professor, Edinburgh University and Director of the Roslin Institute, Edinburgh
Bryan Appleyard, features writer for The Sunday Times and author of Brave New Worlds: Genetics and the Human Experience
21 January 1999 Modern Culture Will Self, writer and novelist
Roger Scruton, novelist, philosopher and former Professor at Birkbeck College, London
28 January 1999 Ageing Alan Walker, social gerontologist, advisor to the UN's programme on Ageing and has chaired the European Commission's observatory on Ageing and Older People
Tom Kirkwood, Britain's first professor of Biological Gerontology, University of Manchester and President of the British Society for Research into Ageing
4 February 1999 Psychoanalysis and its Legacy Juliet Mitchell, psychoanalyst, Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, Department of Political and Social Sciences
Adam Phillips, psychoanalyst and author of The Beast in the Nursery
11 February 1999 Language and the Mind Jonathan Miller, medical doctor, performer, broadcaster, author and film and opera director
Steven Pinker, cognitive scientist, Professor of Psychology and Director of the Centre for Neuroscience, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
18 February 1999 Space in Religion and Science John Polkinghorne, Fellow of Queen's College, Cambridge and Canon Theologian of Liverpool
Margaret Wertheim, science writer and author of The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace: A History of Space from Dante to the Internet
25 February 1999 The Avant Garde's Decline and Fall in the 20th Century Eric Hobsbawm, eminent historian and author of Behind The Times: The Decline and Fall of the Twentieth Century Avant-Gardes
Frances Morris, specialist in contemporary art and Art Programme Curator for the Tate Gallery of Modern Art
4 March 1999 Shakespeare and Literary Criticism Harold Bloom, literary critic, Professor of Humanities, Yale University and Berg Professor of English, New York University
Jacqueline Rose, literary critic and Professor of English, University of London
11 March 1999 History as Science Jared Diamond, ecologist and physiologist at the Los Angeles Medical School, University of California, and author of Guns, Germs and Steel
Richard J. Evans, Professor of Modern History, Cambridge University
18 March 1999 Animal Experiments and Rights Colin Blakemore, Professor of Physiology, Oxford University, President of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of the Royal Society and targeted in the 1980s by animal welfare activists protesting at his research methods
Lynda Birkebiologist, teacher at Lancaster and Warwick Universities, and previously worked for 7 years in animal behaviour at the Open University
25 March 1999 Architecture in the 20th Century Daniel Libeskind, architect of the Jewish Museum in Berlin and the Spiral Extension to London's Victoria and Albert Museum
Richard Weston, architect and lecturer at De Montfort University
1 April 1999 Good and Evil Leszek Kołakowski, author and Professor of Philosophy, Oxford University
Galen Strawson, author and Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy, Jesus College, Oxford
8 April 1999 Writing and Political Oppression Nadine Gordimer, Nobel Prize-winning South African novelist
Ariel Dorfman, Chilean journalist, scholar and author of Death and the Maiden
15 April 1999 Evolution John Maynard Smith, evolutionary biological theorist and Emeritus Professor of Biology at the University of Sussex
Colin Tudge, writer, journalist and research fellow at the Centre for Philosophy
22 April 1999 Fundamentalism Karen Armstrong, writer on the history of religious ideas and author of A History of God: From Abraham to the Present
Tariq Ali, film-maker, writer and author of The Book of Saladin
29 April 1999 Artificial Intelligence Igor Aleksander, professor, Imperial College London and inventor of Magnus – a neural computer which he says is an artificially conscious machine
John Searle, Professor of Philosophy, University of California and one of only two people in the world to invent an argument, the Chinese Room Argument, which destroys the plausibility of the idea of conscious machines
6 May 1999 Mathematics Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics and Gresham Professor of Geometry, University of Warwick
Brian Butterworth, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College, London
13 May 1999 Multiculturalism Stuart Hall, former Professor of Sociology, Open University and currently on a Commission set up by the Runnymede Trust looking at the future of multi-ethnic Britain
Avtar Brah, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, Birkbeck College, London University
20 May 1999 The Universe's Origins Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal and Royal Society Research Professor in Astronomy and Physics, Cambridge University
Paul Davies, theoretical physicist and Visiting Professor at Imperial College, London
27 May 1999 Memory and Culture Malcolm Bowie, Marshall Foch Professor of French Literature at Oxford University and Director of Oxford's European Humanities Research Centre
Nancy Wood, Chair of Media Studies, University of Sussex and author of Vectors of Memory
3 June 1999 Just War John Keane, Professor of Politics, University of Westminster and Director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy
Niall Ferguson, Fellow and Tutor in Modern History, Jesus College, Oxford and author of The Pity of War
10 June 1999 The Monarchy David Cannadine, Director of the Institute of Historical Research, London and former Lecturer in History and Fellow, Christ's College, Cambridge
Bea Campbell, sociologist, journalist and author of Diana, Princess of Wales
17 June 1999 The Great Disruption Francis Fukuyama, Hirst Professor of Public Policy, George Mason University, Washington, D.C., and author of The Great Disruption: Human Nature and the Reconstitution of Social Order
Amos Oz, author and Professor of Hebrew Literature, Ben-Gurion University, Beer-Sheva
24 June 1999 Capitalism Anatole Kaletsky, economics commentator and Associate Editor of The Times, and author of The Costs of Default and In the Shadow of Debt
Edward Luttwak, Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, D.C. and author of Turbo Capitalism: Winners and Losers in the Global Economy
1 July 1999 Intelligence Ken Richardson, educational psychologist, former Senior Lecturer, Open University and author of The Making of Intelligence
Michael Ruse, Philosopher of Biology, University of guelph, Ontario and author of Mystery of Mysteries: Is Evolution a Social Construction?
8 July 1999 Africa Henry Louis Gates Jr, Chair of the Afro-American Studies Department, Harvard University and presenter of the BBC 2 series Into Africa
Anthony Sampson, writer, journalist and author of Mandela: The Authorised Biography
15 July 1999 Truth, Lies and fiction Elena Lappin, novelist and author of an investigative essay published in Granta called "Truth and Lies", where she questions the veracity of the account of the Holocaust in the book Fragments by Binjamin Wilkomirski
Nick Groom, lecturer in English, University of Exeter
22 July 1999 Pain Patrick Wall, Professor of Physiology at St Thomas' Hospital, London and author of Pain: The Science of Suffering
Semir Zeki, Professor of Neurobiology at University College, London

1999-2000

From 6 April 2000, and the discussion on “The Natural Order” the programme moved from 30 minutes to a 45-minute format.

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
23 September 1999 Genetic Determinism Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics, University College London and author of Almost Like a Whale: The Origin of Species Updated
Matt Ridley, science journalist, chairman of the International Centre for Life and author of Genome: The autobiography of a species in 23 chapters
30 September 1999 Maths and Storytelling John Allen Paulos, Presidential Scholar of Mathematics, Temple University, Philadelphia and author of Once Upon a Number – The hidden mathematical logic of stories
Marina Warner, novelist, historian, critic, former Reith Lecturer and Visiting Professor at Birkbeck College, London
7 October 1999 Utopia A. C. Grayling, human rights campaigner, lecturer in philosophy at Birkbeck College, London and Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford
John Carey, distinguished critic, journalist, broadcaster, Merton Professor of English, Oxford University and editor of the Faber Book of Utopias
14 October 1999 The Nation State Norman Davies, Emeritus Professor, London University and author of The Isles: A History
Andrew Marr, former editor of The Independent and author of Ruling Britannia: the Failure and Future of British Democracy
21 October 1999 The Individual Richard Wollheim, Professor of Philosophy, University of California in Berkeley
Jonathan Dollimore, Professor of English, York University
28 October 1999 Atrocity in the 20th Century Jonathan Glover, philosopher and Director of the Centre of Medical Law and Ethics, King's College, London
Gwen Adshead, consultant psychiatrist, Broadmoor Special Hospital
4 November 1999 Education Mary Warnock, philosopher and educationalist
Ted Wragg, Professor of Education, University of Exeter
11 November 1999 The Novel D. J. Taylor, novelist, critic, biographer of Thackeray and author of After the War
Gillian Beer, King Edward VII Professor of English Literature, Cambridge University and Chairman of the Booker Prize judges 1997
18 November 1999 Progress Anthony O'Hear, Professor of Philosophy, University of Bradford
Adam Phillips, psychoanalyst and author of Darwin's Worms
25 November 1999 Consciousness Ted Honderich, philosopher and former Grote Professor of the Philosophy of Mind and Logic, University College London
Roger Penrose, physicist, mathematician and author of The Large, The Small, and the Human Mind
2 December 1999 Tragedy George Steiner, critic, Extraordinary Fellow, Churchill College, Cambridge and author of The Death of Tragedy
Catherine Belsey, Chair of the Centre for Critical and Cultural Theory, University of Cardiff and author of The Subject of Tragedy
9 December 1999 Childhood Christina Hardyment, social historian and author of The Future of the Family
Theodore Zeldin, Senior Fellow, St Antony's College, Oxford and author of An Intimate History of Humanity
16 December 1999 Medical Ethics Barry Jackson, consultant surgeon and President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England
Sheila McLean, Director of the Institute of Law and Ethics in Medicine, Glasgow University
23 December 1999 Prayer Russell Stannard, physicist, religious writer and author of The God Experiment
Andrew Samuels, Jungian analyst and Professor of Analytical Psychology, University of Essex
30 December 1999 Time Neil Johnson, theoretical physicist at the Clarendon Laboratory, Oxford University and Royal Institution Christmas Lectures 1999 on the subject of Time
Lee Smolin, cosmologist and Professor of Physics, Pennsylvania State University
6 January 2000 Climate Change John Houghton, Co-Chair of the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change – the United Nations' global warming science committee
George Monbiot, environmentalist, journalist and Visiting Professor, Department of Philosophy, Bristol University
13 January 2000 Information Technology Charles Leadbeater, Demos Research Associate and author of Living on Thin Air: The New Economy
Ian Angell, Professor of Information Systems, London School of Economics and author of The New Barbarian Manifesto: How to Survive the Information Age
20 January 2000 Masculinity in Literature Martin Amis, author of Money, Success and The Information
Cora Kaplan, feminist cultural critic and Professor of English, Southampton University
27 January 2000 Economic Rights Amartya Sen, Master of Trinity College, Cambridge and winner of the 1998 Nobel Prize in Economic Science
Will Hutton, former Editor of The Observer, Director of The Industrial Society and author of The State We're In
3 February 2000 Republicanism Sarah Barber, lecturer in the Department of History, Lancaster University and author of Regicide and Republicanism: Politics and Ethics in the English Revolution 1646–1659
Andrew Roberts, historian, journalist, conservative thinker and author of Salisbury: Victorian Titan
10 February 2000 Goethe and the Science of the Enlightenment Nicholas Boyle, Reader in German Literary and Intellectual History, Magdalene College, Cambridge, and biographer of Goethe
Simon Schaffer, Reader in the History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge University and Fellow of Darwin College, Cambridge
17 February 2000 Reading Kevin Sharpe, Professor of History, University of Southampton
Jacqueline Pearson, Professor of English Literature, Manchester University
24 February 2000 Grand unified theory Brian Greene, Professor of Physics and Mathematics, Columbia University and Cornell University
Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal and Royal Society Research Professor in Astronomy and Physics at Cambridge University
2 March 2000 Metamorphosis A. S. Byatt, novelist and one of the contributors to Ovid Metamorphosed
Catherine Bates, critic and research fellow, University of Warwick
9 March 2000 The Age of Doubt A. N. Wilson, novelist, biographer, journalist and author of God's Funeral
Victoria Glendinning, author, journalist and biographer of Anthony Trollope and Jonathan Swift
16 March 2000 Lenin Robert Service, lecturer in Russian History and Fellow of St Antony's College, Oxford and biographer of Lenin
Vitali Vitaliev, author, columnist, broadcaster former Soviet Journalist of the Year
23 March 2000 Materialism and the Consumer Rachel Bowlby, Professor of English, University of York and author of Carried Away: The Invention of Modern Shopping
William Gibson, science fiction writer and author of Neuromancer and All Tomorrow's Parties
30 March 2000 History and Understanding the Past Richard J. Evans, Professor of Modern History, University of Cambridge
Eric Hobsbawm, historian and author of The New Century
6 April 2000 The Natural Order Colin Tudge, writer, scientist and author of The Variety of Life: A Survey and a Celebration of all the Creatures that Have Ever Lived
Sandy Knapp, Research Botanist, Department of Botany, Natural History Museum, London
Henry Gee, Senior Editor of Nature and author of Deep Time: Cladistics, the Revolution in Evolution
13 April 2000 New Wars Michael Howard, Emeritus Professor of Modern History, Oxford University
Mary Kaldor, Director of the Programme on Global Civil Society, London School of Economics
Michael Rose, General. former Commander of the United Nations Protection Force in Bosnia and author of Fighting for Peace: Lessons from Bosnia
20 April 2000 Englishness Paul Langford, Professor of Modern History, University of Oxford
Peter Mandler, Professor of Modern History at London Guildhall University
Lola Young, Director of the National Museum and Archives of Black History and Culture.
27 April 2000 Human Origins Leslie Aiello, Professor of Biological Anthropology, University College London
Robert Foley, evolutionary ecologist, writer and lecturer in biological anthropology at Cambridge University
Mark Roberts, Field Archaeologist, Project Leader of Boxgrove excavation and the discoverer of Boxgrove Man
4 May 2000 Death Jonathan Dollimore, Professor of English, York University
Thomas Lynch, poet, essayist, funeral director and author of The Undertaking – Life Studies from the Dismal Trade
Marilyn Butler, Professor of English Literature and Rector of Exeter College, Oxford
11 May 2000 Shakespeare's Work Frank Kermode, literary critic and author of Shakespeare's Language
Michael Bogdanov, theatre, television, opera and film director and a founder member of the English Shakespeare Company
Germaine Greer, Professor of English and Comparative Studies, Warwick University
18 May 2000 The Wars of the Roses Helen Castor, Fellow and Director of Studies in History, Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge
Colin Richmond, Emeritus Professor of History, Keele University
Steven Gunn, Tudor historian and Fellow and Tutor in Modern History, Merton College, Oxford
25 May 2000 Chemical elements Paul Strathern, former lecturer in philosophy and science, Kingston University and author of Mendeleyev's Dream: The Quest for the Elements
Mary Archer, Visiting Professor of Chemistry at Imperial College, London
John Murrell, Emeritus Professor of Chemistry, University of Sussex
1 June 2000 The American Ideal Christopher Hitchens, writer, journalist and author of No One Left to Lie To: The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton
John Keane, Professor of Politics, University of Westminster and Director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy
Susan Sontag, cultural critics and essayists, and author of the novel In America
8 June 2000 The Renaissance Francis Ames-Lewis, Professor of History of Art, Birkbeck College
Peter Burke, Professor of Cultural History and Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Evelyn Welch, Reader in the History of Art, University of Sussex
15 June 2000 Inspiration and Genius Arthur I. Miller, Professor of History and Philosophy of Science, Department of Science & Technology, University College London
Michael Howe, Professor of Psychology, Exeter University
Juliet Mitchell, psychoanalyst and lecturer at Cambridge University
22 June 2000 Biography Richard Holmes, writer, biographer and the author of Sidetracks: Explorations of a Romantic Biographer
Nigel Hamilton, biographer, Director of the British Institute of Biography and Professor of Biography, De Montfort University
Amanda Foreman, biographer of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire.
29 June 2000 Imagination and Consciousness Gerald Edelman, Director of the Neurosciences Institute in California and winner of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1972
Igor Aleksander, Professor of Neural Engineering Systems, Imperial College, London
Margaret Boden, Professor of Philosophy and Psychology, University of Sussex

2000-2001

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
28 September 2000 London Peter Ackroyd, author of London: The Biography
Claire Tomalin, author and biographer of Samuel Pepys
Iain Sinclair poet, novelist and author of Liquid City and Lights Out for the Territory.
5 October 2000 Hitler in History Ian Kershaw, historian and biographer of Hitler
Niall Ferguson, fellow and tutor in Modern History at Jesus College Oxford
Mary Fulbrook, Professor of German History at University College London.
12 October 2000 The Romantics Jonathan Bate, Professor of English, University of Liverpool
Rosemary Ashton, Professor of English, University College London
Nicholas Roe, Professor of English, University of St Andrews
19 October 2000 Laws of Nature Mark Buchanan, physicist and author of Ubiquity
Frank Close, theoretical physicist and author of Lucifer's Legacy: The Meaning of Asymmetry
Nancy Cartwright, Professor of Philosophy, LSE
26 October 2000 The Tudor State John Guy, Professor of Modern History, University of St Andrews
Christopher Haigh, Tutor of Modern History at Christ Church, Oxford
Christine Carpenter, Fellow in History at New Hall, Cambridge
2 November 2000 Evolutionary Psychology Janet Radcliffe Richards, Reader in Bioethics, University College, London
Nicholas Humphrey, Professor of Psychology, New School For Social Research, New York
Steven Rose, Professor of Physic, Open University
9 November 2000 Psychoanalysis and Literature Adam Phillips, author of Promises Promises: Essays on Psychoanalysis and Literature
Malcolm Bowie, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature, Oxford University
Lisa Appignanesi, novelist and co-author of Freud's Women.
16 November 2000 Nihilism Rob Hopkins, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University of Birmingham
Raymond Tallis, doctor and philosopher
Catherine Belsey University of Cardiff
4 January 2001 Gothic Chris Baldick, Professor of English at Goldsmiths College, London and author of In Frankenstein's Shadow
A. N. Wilson, novelist, biographer, journalist and author of God's Funeral
Emma Clery, senior lecturer in the English Department at Sheffield Hallam University and author of The Rise of Supernatural Fiction
11 January 2001 Mathematics and Platonism Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics and Gresham Professor of Geometry, University of Warwick
Margaret Wertheim, science writer, journalist and author of Pythagoras' Trousers
John D. Barrow, Professor of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge.
18 January 2001 The Enlightenment in Britain Roy Porter, Professor in the Social History of Medicine, Wellcome Trust Centre of University College London
Linda Colley, Leverhulme Research Professor and School Professor of History, London School of Economics
Jeremy Black, Professor of History at Exeter University.
25 January 2001 Science and Religion Stephen Jay Gould, Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Professor of Geology, Harvard University
John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy, University of St Andrews and Stanton Lecturer in Divinity, Cambridge University
Hilary Rose, sociologist and Visiting Professor of Social Policy, Bradford University.
1 February 2001 Imperial Science Richard Ayton, Professor of History at the University of Virginia and author of Nature's Government: Science, Imperial Britain and the ‘Improvement' of the World
Maria Misra, Lecturer in Modern History and fellow of Keble College Oxford
Ziauddin Sardar, Professor of Science and Technology Policy, Middlesex University.
8 February 2001 Humanism Tony Davies, Professor and Head of the Department of English, University of Birmingham and author of Humanism
Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies, Queen Mary College, University of London and Honorary Fellow of King's College Cambridge
Simon Goldhill, Reader in Greek Literature and Culture at King's College Cambridge.
15 February 2001 The Restoration Mark Goldie, lecturer in History, Churchill College, University of Cambridge
Richard Ollard, author of The Image of the King: Charles I and Charles II
Clare Jackson, lecturer and Director of Studies in History, Trinity Hall, Cambridge
22 February 2001 Quantum Gravity John Gribbin, Visiting Fellow in Astronomy, University of Sussex
Lee Smolin, Professor of Physics, Centre for Gravitational Physics and Geometry, Pennsylvania State University and Visiting Professor of Physics at Imperial College, London
Janna Levin, Advanced Fellow, Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, Cambridge University
1 March 2001 Money Niall Ferguson, Professor of Political and Financial History at the University of Oxford
Richard J. Evans, Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge
Jane Humphries, reader in Economic History at Oxford University
15 March 2001 Shakespeare's Life Katherine Duncan-Jones, Professor of English at Somerville College, Oxford
John Sutherland, Professor of Modern English at University College, London and textual scholar
Grace Ioppolo, lecturer in English at the University of Reading
22 March 2001 Fossils Richard Corfield, Research Associate in the Department of Earth Sciences at Oxford University
Dianne Edwards, Distinguished Research Professor in Palaeobotany at Cardiff University
Richard Fortey, Senior Research Palaeontologist at the Natural History Museum
29 March 2001 The Philosophy of Love Roger Scruton, author of many books including Sexual Desire
Angie Hobbs, lecturer in philosophy at Warwick University
Thomas Docherty, Professor of English at the University of Kent
5 April 2001 The Roman Empire's Collapse in the 5th century Charlotte Roueché, historian of late antiquity at King's College London
David Womersley, Fellow and Tutor at Jesus College, Oxford and editor of Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
Richard Alston, Lecturer in Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London
12 April 2001 Black Holes Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal – 2001, Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Cambridge University
Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Professor of Physics at The Open University
Martin Ward, director of the X-Ray Astronomy Group at the University of Leicester
19 April 2001 The Glorious Revolution John Spurr, Reader in History at the University of Wales, Swansea
Rosemary Sweet, Lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Leicester
Scott Mandelbrote, Fellow and Director of Studies at Peterhouse, Cambridge
26 April 2001 Literary Modernism John Carey, Merton Professor of English Literature at Oxford University
Laura Marcus, Reader in English at the University of Sussex
Valentine Cunningham, Professor of English Language and Literature at the University of Oxford
3 May 2001 Evil Jones Erwin, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Limerick
Stephen Mulhall, Tutor in Philosophy at New College, Oxford University
Margaret Atkins, Lecturer in Theology at Trinity and All Saints College, University of Leeds
14 June 2001 The French Revolution's Legacy Stefan Collini, Professor of Intellectual History and English Literature at Cambridge University
Anne Janowitz, Professor of Romantic Poetry at Queen Mary College, London
Andrew Roberts, nineteenth century historian
21 June 2001 The Sonnet Frank Kermode, author of many books including Shakespeare's Language
Phillis Levin, Poet in Residence and Professor of English at Hofstra University
Jonathan Bate, King Alfred Professor of English at the University of Liverpool
28 June 2001 Existentialism A. C. Grayling, Reader in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Christina Howells, Professor of French at the University of Oxford, fellow of Wadham College
Simon Critchley, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Essex and author of A Companion to Continental Philosophy.
5 July 2001 The Earth's Origins Simon Winchester, author of The Map That Changed the World: the Tale of William Smith and the Birth of A Science
Cherry Lewis, geologist and author of The Dating Game: One Man's Search for the Age of the Earth
John Cosgrove, Structural Geologist from the Royal School of Mines at Imperial College, London
12 July 2001 Dickens Rosemary Ashton, Professor of English at University College London
Michael Slater, Professor of Victorian Literature at Birkbeck College, University of London and editor of The Dent Uniform Edition of Dickens' Journalism
John Bowen, Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Keele.
19 July 2001 Byzantium Charlotte Roueché, Reader in Classical and Byzantine Greek, King's College London
John Julius Norwich, author of a three-part history of Byzantium: The Early Centuries, The Apogee and Decline and Fall
Liz James, Senior Lecturer in the History of Art, University of Sussex.

2001-2002

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
18 October 2001 Democracy Melissa Lane, University Lecturer in the History of Political Thought
David Wootton, Professor of Intellectual History at Queen Mary College, London
Tim Winter, Assistant Muslim Chaplain at Cambridge University where he is lecturer in Islamic Studies
25 October 2001 Napoleon and Wellington Andrew Roberts, military historian
Mike Broers, University of Aberdeen
Belinda Beaton, from the Department of History of Art, at Oxford University
1 November 2001 Confucius Frances Wood, Curator of the Chinese section of the British Library
Tim Barrett, Professor of East Asian History at SOAS, the School of African and Oriental Studies at London University
Tao Tao Liu, Tutorial Fellow in Oriental Studies at Wadham College, Cambridge University
8 November 2001 The British Empire Maria Misra, Lecturer in Modern History and Fellow of Keble College Oxford
Peter Cain, Research Professor in History at Sheffield Hallam University
Catherine Hall, Professor of Modern Social and Cultural History at University College London
15 November 2001 Surrealism Dawn Adiss, Professor of Art History and Theory at the University of Essex
Malcolm Bowie, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature at Oxford University and a fellow of All Souls College
Darian Leader, the psychoanalyst
22 November 2001 Oceanography Margaret Deacon, visiting research fellow at Southampton Oceanography Centre and author of Scientists and the Sea
Tony Rice, biological oceanographer and author of Deep Ocean
Simon Schaffer, Reader in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge, and a fellow of Darwin College.
29 November 2001 Third Crusade Jonathan Riley-Smith, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University and author of many books on the Crusades
Carole Hillenbrand, Professor of Islamic History at the University of Edinburgh
Tariq Ali, novelist, playwright and author of The Book of Saladin
6 December 2001 Oscar Wilde Valentine Cunningham, Professor of English Language and Literature at Oxford University
Regenia Gagnier, Professor of English at the University of Exeter
Neil Sammells, Dean of Humanities at Bath Spa University and author of Wilde Style
13 December 2001 Genetics Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics and Head of the Galton Laboratory at University College London
Richard Dawkins, genetic scientist, Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University
Linda Partridge, Natural Environment Research Council Research Professor at the Galton Laboratory, University College London
20 December 2001 Rome and European Civilization Mary Beard, Reader in Classics at Cambridge University
Catharine Edwards, Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck College, London University
Greg Woolf, Professor of Ancient History at St Andrews University.
27 December 2001 History of food in Modern Europe Rebecca Spang, Lecturer in Modern History at University College London
Ivan Day, food historian
Felipe Fernández-Armesto, Professor of Modern History at Oxford University
3 January 2002 Sensibility Claire Tomalin, literary biographer and author of Jane Austen: A Life and The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft
John Mullan, Senior Lecturer in English at University College London
Hermione Lee, Goldsmiths Professor of English Literature, University of Oxford
10 January 2002 Nuclear Physics Jim Al-Khalili, Senior Lecturer in Physics at the University of Surrey
Christine Sutton, Particle Physicist and Lecturer in Physics at St Catherine's College Oxford
John Gribbin, Visiting Fellow in Astronomy at the University of Sussex
17 January 2002 Catharism Malcolm Barber, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Reading
Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval History at Queen Mary, University of London
Euan Cameron, Professor of Modern History at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne
24 January 2002 Happiness Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Simon Blackburn, Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge University
A. C. Grayling, Reader in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
31 January 2002 W. B. Yeats and Mysticism Roy Foster, Carroll Professor of Irish History at Oxford University
Warwick Gould, Director of the Institute of English Studies, University of London
Brenda Maddox, author of George's Ghosts: A New Life of W B Yeats
7 February 2002 The Universe's Shape Martin Rees, Royal Society Research Professor in Astronomy and Physics, Cambridge University
Julian Barbour, Independent Theoretical Physicist
Janna Levin, Advanced Fellow in Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge
14 February 2002 Anatomy – 2000 years of anatomical study Harold Ellis, Clinical Anatomist, School of Biomedical Sciences, King's College, London
Ruth Richardson, historian, and author of Death, Dissection and the Destitute, Phoenix Press
Andrew Cunningham, Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow in the History of Medicine, Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge University
21 February 2002 The Celts – what were the Celts in Britain really like? Barry Cunliffe, Professor of European Archaeology at Oxford University
Alistair Moffat, Historian and author of The Sea Kingdoms – The Story of Celtic Britain and Ireland
Miranda Aldhouse Green, Professor of Archaeology at the University of Wales
28 February 2002 Virtue – is it derived from reason? Galen Strawson, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading
Miranda Fricker, Lecturer in Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Roger Crisp, Uehiro Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy at St Anne's College, Oxford.
7 March 2002 John Milton – poet or politician? John Carey, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Oxford University
Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary College, University of London and Honorary Fellow of King's College Cambridge
Blair Worden, Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Sussex
14 March 2002 The Buddha – why has it captured the spirit of our age? Peter Harvey, Professor of Buddhist Studies at the University of Sunderland
Kate Crosby, Lecturer in Buddhist Studies, SOAS
Mahinda Deagallee, Lecturer in the Study of Religions, Bath Spa University College and a Buddhist Monk from the Theravada tradition in Sri Lanka
21 March 2002 Marriage – its various forms and the role of the State Janet Soskice, Reader in Modern Theology and Philosophical Theology, Cambridge University
Frederik Pedersen, Lecturer in History, Aberdeen University
Christina Hardyment, Social historian and journalist
28 March 2002 The Artist – a special kind of human being? Emma Barker, Lecturer in Art History, The Open University
Thomas Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck University of London
Tim Blanning, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
4 April 2002 Extraterrestrial life – new life within our solar system Simon Goodwin, Researcher in Astronomy, Cardiff University
Heather Couper, Space expert
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics, Warwick University
11 April 2002 Bohemia – what did it mean to be Bohemian? Norman Davies, Professor Emeritus, University of London
Karin Friedrich, Lecturer in History, School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London
Robert Pynsent, Professor of Czech and Slovak Literature, University College London
25 April 2002 Tolstoy – the influence of the Russian Novel A. N. Wilson, novelist, journalist and biographer of Tolstoy
Catriona Kelly, Reader in Russian, Oxford University
Sarah Hudspith, Lecturer in Russian, University of Leeds
2 May 2002 Physics of Reality – Quantum Mechanics Roger Penrose, Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics, Oxford University
Fay Dowker, Lecturer in Theoretical Physics, Queen Mary, University of London
Tony Sudbery, Professor of Mathematics, University of York
9 May 2002 The Examined Life – is an unexamined life worth living? A. C. Grayling, Reader in Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London
Janet Radcliffe Richards, Philosopher of Science and Reader in Bioethics, University College, London
Julian Baggini, editor, The Philosopher's Magazine and co-editor of New British Philosophy: The Interviews
16 May 2002 Chaos Theory – was the universe chaotic or orderly? Susan Greenfield, senior research fellow, Lincoln College, Oxford
David Papineau, Professor of the Philosophy of Science, King's College London
Neil Johnson, University Lecturer in Physics at Oxford University
23 May 2002 History of Drugs – their role in medicine and the arts Richard Davenport-Hines, historian and author of The Pursuit of Oblivion: A Global History of Narcotics
Sadie Plant, author of Writing on Drugs
Mike Jay, historian and author of Emperors of Dreams: Drugs in the Nineteenth Century
30 May 2002 The Grand Tour – what drove this desire for travel? Chloe Chard, Literary historian
Jeremy Black, Professor of History, University of Exeter
Edward Chaney, Professor of Fine and Decorative Arts, Southampton Institute
6 June 2002 The Soul – the key to our individuality as humans? Richard Sorabji, Gresham Professor of Rhetoric at Gresham College
Ruth Padel, poet and author
Martin Palmer, Theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
13 June 2002 The American West – was it an "experiment of liberty"? Frank McLynn, Visiting Professor in the Department of Literature, University of Strathclyde
Jenni Calder, author of There Must Be a Lone Ranger: The myth and reality of the American Wild West
Christopher Frayling, Rector of the Royal College of Art
20 June 2002 Richard Wagner – his influence on the German spirit. John Deathridge, King Edward the Seventh Professor of Music, King's College London
Lucy Beckett, author of Richard Wagner: Parsifal
Michael Tanner, philosopher and author of Wagner and Nietzsche
27 June 2002 Cultural Imperialism – should we try to prevent it? Linda Colley, School Professor of History, London School of Economics
Phillip Dodd, director, Institute of Contemporary Arts
Mary Beard, Reader in Classics, Cambridge University
4 July 2002 Freedom – a principle worth fighting and dying for? John Keane, Professor of Politics, University of Westminster
Bernard Williams, Professor of Philosophy, University of California
Annabel Brett, Lecturer in History, University of Cambridge
11 July 2002 Psychoanalysis – do people crave dictatorship? Adam Phillips, general editor of the new Penguin translations of Freud
Sally Alexander, Professor of History, Goldsmiths College, University of London
Malcolm Bowie, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature and Fellow, All Souls College, Oxford
18 July 2002 History of Heritage David Cannadine, Director of the University of London's Institute of Historical Research
Miri Rubin, Professor of European History at Queen Mary, University of London
Peter Mandler, Fellow in History, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge

2002-2003

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
17 October 2002 Slavery and Empire – were Britons also captives? Linda Colley, School Professor of History, LSE
Catherine Hall, Professor of Modern British Social and Cultural History, University College London
Felipe Fernández-Armesto, Professorial Research Fellow, Queen Mary College London
24 October 2002 The Scientist in History – missionary or monster? John Gribbin, Visiting Fellow in Astronomy, University of Sussex
Patricia Fara, Lecturer on the History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge University
Hugh Pennington, Head of the Department of Medical Microbiology, University of Aberdeen
31 October 2002 Architecture and Power – imagery of imperialism Adrian Tinniswood, Architectural historian
Gavin Stamp, Senior Lecturer, Mackintosh School of Architecture, Glasgow School of Art
Gillian Darley, Architectural historian and biographer of John Soane
7 November 2002 Human nature – innate or nurtured? Steven Pinker, Professor of Psychology and Director of the Centre of Cognitive Neuroscience, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Janet Radcliffe Richards, philosopher, Reader in Bioethics, University College London
John Gray, Professor of European Thought, London School of Economics
14 November 2002 Victorian Realism – how real? Philip Davis, Reader in English Literature at the University of Liverpool and author of "The Victorians", a volume of the New Oxford English Literary History
A. N. Wilson, novelist, biographer and author of The Victorians
Dinah Birch, Fellow and tutor in English at Trinity College, Oxford
21 November 2002 Muslim Spain – a culture of tolerance? Tim Winter, a convert to Islam and lecturer in Islamic Studies at the Faculty of Divinity at Cambridge University
Martin Palmer, Anglican lay preacher and theologian and author of The Sacred History of Britain
Mehri Niknam, executive director of the Maimonides Foundation, a joint Jewish-Muslim Interfaith Foundation in London
28 November 2002 Imagination – just what is it? Susan Stuart, Lecturer in Philosophy of Mind at the University of Glasgow
Steven Mithen, Professor of Early Prehistory at the University of Reading
Semir Zeki, Professor of Neurobiology at the University of London and author of Inner Vision: An Exploration of Art and the Brain
5 December 2002 The Scottish Enlightenment – how enlightened? Tom Devine, Professor and Director of the Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies at the University of Aberdeen
Karen O'Brien, Reader in English and American Literature at the University of Warwick
Alexander Broadie, Professor of Logic and Rhetoric at the University of Glasgow
12 December 2002 Man and Disease – the fight against diseases and plagues Anne Hardy, Reader in the History of Medicine at the Wellcome Trust Centre at University College London
David Bradley, Professor of Tropical Hygiene at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
Chris Dye, epidemiologist with the World Health Organisation
19 December 2002 The Calendar – a history of the Calendar Robert Poole, Reader in History at St Martin's College Lancaster and author of Time's Alteration, Calendar Reform in Early Modern England
Kristen Lippincott, Deputy Director of the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich
Peter Watson, Research Associate at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at Cambridge University and author of A Terrible Beauty – A History of the People and Ideas that Shaped the Modern Mind
6 February 2003 The Epic – from Homer to Joyce John Carey, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Oxford University
Karen Edwards, Lecturer in English at Exeter University
Oliver Taplin, Professor of Classical Languages and Literature at the University of Oxford
13 February 2003 Chance and Design in Evolution – Design in Nature Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology at Cambridge University and author of The Crucible of Creation – the Burgess Shale and the Rise of Animals
Sandy Knapp, botanist at the Natural History Museum
John Brooke, Andreas Idreos Professor of Science and Religion at Oxford University
20 February 2003 The Lindisfarne Gospels – unifying Christianity in Britain Richard Gameson, Reader in Medieval History at Kent University and editor of St Augustine and the Conversion of England
Clare Lees, Professor of Medieval Literature at King's College London and author of Tradition and Belief: Religious Writing in Late Anglo-Saxon England
Michelle Brown, Curator of Illuminated Manuscripts at the British Library and author of A Guide to Western Historical Scripts
27 February 2003 The Aztecs – looking behind the myths Alan Knight, Professor of the History of Latin America at Oxford University and author of Mexico: From the Beginning to the Spanish Conquest
Adrian Locke, co-curator of the Aztecs exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts
Elizabeth Graham, Senior Lecturer in Mesoamerican Archaeology at University College London
6 March 2003 Meteorology – why does it still fascinate us? Vladimir Janković, Wellcome Research Lecturer at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at Manchester University
Richard Hamblyn, writer
Liba Taub, Director of the Whipple Museum of the History of Science at Cambridge University
13 March 2003 Redemption – the concept of salvation Richard Harries, Bishop of Oxford
Janet Soskice, Reader in Modern Theology and Philosophical Theology at Cambridge University
Stephen Mulhall, Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy at Oxford University
20 March 2003 Originality – is it just a romantic notion? John Deathridge, King Edward Professor of Music at King's College London
Jonathan Rée, philosopher and author of Philosophical Tales
Catherine Belsey, Professor and Chair of the Centre for Critical and Cultural Theory at Cardiff University
27 Mar 2003 Supernovas – the life cycle of stars Paul Murdin, Senior Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge
Janna Levin, Advanced Fellow in Theoretical Physics in the Department of Applied Mathematics & Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge
Phil Charles, Professor of Astronomy at Southampton University
3 April 2003 The Spanish Civil War – causes and legacy Paul Preston, Principe de Asturias Professor of Contemporary Spanish History at the London School of Economics
Helen Graham, Professor of Spanish History at Royal Holloway, University of London
Mary Vincent, Senior Lecturer in the Department of History at Sheffield University
17 April 2003 Proust – his life and work Jacqueline Rose, Professor of English Literature at Queen Mary, University of London and author of Albertine
Malcolm Bowie, Master of Christ's College, Cambridge and author of Proust among the Stars
Robert Fraser, senior research fellow in the Literature Department at the Open University and author of Proust and the Victorians
24 April 2003 Youth – from Adonis to James Dean Tim Whitmarsh, Lecturer in Hellenistic Literature at Exeter University
Thomas Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck College, London
Deborah Thom, Lecturer in History at Robinson College, Cambridge
1 May 2003 Roman Britain – the effects of 400 years of occupation Greg Woolf, Professor of Ancient History at St Andrews University
Mary Beard, Reader in Classics at Cambridge University
Catharine Edwards, Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck College, London University
8 May 2003 The Jacobite Rebellion – could it have succeeded? Murray Pittock, Professor of English Literature at the University of Strathclyde
Stana Nenadic, Senior Lecturer in Social History at Edinburgh University
Allan Macinnes, Burnett-Fletcher Professor of History at Aberdeen University.
15 May 2003 The Holy Grail – just a medieval myth? Carolyne Larrington, Tutor in Medieval English at St John's College, Oxford
Jonathan Riley-Smith, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University
Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh at the University College of Wales in Cardiff
22 May 2003 Blood – its religious, medical and moral significance Miri Rubin, Professor of European History at Queen Mary, University of London
Anne Hardy, Reader in the History of Medicine at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London
Jonathan Sawday, Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde
29 May 2003 Memory – and the brain Martin Conway, Professor of Psychology at Durham University
Mike Kopelman, Professor of Neuropsychiatry at King's College London and St Thomas' Hospital
Kim Graham, Senior Scientist at the Medical Research Council's Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit
5 June 2003 The Lunar Society – scientific ferment 200 years ago. Simon Schaffer, Reader in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Jenny Uglow, Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick and author of The Lunar Men: The Friends who Made the Future
Peter Jones, Professor of French History at the University of Birmingham
12 June 2003 The Art of War – maintaining the objective? Michael Howard, Emeritus Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford
Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Jeremy Black, Professor of History at the University of Exeter
19 June 2003 The Aristocracy – how the ruling class survives David Cannadine, Director of the University of London's Institute of Historical Research and author of The Decline and Fall of the British Aristocracy
Rosemary Sweet, Lecturer in History at the University of Leicester
Felipe Fernández-Armesto, Professorial Research Fellow at Queen Mary, University of London
26 June 2003 The East India Company – a corporate route to Empire. Huw Bowen, Senior Lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Leicester
Linda Colley, School Professor of History at the London School of Economics
Maria Misra, Fellow and Tutor in Modern History at Keble College, Oxford
3 July 2003 Vulcanology – significance of volcanoes. Hilary Downes, Professor of Geochemistry at Birkbeck, University of London
Steve Self, Professor of Vulcanology at the Open University
Bill McGuire, Benfield Professor of Geophysical Hazards at University College London.
10 July 2003 Nature – from Homer to Darwin Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warwick
Roger Scruton, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Buckingham
Karen Edwards, Lecturer in English at the University of Exeter
17 July 2003 The Apocalypse – was it a revelation? Martin Palmer, theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Marina Benjamin, journalist and author of Living at the End of the World
Justin Champion, Reader in the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway College, University of London

2003-2004

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
2 October 2003 James Clerk Maxwell – great 19th century physicist Simon Schaffer, Reader in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Peter Harman, Professor of the History of Science at Lancaster University and editor of The Scientific Letters and Papers of James Clerk Maxwell
Joanna Haigh, Professor of Atmospheric Physics at Imperial College London
9 October 2003 Bohemianism – a life of art, freedom and poverty Hermione Lee, Goldsmiths' Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford and biographer of Virginia Woolf
Virginia Nicholson, author of Among the Bohemians: Experiments in Living 1900–1939
Graham Robb, writer and biographer of Balzac, Victor Hugo and Rimbaud
16 October 2003 The Schism – between East and West in Christianity. Henrietta Leyser, medieval historian and Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford
Norman Housley, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Leicester
Jonathan Shepard, editor of the Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire
23 October 2003 Infinity – a brief history. Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Robert D. Kaplan, co-founder of The Math Circle at Harvard University and author of The Art of the Infinite: Our Lost Language of Numbers
Sarah Rees, Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of Newcastle
30 October 2003 Robin Hood – the greatest of English myths. Stephen Knight, Professor of English Literature at Cardiff University and author of Robin Hood: A Mythic Biography
Thomas Hahn, Professor of English Literature at the University of Rochester, New York
Juliette Wood, Secretary of the Folklore Society
6 November 2003 Sensation – the best sellers of the 19th century. John Mullan, Senior Lecturer in English at University College London
Lyn Pykett, Professor of English and Pro-Vice Chancellor at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Dinah Birch, Professor of English at the University of Liverpool
13 November 2003 Duty – concepts of obligation. Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Annabel Brett, Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge and Lecturer in History at the University of Cambridge
A. C. Grayling, Reader in Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
20 November 2003 Ageing the Earth – a journey in geological time. Richard Corfield, Research Associate in the Department of Earth Sciences at Oxford University
Hazel Rymer, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Earth Sciences at the Open University
Henry Gee, Senior Editor at Nature
27 November 2003 St Bartholomew's Day Massacre – slaughter in Paris. Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at Oxford University and author of a new book: Reformation: Europe's House Divided 1490–1700
Mark Greengrass, Professor of History at the University of Sheffield
Penny Roberts, Lecturer in History at the University of Warwick
4 December 2003 Wittgenstein – a philosophy of linguistics Ray Monk, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southampton and author of Ludwig Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius
Barry Smith, Lecturer in Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Marie McGinn, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of York
11 December 2003 The Devil – a brief biography Martin Palmer, theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Alison Rowlands, Senior Lecturer in European History at the University of Essex
David Wootton, Professor of Intellectual History at Queen Mary, University of London
18 December 2003 The Alphabet – its creation and development Eleanor Robson, historian of Ancient Iraq and Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford
Alan Millard, Rankin Professor Emeritus of Hebrew and Ancient Semitic Languages at the University of Liverpool
Rosalind Thomas, Professor of Greek History at Royal Holloway, University of London
26 December 2003 Lamarck and Natural Selection – the Lamarckian Heresy Sandy Knapp, Senior Botanist at the Natural History Museum
Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics in the Galton Laboratory at University College London and author of Almost Like a Whale: The Origin of Species Updated
Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Paleobiology at Cambridge University
29 January 2004 Cryptography – secret history of ciphers and codes Simon Singh, science writer and author of The Code Book: The Secret History of Codes and Code-Breaking
Fred Piper, Professor and Director of the Information Security Group at Royal Holloway, University of London and co-author of Cryptography: A Very Short Introduction
Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London and author of Ingenious Pursuits
5 February 2004 The Battle of Thermopylae – battle that defined East and West Tom Holland, historian and author of Persian Fire
Simon Goldhill, Professor in Greek Literature and Culture at King's College, Cambridge
Edith Hall, Leverhulme Professor of Greek Cultural History at the University of Durham and author of Inventing the Barbarian: Greek Self-Definition through Tragedy
12 February 2004 The Sublime – defining the state of awe Janet Todd, Professor of English Literature at the University of Glasgow
Annie Janowitz, Professor of Romantic Poetry at Queen Mary, University of London
Peter de Bolla, Lecturer in English at the University of Cambridge
19 February 2004 Rutherford – the father of nuclear physics Simon Schaffer, Professor in the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Jim Al-Khalili, Senior Lecturer in Physics at the University of Surrey
Patricia Fara, Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge
26 February 2004 The Mughal Empire – the glory of India Sanjay Subrahmanyam, Professor of Indian History and Culture at the University of Oxford
Susan Stronge, Curator in the Asian Department of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Chandrika Kaul, Lecturer in Imperial History at the University of St Andrews
4 March 2004 Dreams – is there a science of dreams? VS Ramachandran, Professor and Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition at the University of California, San Diego
Mark Solms, Professor of Neuropsychology at the University of Cape Town
Martin Conway, Professor of Psychology at the University of Durham
11 March 2004 The Norse Gods – the great myths of pagan Europe Carolyne Larrington, Tutor in Medieval English at St John's College, Oxford
Heather O'Donoghue, Vigfusson Rausing Reader in Ancient Icelandic Literature in the Department of English at Oxford University
John Hines, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University
25 March 2004 Theories of Everything – still the holy grail of physics? Brian Greene, Professor of Physics and Mathematics at Columbia University and author of The Fabric of the Cosmos
John Barrow, Professor of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Cambridge and author of The Constants of Nature
Val Gibson, particle physicist from the Cavendish Laboratory and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
1 April 2004 China: The Warring States period – the fiery beginnings of Chinese civilisation Chris Cullen, Director of the Needham Research Institute at Cambridge University
Vivienne Lo, Lecturer at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine
Carol Michaelson, Assistant Keeper of Chinese Art in the Department of Oriental Antiquities at the British Museum
8 April 2004 The Fall – how Adam and Eve affect us all Martin Palmer, theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Griselda Pollock, Professor of Art History at the University of Leeds
John Carey, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Oxford University
15 April 2004 The Later Romantics – the world of Byron, Keats and Shelley Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warwick
Robert Woof, Director of the Wordsworth Trust
Jennifer Wallace, Director of Studies in English at Peterhouse, Cambridge
22 April 2004 Hysteria – the normal state of human beings? Juliet Mitchell, Professor of Psychoanalysis and Gender Studies at the University of Cambridge and author of Mad Men and Medusas: Reclaiming Hysteria and the Effects of Sibling Relations on the Human Condition
Rachel Bowlby, Professor of English at the University of York who has written the introduction to the latest Penguin translation of Sigmund Freud and Joseph Breuer's Studies in Hysteria
Brett Kahr, Senior Clinical Research Fellow in Psychotherapy and Mental Health at the Centre for Child Mental Health in London
29 April 2004 Tea – an empire in a teacup Huw Bowen, Senior Lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Leicester
James Walvin, Professor of History at the University of York
Amanda Vickery, Reader in History at Royal Holloway, University of London
6 May 2004 Heroism – do we live in an heroic age? Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick and author of Plato and the Hero: Courage, Manliness and the Impersonal Good
A. C. Grayling, Reader in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Paul Cartledge, Professor of Greek History at the University of Cambridge
13 May 2004 Zero – everything about nothing Robert D. Kaplan, co-founder of the Maths Circle at Harvard University and author of The Nothing That Is: A Natural History of Zero
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
20 May 2004 Toleration – from medieval intolerance to religious freedom Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
David Wootton, Professor of Intellectual History at Queen Mary, University of London
Sarah Barber, Senior Lecturer in History at Lancaster University
27 May 2004 Planets – the astronomy of the 21st century Paul Murdin, Senior Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge
Hugh Jones, planet hunter and Reader in Astrophysics at Liverpool John Moores University
Carolin Crawford, Royal Society Research Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge
3 June 2004 Babylon – the great forgotten civilisation Eleanor Robson, Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge University
Irving Finkel, Curator in the Department of the Ancient Near East at the British Museum
Andrew George, Professor of Babylonian at the School of Oriental and African Studies
10 June 2004 Empiricism – the English philosophy? Judith Hawley, Senior Lecturer in English at Royal Holloway, University of London
Murray Pittock, Professor of Scottish and Romantic Literature at the University of Manchester
Jonathan Rée, philosopher and author of Philosophy and its Past
17 June 2004 Renaissance Magic – the great passion of the age Peter Forshaw, Lecturer in Renaissance Philosophies at Birkbeck, University of London
Valery Rees, Renaissance historian and a translator of Ficino's letters
Jonathan Sawday, Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde
24 June 2004 George Washington and the American Revolution – the most significant event in history Carol Berkin, Professor of History at The City University of New York
Simon Middleton, Lecturer in American History at the University of East Anglia
Colin Bonwick, Professor Emeritus in American History at Keele University

2004-2005

In 2005 listeners were invited to vote in a poll for the greatest philosopher in history. The winner was the subject of the final programme before the summer break. The vote was won by Karl Marx with 27.9% of the votes. Other shortlisted figures were David Hume (12.7%), Ludwig Wittgenstein (6.8%), Friedrich Nietzsche (6.5%), Plato (5.6%), Immanuel Kant (5.6%), Thomas Aquinas (4.8%), Socrates (4.8%), Aristotle (4.5%) and Karl Popper (4.2%).[2]

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
2 September 2004 Pi – the number that doesn't add up Robert D. Kaplan, co-founder of the Maths Circle at Harvard University
Eleanor Robson, Lecturer in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge University
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
9 September 2004 The Odyssey – Homer's epic tale of Odysseus' return home Simon Goldhill, Professor of Greek at King's College, Cambridge
Edith Hall, Leverhulme Professor of Greek Cultural History at Durham University
Oliver Taplin, Classics Scholar and Translator at Oxford University
16 September 2004 Agincourt – the real facts behind the battle. Anne Curry, Professor of Medieval History at Southampton University
Michael Jones, medieval historian and writer
John Watts, Fellow and Tutor in Modern History at Corpus Christi College, Oxford
23 September 2004 The Origins of Life – how it all began Richard Dawkins, Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University
Richard Corfield, Visiting Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Earth, Planetary, Space and Astronomical Research at the Open University
Linda Partridge, Biology and Biotechnology Research Council Professor at University College London
30 September 2004 Politeness – the great 18th century craze Amanda Vickery, Reader in History at Royal Holloway, University of London
David Wootton, Professor of History at the University of York
John Mullan, Senior Lecturer in English at University College London
7 October 2004 Jean-Paul Sartre – a man condemned to be free Jonathan Rée, philosopher and historia
Benedict O'Donohoe, Principal Lecturer in French at the University of the West of England and Secretary of the UK Society for Sartrean Studies
Christina Howells, Professor of French at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Wadham College
14 October 2004 The Han Synthesis – creating the Chinese cosmos Christopher Cullen, Director of the Needham Research Institute
Carol Michaelson, Assistant Keeper of Chinese Art in the Department of Asia at the British Museum
Roel Sterckx, Lecturer in Chinese Studies at the University of Cambridge
21 October 2004 Witchcraft – Reformation Europe turned upon itself Alison Rowlands, Senior Lecturer in European History at the University of Essex
Lyndal Roper, Fellow and Tutor in History at Balliol College, University of Oxford
Malcolm Gaskill, Fellow and Director of Studies in History at Churchill College, Cambridge
28 October 2004 Rhetoric – from the original sophists to latter-day demagogues Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Thomas Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London
Ceri Sullivan, Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Wales, Bangor
4 November 2004 Electrickery – the origins of electricity Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Darwin College
Patricia Fara, historian of science and a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge
Iwan Morus, Lecturer in the History of Science at Queen's University Belfast
11 November 2004 Zoroastrianism – was the religion of the Persian Empire the first monotheism? Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis, Curator of Ancient Iranian Coins in the Department of Coins and Medals at the British Museum
Farrokh Vajifdar, Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society
Alan Williams, Senior Lecturer in Comparative Religion at the University of Manchester
18 November 2004 Higgs Boson – the search for the God particle Jim Al-Khalili, Senior Lecturer in Physics at the University of Surrey
David Wark, Professor of Experimental Physics at Imperial College London and the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
Roger Cashmore, Professor and former Research Director at CERN and now Principal of Brasenose College, Oxford
25 November 2004 The Venerable Bede – the father of English history Richard Gameson, Reader in Medieval History at the University of Kent at Canterbury
Sarah Foot, Professor of Early Medieval History at the University of Sheffield
Michelle Brown, manuscript specialist from the British Library
2 December 2004 Carl Gustav Jung – Discovering the Self Brett Kahr, Senior Clinical Research Fellow in Psychotherapy and Mental Health at the Centre for Child Mental Health in London and a practising Freudian
Ronald Hayman, writer and biographer of Jung
Andrew Samuels, Professor of Analytical Psychology at the University of Essex and a Jungian analyst in clinical practice
9 December 2004 Machiavelli and the Italian City States – high politics and low cunning in the Italian Renaissance Quentin Skinner, Regius Professor of History at the University of Cambridge
Evelyn Welch, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
Lisa Jardine, Director of the Centre for Editing Lives and Letters at Queen Mary, University of London
16 December 2004 The Second Law of Thermodynamics – the most important thing you will ever know John Gribbin, Visiting Fellow in Astronomy at the University of Sussex
Peter Atkins, Professor of Chemistry at Oxford University
Monica Grady, Head of Petrology and Meteoritics at the Natural History Museum
23 December 2004 Faust – the original pact with the Devil Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh at the University College of Wales in Cardiff and Secretary of the Folklore Society
Osman Durrani, Professor of German at the University of Kent at Canterbury
Rosemary Ashton, Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College London
30 December 2004 The Roman Republic – what were Rome's republican ideals? Greg Woolf, Professor of Ancient History at St Andrews University
Catherine Steel, Lecturer in Classics at the University of Glasgow
Tom Holland, historian and author of Rubicon: the Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic
6 January 2005 The Assassination of Tsar Alexander II – did his killing cause the Russian Revolution? Orlando Figes, Professor of History at Birkbeck College, University of London
Dominic Lieven, Professor of Russian Government, London School of Economics
Catriona Kelly, Professor of Russian, Oxford University
13 January 2005 The Mind/Body Problem – does the mind rule the body or the body rule the mind? A. C. Grayling, Reader in Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Julian Baggini, editor of The Philosophers' Magazine
Sue James, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
17 February 2005 The Cambrian Explosion – the big bang of evolutionary history Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology, Cambridge University
Richard Corfield, Visiting Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Earth, Planetary, Space and Astronomical Research, Open University
Jane Francis, Professor of Palaeoclimatology, University of Leeds
24 February 2005 Alchemy – seeking the perfection of all things Peter Forshaw, Lecturer in Renaissance Philosophies at Birkbeck, University of London
Lauren Kassell, Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Stephen Pumfrey, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science at the University of Lancaster
3 March 2005 Stoicism – the search for inner calm Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy, University of Warwick
Jonathan Rée, philosopher and historian
David Sedley, Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy, University of Cambridge
10 March 2005 Modernist Utopias – the original 21st century John Carey, Emeritus Professor of English Literature, Oxford University and editor of The Faber Book of Utopias
Steve Connor, Professor of Modern Literature at Birkbeck, University of London
Laura Marcus, Professor of English, University of Sussex
17 March 2005 Dark Energy – the unknown force breaking the universe apart Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal and Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics, Cambridge University
Carolin Crawford, Royal Society University Research Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge
Roger Penrose, Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Maths at Oxford University
24 March 2005 Angels – how they got their wings Martin Palmer, theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Valery Rees, Renaissance Scholar at the School of Economic Science
John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy, University of St Andrews
31 March 2005 John Ruskin – a different kind of Victorian Dinah Birch, Professor of English, Liverpool University
Keith Hanley, Professor of English Literature and Director of the Ruskin Programme, Lancaster University
Stefan Collini, Professor of Intellectual History and English Literature, University of Cambridge
7 April 2005 Alfred and the Battle of Edington – without Alfred, no England? Richard Gameson, Reader in Medieval History, University of Kent at Canterbury
Sarah Foot, Professor of Early Medieval History, University of Sheffield
John Hines, Professor in the School of History and Archaeology, Cardiff University
14 April 2005 Archaeology and Imperialism – conquest of the past Tim Champion, Professor of Archaeology, University of Southampton
Richard Parkinson, Assistant Keeper in the Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum
Eleanor Robson, Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge University and a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford
21 April 2005 The Aeneid – the Roman history of the world Edith Hall, Leverhulme Professor of Greek Cultural History, Durham University
Philip Hardie, Corpus Christi Professor of Latin at the University of Oxford
Catharine Edwards, Senior Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History, Birkbeck College University of London
28 April 2005 Perception and the Senses – how do we see what we see? Richard Gregory, senior research fellow in the Department of Experimental Psychology, Bristol University
David Moore, Director of the Medical Research Council Institute of Hearing Research, University of Nottingham
Gemma Calvert, Reader in Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Bath
5 May 2005 Abelard and Heloise – love, sex and theology in 12th century Paris A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Henrietta Leyser, Medieval Historian and Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford
Michael Clanchy, Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the Institute of Historical Research
19 May 2005 Beauty – the philosophy of beauty Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Susan James, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Julian Baggini, Editor of The Philosophers' Magazine
26 May 2005 The Terror – when Madame Guillotine ruled France Mike Broers, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Lady Margaret Hall
Rebecca Spang, Lecturer in Modern History at University College London
Tim Blanning, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
2 June 2005 Renaissance Maths – the birth of modern mathematics? Robert D. Kaplan, co-founder of the Maths Circle at Harvard University
Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of Science and Fellow of Linacre College, University of Oxford
Jackie Stedall, research fellow in the History of Mathematics, The Queen's College, Oxford
9 June 2005 The Scriblerus Club – the satirists-in-chief of the 18th century John Mullan, Senior Lecturer in English, University College London
Judith Hawley, Senior Lecturer in English, Royal Holloway, University of London
Marcus Walsh, Kenneth Allott Professor of English Literature, University of Liverpool
16 June 2005 Paganism in the Renaissance – how the classical gods returned to the Christian cities Tom Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies, Birkbeck College, University of London
Charles Hope, Director of the Warburg Institute and Professor of the History of the Classical Tradition, University of London
Evelyn Welch, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
23 June 2005 The K–T boundary – did the dinosaurs burn out or fade away? Simon Kelley, Head of Department in the Department of Earth Sciences, Open University
Jane Francis, Professor of Palaeoclimatology, University of Leeds
Mike Benton, Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology in the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol
30 June 2005 Merlin – the original Welsh wizard Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh at Cardiff University
Stephen Knight, Distinguished Research Professor in English Literature at Cardiff University
Peter Forshaw, Lecturer in Renaissance Philosophies at Birkbeck, University of London
7 July 2005 Christopher Marlowe – poet, spy, atheist, murder victim? Katherine Duncan-Jones, senior research fellow in the English Faculty of Oxford University
Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature, University of Warwick
Emma J. Smith, Lecturer in English, Oxford University
14 July 2005 Karl Marx – In Our Time's Greatest Philosopher A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Francis Wheen, journalist and author of a biography of Karl Marx
Gareth Stedman Jones, Professor of Political Science at Cambridge University

2005-2006

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TitleContributors
29 September 2005 Magnetism – an attractive history Stephen Pumfrey, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science at the University of Lancaster
John Heilbron, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of California, Berkeley
Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
6 October 2005 Field of the Cloth of Gold – a Renaissance entente cordiale Steven Gunn, Lecturer in Modern History at Oxford University
John Guy, Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge
Penny Roberts, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Warwick
13 October 2005 Mammals – life in a cold climate Richard Corfield, Senior Lecturer in Earth Sciences at the Open University
Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
Jane Francis, Professor of Palaeoclimatology at the University of Leeds
20 October 2005 Cynicism – bold and populist, the history of a shocking philosophy Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy, University of Warwick
Miriam Griffin, Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford
John Moles, Professor of Latin, University of Newcastle
27 October 2005 Samuel Johnson and His Circle – life with the professional man of letters John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Jim McLaverty, Professor of English at Keele University
Judith Hawley, Senior Lecturer in English at Royal Holloway, University of London
3 November 2005 Asteroids – celestial bodies from the beginning of time Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences, Open University
Carolin Crawford, Royal Society Research Fellow, University of Cambridge
John Zarnecki, Professor of Space Science, Open University
10 November 2005 Greyfriars and Blackfriars – philosophy, evangelism and fund-raising in the 13th century Church Henrietta Leyser, medieval historian and Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford
Alexander Murray, medieval historian and emeritus fellow of University College, Oxford
Anthony Kenny, philosopher and former Master of Balliol College, Oxford
17 November 2005 Pragmatism – a practical philosophy fit for 20th century America A. C. Grayling, Professor of Applied Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London and a Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford
Julian Baggini, editor of The Philosophers' Magazine
Miranda Fricker, Lecturer in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
24 November 2005 The Graviton – the quest for the theoretical gravity particle Roger Cashmore, Former Research Director at CERN and Principal of Brasenose College, Oxford
Jim Al-Khalili, Professor of Physics at the University of Surrey
Sheila Rowan, Reader in Physics in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Glasgow
1 December 2005 Thomas Hobbes and the political philosophy of Leviathan Quentin Skinner, Regius Professor of History at the University of Cambridge
David Wootton, Professor of History at the University of York
Annabel Brett, Senior Lecturer in Political Thought and Intellectual History at Cambridge University
8 December 2005 Artificial Intelligence – the quest for a machine that can think Jon Agar, Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge
Alison Adam, Professor of Information Systems, Salford University
Igor Aleksander, Professor of Neural Systems Engineering at Imperial College, University of London
15 December 2005 The Peterloo massacre – democratic protest and brutal repression Jeremy Black, Professor of History at the University of Exeter
Sarah Richardson, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Warwick
Clive Emsley, Professor of History at the Open University
22 December 2005 Heaven – a journey through the afterlife Valery Rees, Renaissance scholar and senior member of the Language Department at the School of Economic Science
Martin Palmer, Theologian and Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
John Carey, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Oxford University
29 December 2005 Aeschylus' Oresteia – the birth of tragedy Edith Hall, Professor of Greek Cultural History at Durham University
Simon Goldhill, Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge
Tom Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London
5 January 2006 The Oath – guaranteeing law, government and the army in the Classical world Alan Sommerstein, Professor of Greek at the University of Nottingham
Paul Cartledge, Professor of Greek History at the University of Cambridge
Mary Beard, Professor in Classics at the University of Cambridge
12 January 2006 Prime Numbers – the building blocks of mathematics Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics and Fellow of Wadham College at the University of Oxford
Robin Wilson, Professor of Pure Mathematics at the Open University and Gresham Professor of Geometry
Jackie Stedall, Junior Research Fellow in the History of Mathematics at Queen's College, Oxford
19 January 2006 Relativism – the battle against transcendent knowledge Barry Smith, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Jonathan Rée, freelance philosopher who holds visiting professorships at the Royal College of Art and Roehampton University
Kathleen Lennon, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Hull
26 January 2006 Seventeenth Century Print Culture – piety, populism and political protest Kevin Sharpe, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
Ann Hughes, Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Keele
Joad Raymond, Professor of English Literature at the University of East Anglia
2 February 2006 The Abbasid Caliphs – when Baghdad ruled the Muslim world. Hugh Kennedy, Professor of History at the University of St Andrews
Robert Irwin, Senior Research Associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
9 February 2006 Geoffrey Chaucer – the first Great English Poet Carolyne Larrington, Tutor in Medieval English at St John's College, Oxford
Helen Cooper, Professor of Medieval and Renaissance English at the University of Cambridge
Ardis Butterfield, Reader in English at University College London
16 February 2006 Human Evolution – from early hominids to Homo sapiens Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics in the Galton Laboratory at University College London
Fred Spoor, Professor of Evolutionary Anatomy at University College London
Margaret Clegg, Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Biological Anthropology at University College London
23 February 2006 Catherine the Great – the Enlightened Despot of Eighteenth Century Russia Janet Hartley, Professor of International History at the London School of Economics
Simon Dixon, Professor of Modern History at the University of Leeds
Tony Lentin, Professor of History at the Open University
2 March 2006 Friendship – thinking philosophically about our close companions Angie Hobbs, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Mark Vernon, Visiting Lecturer in Philosophy at Syracuse University and London Metropolitan University
John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
9 March 2006 Negative numbers – how they spread across civilizations Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Colva Roney-Dougal, Lecturer in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Raymond Flood, Lecturer in Computing Studies and Mathematics at Kellogg College, Oxford
16 March 2006 Don Quixote – Spanish romance and the first novel Barry Ife, Cervantes Professor Emeritus at King's College London
Edwin Williamson, Professor of Spanish Studies at the University of Oxford
Jane Whetnall, Senior Lecturer in Hispanic Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
23 March 2006 The Royal Society – the first club for experimental science Stephen Pumfrey, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science at the University of Lancaster
Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
Michael Hunter, Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
30 March 2006 The Carolingian Renaissance – the revival of early medieval Western Europe Matthew Innes, Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
Julia Smith, Edwards Professor of Medieval History at Glasgow University
Mary Garrison, Lecturer in History at the University of York
6 April 2006 Goethe – formation of a German cultural icon Tim Blanning, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
Sarah Colvin, Professor of German at the University of Edinburgh
W. Daniel Wilson, Professor of German at Royal Holloway, University of London
13 April 2006 The Oxford Movement – Anglicans and Catholics in the 19th century Sheridan Gilley, Emeritus Reader in Theology at the University of Durham
Frances Knight, Senior Lecturer in Church History at the University of Wales, Lampeter
Simon Skinner, Fellow and Tutor in History at Balliol College, Oxford
20 April 2006 The Search for Immunisation – and the battle against smallpox Nadja Durbach, associate professor of History at the University of Utah
Chris Dye, Co-ordinator of the World Health Organisation's work on tuberculosis epidemiology
Sanjoy Bhattacharya, Lecturer in the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL
27 April 2006 The Great Exhibition – a wonder of the Victorian world Jeremy Black, Professor of History at the University of Exeter
Hermione Hobhouse, Architectural Historian and writer
Clive Emsley, Professor of History at the Open University
4 May 2006 Astronomy and Empire – the link between colonial expansion and scientific discovery Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Kristen Lippincott, former Director of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich
Allan Chapman, Historian of Science at the History Faculty at Oxford University
11 May 2006 Fairies – supernatural creatures that are neither gods nor humans Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh at Cardiff University and Secretary of the Folklore Society
Diane Purkiss, Fellow and Tutor of English at Keble College, Oxford
Nicola Bown, Lecturer in Victorian Studies at Birkbeck, University of London
18 May 2006 John Stuart Mill – one of the most influential philosophers of the 19th Century A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Janet Radcliffe Richards, Reader in Bioethics at University College London
Alan Ryan, Professor of Politics at Oxford University
25 May 2006 Mathematics and Music – the science behind sound and composition Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
Robin Wilson, Professor of Pure Mathematics at the Open University
Ruth Tatlow, Lecturer in Music Theory at the University of Stockholm
1 June 2006 The Heart – its anatomical and cultural history David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Fay Bound Alberti, research fellow at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine at the University of Manchester
Jonathan Sawday, Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde
8 June 2006 Uncle Tom's Cabin – the novel that started the American Civil War Celeste-Marie Bernier, Lecturer in American Studies at the University of Nottingham
Sarah Meer, Lecturer and Director of Studies in English at Selwyn College, Cambridge
Clive Webb, Reader in American History at the University of Sussex
15 June 2006 Carbon – the basis of life Harry Kroto, Professor of Chemistry at Florida State University
Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University
Ken Teo, Royal Academy of Engineering Research Fellow at Cambridge University
22 June 2006 The Spanish Inquisition – one of the most barbaric episodes in European history John Edwards, research fellow in Spanish at the University of Oxford
Alexander Murray, emeritus fellow in History at University College, Oxford
Michael Alpert, Emeritus Professor in Modern and Contemporary History of Spain at the University of Westminster
29 June 2006 Galaxies – extra-galactic nebulae, black holes, stars and dark matter John Gribbin, Visiting Fellow in Astronomy at the University of Sussex
Carolin Crawford, Royal Society University Research Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge
Robert Kennicutt, Plumian Professor of Astronomy and Experimental Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
6 July 2006 Pastoral Literature – the romantic idealisation of the countryside Helen Cooper, Professor of Medieval and Renaissance English at the University of Cambridge
Laurence Lerner, former Professor of English at the University of Sussex
Julie Sanders, Professor of English Literature and ama at the University of Nottingham
13 July 2006 Comedy in Ancient Greek Theatre – sing as you revel and rout Paul Cartledge, Professor of Greek History at the University of Cambridge
Edith Hall, Professor of ama and Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London
Nick Lowe, Senior Lecturer in Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London

2006-2007

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TitleContributors
28 September 2006 Alexander von Humboldt – the remarkable career of the Prussian naturalist Jason Wilson, Professor of Latin American Literature at University College London
Patricia Fara, Affiliated Lecturer in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Jim Secord, Professor in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge and Director of the Darwin Correspondence Project
5 October 2006 Averroes – the battle between faith and reason Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
Peter Adamson, Reader in Philosophy at King's College London
Anthony Kenny, philosopher and former Master of Balliol College, Oxford
12 October 2006 The Diet of WormsLuther's stand against the Church Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at Oxford University
David Bagchi, Lecturer in the History of Christian Thought at the University of Hull
Charlotte Methuen, Lecturer in Reformation History at the University of Oxford
19 October 2006 The Needham Question – did China lay the foundations of modern science? Chris Cullen, Director of the Needham Research Institute in Cambridge
Tim Barrett, Professor of East Asian History at SOAS
Frances Wood, Head of Chinese Collections at the British Library
26 October 2006 The Encyclopédie – the great project of the Enlightenment Judith Hawley, Senior Lecturer in English at Royal Holloway, University of London
Caroline Warman, Fellow and Tutor in French at Jesus College, Oxford
David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
2 November 2006 The Poincaré conjecture – how a 19th-century mathematician changed how we think about the shape of the universe June Barrow-Green, Lecturer in the History of Mathematics at the Open University
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
9 November 2006 Alexander Pope – "short is my date, but deathless my renown" John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Jim McLaverty, Professor of English at Keele University
Valerie Rumbold, Reader in English Literature at Birmingham University.
16 November 2006 The Peasants' Revolt – a lasting legacy for popular uprising? Miri Rubin, Professor of Early Modern History at Queen Mary, University of London
Caroline Barron, Professorial Research Fellow at Royal Holloway, University of London
Alastair Dunn, author of The Peasants' Revolt – England's Failed Revolution of 1381
23 November 2006 Altruism – how can evolutionary biology explain it? Miranda Fricker, Senior Lecturer in the School of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist and the Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University
John Dupré, Professor of Philosophy of Science at Exeter University and director of Egenis, the ESRC Centre for Genomics in Society
30 November 2006 The Speed of Light – a cosmic speed limit? John Barrow, Professor of Mathematical Sciences and Gresham Professor of Astronomy at Cambridge University
Iwan Morus, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science at The University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Visiting Professor of Astrophysics at Oxford University.
7 December 2006 Anarchism – a question of authority? John Keane, Professor of Politics at University of Westminster
Ruth Kinna, Senior Lecturer in Politics at Loughborough University
Peter Marshall, philosopher and historian
14 December 2006 Indian Maths – laying the foundations for modern numerals and zero as a number George Gheverghese Joseph, Honorary Reader in Mathematics Education at Manchester University
Colva Roney-Dougal, Lecturer in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Dennis Almeida, Lecturer in Mathematics Education at Exeter University and the Open University
21 December 2006 Hell – its representation through the ages Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Margaret Kean, Tutor and Fellow in English at St Hilda's College, Oxford
Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum
28 December 2006 The Siege of Constantinople – the end of a thousand years of the Byzantine Empire Roger Crowley, author and historian
Judith Herrin, Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine Studies at King's College London
Colin Imber, formerly Reader in Turkish at Manchester University
4 January 2007 Jorge Luis Borges – the life and work of Argentina's best loved short story writer Edwin Williamson, Professor of Spanish Studies at Oxford University
Efraín Kristal, Professor of Comparative Literature at University of California, Los Angeles
Evelyn Fishburn, Professor Emeritus at London Metropolitan University and Honorary Senior Research Fellow at University College London
11 January 2007 Mars – the search for life on the Red Planet John Zarnecki, Professor of Space Science at the Open University and a team leader on the ExoMars mission
Colin Pillinger, Professor of Planetary Sciences at the Open University and leader of the Beagle 2 expedition to Mars
Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University and an expert on Martian meteorites
18 January 2007 The Jesuits – the school masters of Europe Nigel Aston, Reader in Early Modern History at the University of Leicester
Simon Ditchfield, Reader in History at the University of York
Dame Olwen Hufton, emeritus fellow of Merton College, Oxford
25 January 2007 Archimedes – the Greek mathematician and his Eureka moments Jackie Stedall, Junior Research Fellow in the History of Mathematics at Queen's College, Oxford
Serafina Cuomo, Reader in the History of Science at Imperial College London
George Phillips, Honorary Reader in Mathematics at St Andrews University
1 February 2007 Genghis Khan – founder of one of the world's largest ever land-based empires Peter Jackson, Professor of Medieval History at Keele University
Naomi Standen, Lecturer in Chinese History at Newcastle University
George Lane, Lecturer in History at the School of Oriental and African Studies
8 February 2007 Karl Popper – his ideas challenged our approach to the philosophy of science John Worrall, Professor of Philosophy of Science at the London School of Economics
Anthony O'Hear, Weston Professor of Philosophy at Buckingham University
Nancy Cartwright, Professor of Philosophy at the LSE and the University of California
15 February 2007 Heart of Darkness – one of the most influential novels of the 20th century Susan Jones, Fellow and Tutor in English at St Hilda's College, Oxford
Robert Hampson, Professor of Modern Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Laurence Davies, Honorary Senior Research Fellow in English at Glasgow University and Visiting Professor of Comparative Literature at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire
22 February 2007 William Wilberforce – the man and his legacy This broadcast was a documentary rather than a discussion
1 March 2007 The History of Optics – from telescopes to microscopes, a new way of seeing the world Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of the History of Science and Fellow of Linacre College at the University of Oxford
Emily Winterburn, Curator of Astronomy at the National Maritime Museum
8 March 2007 Microbiology – the story of the invisible masters of the universe John Dupré, Professor of Philosophy of Science at Exeter University
Anne Glover, Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology at Aberdeen University
Andrew Mendelsohn, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science and Medicine at Imperial College, University of London
15 March 2007 Epistolary Literature – great novels of fictional letters John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Karen O'Brien, Professor in English at the University of Warwick
Brean Hammond, Professor of Modern English Literature at the University of Nottingham
22 March 2007 Bismarck – The Iron Chancellor Richard J Evans, Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge
Christopher Clark, Reader in Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
Katharine Lerman, Senior Lecturer in Modern European History at London Metropolitan University
29 March 2007 Anaesthetics – from ether frolics to pain free surgery David Wilkinson, Consultant Anaesthetist at St Bartholomew's Hospital in London and President of the History of Anaesthesia Society
Stephanie Snow, Research Associate at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology & Medicine at the University of Manchester
Anne Hardy, Professor in the History of Modern Medicine at University College London
5 April 2007 St Hilda – the life and times of the Abbess of Whitby John Blair, Fellow in History at The Queen's College, Oxford
Rosemary Cramp, Emeritus Professor in Archaeology at Durham University
Sarah Foot, Professor of Early Medieval History at Sheffield University
12 April 2007 The Opium Wars – a conflict that was to affect British-Chinese relations for generations Yangwen Zheng, Lecturer in Modern Chinese History at the University of Manchester
Lars Laamann, research fellow in Chinese History at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London
Xun Zhou, research fellow in History at SOAS, University of London
19 April 2007 Symmetry – the pattern at the heart of our physical world Fay Dowker, Reader in Theoretical Physics at Imperial College, London
Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
26 April 2007 Greek and Roman Love Poetry – the pursuit of the Beloved from Sappho to Catullus Nick Lowe, Senior Lecturer in Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London
Edith Hall, Professor of Classics and ama at Royal Holloway, University of London
Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin at University College London
3 May 2007 Spinoza – believed that God and Nature were the same thing Jonathan Rée, historian and philosopher and Visiting Professor at Roehampton University
Sarah Hutton, Professor of English at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth
John Cottingham, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading
10 May 2007 Victorian Pessimism – fear and loathing in the late 19th century Dinah Birch, Professor of English at the University of Liverpool
Rosemary Ashton, Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College London
Peter Mandler, University Lecturer and Fellow in History at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
17 May 2007 Gravitational Waves – a new window on the universe Jim Al-Khalili, Professor of Physics at the University of Surrey
Carolin Crawford, Royal Society Research Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy, Cambridgee
Sheila Rowan, Professor in Experimental Physics in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Glasgow
24 May 2007 The Siege of Orleans – did Joan of Arc really rescue France? Anne Curry, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Southampton
Malcolm Vale, Fellow and Tutor in History at St John's College, Oxford
Matthew Bennett, Senior Lecturer at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst
31 May 2007 Occam's Razor – cutting medieval philosophy down to size Anthony Kenny, philosopher and former Master of Balliol College, Oxford
Marilyn Adams, Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford University
Richard Alan Cross, Professor of Medieval Theology at Oriel College, Oxford
7 June 2007 Siegfried Sassoon – the poet who survived Jean Moorcroft Wilson, Lecturer in English at Birkbeck, University of London and a biographer of Sassoon
Fran Brearton, Reader in English and Assistant Director of the Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry at the University of Belfast
Max Egremont, a biographer of Siegfried Sassoon
14 June 2007 Renaissance Astrology – "we are merely the stars' tennis balls, struck and bandied which way please them" Peter Forshaw, Lecturer in Renaissance Philosophies at Birkbeck, University of London
Lauren Kassell, Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Jonathan Sawday, Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde
21 June 2007 common sense Philosophy – "there is no statement so absurd that no philosopher will make it" A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Melissa Lane, Senior University Lecturer in History at Cambridge University
Alexander Broadie, Professor of Logic and Rhetoric at the University of Glasgow
28 June 2007 Permian-Triassic Boundary – when 95% of life was killed off Richard Corfield, Senior Lecturer in Earth Sciences at the Open University
Mike Benton, Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol
Jane Francis, Professor of Palaeoclimatology at the University of Leeds
5 July 2007 The Pilgrim Fathers – the original American dream Kathleen Burk, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London
Harry Bennett, Reader in History and Head of Humanities at the University of Plymouth
Tim Lockley, associate professor of History at the University of Warwick
12 July 2007 Madame Bovary – the literary sensation caused by Gustave Flaubert's novel Madame Bovary Andy Martin, Lecturer in French at the University of Cambridge
Mary Orr, Professor of French at the University of Southampton
Robert Gildea, Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford

2007-2008

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TitleContributors
27 September 2007 Socrates – the man and the myth Angie Hobbs, associate professor of Philosophy at Warwick University
David Sedley, Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy at Cambridge University
Paul Millett, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge
4 October 2007 Antimatter – where has it all gone? Val Gibson, Reader in High Energy Physics at the University of Cambridge
Frank Close, Professor of Physics at Exeter College, University of Oxford
Ruth Gregory, Professor of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Durham
11 October 2007 Divine Right of Kings – "there's such divinity doth hedge a king" Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
Thomas Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London
Clare Jackson, Lecturer and Director of Studies in History at Trinity Hall, Cambridge
18 October 2007 The Arabian Nights – The art of story-telling Robert Graham Irwin, Senior Research Associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Marina Warner, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies at the University of Essex
Gerard van Gelder, Laudian Professor of Arabic at the University of Oxford
25 October 2007 Taste – the good, the bad and the ugly in 18th century Amanda Vickery, Reader in History at Royal Holloway, University of London
John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Jeremy Black, Professor of History at the University of Exeter
1 November 2007 Guilt – what is it good for? Stephen Mulhall, Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy at New College, Oxford
Miranda Fricker, Oliver Davies, Professor of Christian Doctrine at King's College London.
Oliver Davies, Professor of Christian Doctrine at King's College London
8 November 2007 Avicenna – wine, women and philosophy Peter Adamson, Reader in Philosophy at King's College London
Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
Nader El-Bizri, Affiliated Lecturer in the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
15 November 2007 The Discovery of Oxygen – feuds and revolutions at the birth of modern chemistry Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Jenny Uglow, Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Warwick
Hasok Chang, Reader in Philosophy of Science at University College London
22 November 2007 The Prelude – the greatest poem in the English language? Rosemary Ashton, Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College London
Stephen Gill, University Professor of English Literature and Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford
Emma Mason, Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Warwick
29 November 2007 The Fibonacci Sequence – – the numbers in nature Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
Jackie Stedall, Junior Research Fellow in History of Mathematics at Queen's College, Oxford
Ron Knott, Visiting Fellow in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Surrey
6 December 2007 Genetic Mutation – the error-strewn secrets of life Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics in the Galton Laboratory, University College London
Adrian Woolfson, lectures in Medicine at Cambridge University
Linda Partridge, Weldon Professor of Biometry at University College London
13 December 2007 The Sassanian Empire – – in the shadow of Ancient Persia Hugh N. Kennedy, Professor of Arabic in the Faculty of Languages and Cultures at the School of Oriental and African Studies
Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis, Curator of Iranian and Islamic Coins in the British Museum
James Howard-Johnston, University Lecturer in Byzantine Studies at the University of Oxford
20 December 2007 The Four Humours – yellow bile, blood, choler and phlegm in the original theory of everything David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Vivian Nutton, Professor of the History of Medicine at University College London
Noga Arikha, Visiting Fellow at the Institut Jean-Nicod in Paris
27 December 2007 The Nicene Creed – when Christ became God Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Caroline Humfress, Reader in History at Birkbeck College, University of London
Andrew Louth, Professor of Patristic and Byzantine Studies at the University of Durham
3 January 2008 Albert Camus – Rebel with a Cause Peter Dunwoodie, Professor of French Literature at Goldsmiths, University of London
David Walker, Professor of French at the University of Sheffield
Christina Howells, Professor of French at Wadham College, University of Oxford
10 January 2008 The Charge of the Light Brigade – "All in the valley of Death rode the six hundred" Mike Broers, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Lady Margaret Hall
Trudi Tate, Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge
Saul David, Visiting Professor of Military History at the University of Hull
17 January 2008 The Fisher King – the wound that does not heal Carolyne Larrington, Tutor in Medieval English at St John's College, Oxford
Stephen Knight, Distinguished Research Professor in English Literature at Cardiff University
Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh, Cardiff University and Director of the Folklore Society
24 January 2008 Plate Tectonics – the day the Earth moved Richard Corfield, Visiting Senior Lecturer in Earth Sciences at the Open University
Joe Cann, Senior Fellow in the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds
Lynne Frostick, Director of the Hull Environment Research Institute and Professor of Physical Geography at the University of Hull
31 January 2008 The Court of Rudolf II – the lost powerhouse of Renaissance ideas Peter Forshaw, Postdoctoral Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London and an Honorary Fellow of the University of Exeter
Howard Hotson, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of Oxford
Adam Mosley, Lecturer in the Department of History at the University of Wales, Swansea
7 February 2008 The Social ContractHobbes, Locke, Rousseau and the Origins of Society Melissa Lane, Senior University Lecturer in History at Cambridge University
Susan James, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Karen O'Brien, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warwick
14 February 2008 The Statue of Liberty – From France with love... Robert Gildea, Professor of Modern History at Oxford University
Kathleen Burk, Professor of Modern Contemporary History at University College London
John Keane, Professor of Politics at the University of Westminster
21 February 2008 The Multiverse – the universe is not enough Martin Rees, President of the Royal Society and Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge
Fay Dowker, Reader in Theoretical Physics at Imperial College
Bernard Carr, Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy at Queen Mary, University of London
28 February 2008 King LearShakespeare's finest fairy tale Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warwick
Katherine Duncan-Jones, Tutorial Fellow in English at Somerville College, Oxford
Catherine Belsey, Research Professor in English at the University of Wales, Swansea
6 March 2008 Ada Lovelace – prophet of the computer age Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor at Clare College, Cambridge
Doron Swade, Visiting Professor in the History of Computing at Portsmouth University
John Fuegi, Visiting Professor in Biography at Kingston University
13 March 2008 The Greek Myths – soap opera of the gods Nick Lowe, Senior Lecturer in Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London
Richard Buxton, Professor of Greek Language and Literature at the University of Bristol
Mary Beard, Professor of Classics at Cambridge University
20 March 2008 Søren Kierkegaard – fear and trembling in Copenhagen Jonathan Rée, Visiting Professor at Roehampton University and the Royal College of Art
Clare Carlisle, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Liverpool
John Lippitt, Professor of Ethics and Philosophy of Religion at the University of Hertfordshire
27 March 2008 The Dissolution of the Monasteries – religion in ruins Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at Oxford University
Diane Purkiss, Fellow and Tutor at Keble College, Oxford
George Bernard, Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Southampton
3 April 2008 Newton's Laws of Motion – they put a man on the Moon Simon Schaffer, Professor in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Darwin College
Raymond Flood, University Lecturer in Computing Studies and Mathematics and Senior Tutor at Kellogg College, Oxford
Rob Iliffe, Professor of Intellectual History and History of Science at the University of Sussex
10 April 2008 The Norman Yoke – 1067 and all that Sarah Foot, Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Christ Church, Oxford
Richard Gameson, Professor in the Department of History at Durham University
Matthew Strickland, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Glasgow
17 April 2008 Yeats and Irish Politics – "a terrible beauty is born" Roy Foster, Carroll Professor of Irish History at Oxford University and Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford
Fran Brearton, Reader in English at Queen's University, Belfast and Assistant Director of the Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry
Warwick Gould, Director of the Institute of English Studies in the School of Advanced Study, University of London
24 April 2008 Materialism – are we living in a material world? A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Caroline Warman, Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford
Anthony O'Hear, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Buckingham
1 May 2008 The Enclosures – dividing the country Rosemary Sweet, Director of the Centre for Urban History at the University of Leicester
Murray Pittock, Bradley Professor of English Literature at the University of Glasgow
Mark Overton, Professor of Economic and Social History at the University of Exeter
8 May 2008 The Brain: A History – history of ideas about the human brain Vivian Nutton, Professor of the History of Medicine at University College London
Jonathan Sawday, Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde
Marina Wallace, Professor at the University of the Arts, London, Central St Martin's College of Art and Design
15 May 2008 The Library at Nineveh Eleanor Robson, Senior Lecturer at Cambridge University and Vice-Chair of the British Institute for the Study of Iraq
Karen Radner, Lecturer in the Ancient Near Eastern History at University College London
Andrew R. George, Professor of Babylonian at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London
22 May 2008 The Black Death – a plague on all our houses Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History at Queen Mary, University of London
Samuel Cohn, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Glasgow
Paul Binski, Professor of the History of Medieval Art at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
29 May 2008 Probability – heads or tails? Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
Colva Roney-Dougal, Lecturer in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
5 June 2008 Lysenkoism – political campaign against genetics and science-based agriculture in the Soviet Union Robert Service, Professor of Russian History at the University of Oxford
Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
Catherine Merridale, Professor of Contemporary History at Queen Mary, University of London
12 June 2008 The Riddle of the Sands – how Britain learned to fear the Germans Richard J. Evans, Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge
Rosemary Ashton, Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College London
T. C. W. Blanning, Professor of Modern European History at Cambridge University
19 June 2008 The Music of the Spheres – a dose of heavenly harmonies Peter Forshaw, Postdoctoral Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London
Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford
Angela Voss, Director of the Cultural Study of Cosmology and Divination at the University of Kent, Canterbury
26 June 2008 The Arab Conquests – the 7th century new world order Hugh N. Kennedy, Professor of Arabic at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
Robert Hoyland, Professor in Arabic and Middle East Studies at the University of St Andrews
3 July 2008 The Metaphysical Poets – sex and death in the 17th century Thomas Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London
Julie Sanders, Professor of English Literature and ama at the University of Nottingham
Tom Cain, Professor of Early Modern Literature at the University of Newcastle
10 July 2008 Tacitus – The Decadence of Rome Catharine Edwards, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck, University of London
Ellen O'Gorman, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Bristol
Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin at University College London

2008-2009

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TitleContributors
25 September 2008 Miracles – will they never cease? Religion Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Janet Soskice, Reader in Philosophical Theology at Cambridge University
Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
2 October 2008 The Translation Movement – movement in Baghdad which translated Aristotle and Greek classics into Arabic Peter Adamson, Reader in Philosophy at King's College London
Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
Peter Pormann, Wellcome Trust Assistant Professor in Classics and Ancient History at the University of Warwick
9 October 2008 Gödel's incompleteness theorems – the dirty secret of maths science
Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at Wadham College, University of Oxford
John D. Barrow, Professor of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Cambridge and Gresham Professor of Geometry
Philip Welch, Professor of Mathematical Logic at the University of Bristol
16 October 2008 Vitalism – the spark of life Patricia Fara, Fellow of Clare College and Affiliated Lecturer in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge University
Andrew Mendelsohn, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science and Medicine at Imperial College, University of London
Pietro Corsi, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Oxford
23 October 2008 Dante's Inferno – to Hell and back Margaret Kean, University Lecturer in English and College Fellow at St Hilda's College, Oxford
John Took, Professor of Dante Studies at University College London
Claire Honess, Senior Lecturer in Italian at the University of Leeds and Co-Director of the Leeds Centre for Dante Studies
30 October 2008 Simón Bolívar – the liberator of Spanish America Anthony McFarlane, Professor of Comparative American Studies at the University of Warwick
John Fisher, Professor of Latin American History at the University of Liverpool
Catherine Davies, Professor in the Department of Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies at the University of Nottingham
6 November 2008 Aristotle's Politics – a perfect society? Angie Hobbs, associate professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Paul Cartledge, AG Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at the University of Cambridge
Annabel Brett, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Cambridge
13 November 2008 Neuroscience – does the brain rule the mind? Martin Conway, Professor of Psychology at the University of Leeds,
Gemma Calvert, Professor of Applied Neuroimaging at WMG, University of Warwick
David Papineau, Professor of Philosophy of Science at King's College London
20 November 2008 The Baroque – – the misshapen pearl of Europe T. C. W. Blanning, Professor of Modern European History and Fellow of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge
Nigel Aston, Reader in Early Modern History at the University of Leicester
Helen Hills, Professor of Art History at the University of York
27 November 2008 The Great Reform Act: reform – but was it great? Dinah Birch, Professor of English at Liverpool University
Michael Bentley, Professor of Modern History at the University of St Andrews
Catherine Hall, Professor of Modern British Social and Cultural History at University College London
4 December 2008 Heat: A History -from fire to thermodynamics Simon Schaffer, Professor of History of Science at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Darwin College
Hasok Chang, Professor of Philosophy of Science at University College London
Joanna Haigh, Professor of Atmospheric Physics at Imperial College London
11 December 2008 The Great Fire of London – London's burning, fetch the engines... Lisa Jardine, Centenary Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
Vanessa Harding, Reader in London History at Birkbeck, University of London
Jonathan Sawday, Professor of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde
18 December 2008 The Physics of Time – does time even exist? Jim Al-Khalili, Professor of Theoretical Physics and Chair in the Public Engagement in Science at the University of Surrey
Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University
Ian Stewart, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
1 January 2009 The Consolation of Philosophy – a new year's message from Boethius A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Melissa Lane, Senior University Lecturer in History at the University of Cambridge
Roger Scruton, Research Professor at the Institute for the Psychological Sciences
5 January 2009 Darwin: On the Origins of Charles Darwin Jim Moore, Professor of the History of Science at The Open University
Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
David Norman, Director of The Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences and Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge
Colin Higgins, Assistant Librarian at Christ's College, Cambridge
6 January 2009 Darwin: The Voyage of the Beagle Jim Moore, Professor of the History of Science at The Open University
Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
David Norman, Director of The Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences and Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge
Jenny Clack, Curator at The Cambridge University Museum of Zoology and Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology at the University of Cambridge
7 January 2009 Darwin: On the Origin of Species Jim Moore, Steve Jones, geneticist at University College London
Jim Secord, the Darwin Correspondence Project
Johannes Vogel, Sandy Knapp and Judith Magee, all of the National History Museum
8 January 2009 Darwin: Life After Origins Jim Moore, geneticist at University College London
Steve Jones, Darwin expert
Alison Pearn, the Darwin Correspondence Project
Nick Biddle, former garden curator at Down House
15 January 2009 Thoreau and the American Idyll – America in the Wilderness Kathleen Burk, Professor of American History at University College London
Tim Morris, Lecturer in American Literature at the University of Dundee
Stephen Fender, Honorary Professor in English Literature at University College London
22 January 2009 A History of History – how the writing of history has evolved Paul Cartledge, AG Leventis Professor of Greek Culture and Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge
John Burrow, emeritus fellow of Balliol College, Oxford
Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History at Queen Mary, University of London
29 January 2009 A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift – 18th century satire gets close to the bone John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Judith Hawley, Professor of 18th Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Ian McBride, Senior Lecturer in the History Department at King's College London
5 February 2009 The Brothers Grimm: fairy tales, Grimm – but not as we know them Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in Folklore at Cardiff University
Marina Warner, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies at the University of Essex
Tony Phelan, Professor in German at Keble College, Oxford
12 February 2009 The Destruction of Carthage"Delenda Carthago!" Mary Beard, Professor of Classics at the University of Cambridge
Jo Quinn, Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Oxford
Ellen O'Gorman, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Bristol
19 February 2009 The Observatory at JaipurIndian astronomy on the cusp of colonialism Chandrika Kaul, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of St Andrews
David Arnold, Professor of Asian and Global History at the University of Warwick
Chris Minkowski, Professor in Sanskrit at the University of Oxford
26 February 2009 The Waste Land and Modernity – "I will show you fear in a handful of dust" Steve Connor, Professor of Modern Literature and Theory at Birkbeck College, University of London
Fran Brearton, Reader in English at Queen's University, Belfast
Lawrence Rainey, Professor of English and American Literature at the University of York
5 March 2009 The Measurement problem in Physics – Man is not the measure of all things Basil Hiley, Emeritus Professor of Physics at Birkbeck, University of London
Simon Saunders, Reader in Philosophy of Physics and University Lecturer in Philosophy of Science at the University of Oxford
Roger Penrose, Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
12 March 2009 The Library of Alexandria – of all the books in all the world... Simon Goldhill, Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge
Matthew Nicholls, Lecturer in Classics at the University of Reading
Serafina Cuomo, Reader in Roman History at Birkbeck College, University of London
19 March 2009 The Boxer Rebellion – "Kill all Foreigners!" Frances Wood, Curator of Chinese Collections at the British Library
Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford
R. G. Tiedemann, Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Christianity in China
26 March 2009 The School of Athens – picturing Greece in Renaissance minds Angie Hobbs, associate professor in Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Valery Rees, Renaissance scholar and senior member of the Language Department at the School of Economic Science
Jill Kraye, Professor of the History of Renaissance Philosophy and Librarian at the Warburg Institute at the University of London
2 April 2009 Baconian ScienceFrancis Bacon and the birth of modern science Stephen Pumfrey, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science at the University of Lancaster
Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor at Clare College, Cambridge
Rhodri Lewis, University Lecturer in English at the University of Oxford and Fellow of St Hugh's
9 April 2009 Brave New World – would Soma, free love and the feelies be so bad? David Bradshaw, Reader and Tutor in English Literature at Worcester College, Oxford
Daniel Pick, Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
Michèle Barrett, Professor of Modern Literary and Cultural Theory at Queen Mary, University of London
16 April 2009 Suffragism – the long march towards votes for women Krista Cowman, Professor of History at the University of Lincoln
June Purvis, Professor of Women's & Gender History at the University of Portsmouth
Julia Bush, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Northampton
23 April 2009 The Building of St Petersburg – "a window through which Russia looks on Europe" Simon Dixon, Sir Bernard Pares Professor of Russian History at University College London
Janet Hartley, Professor of International History at the London School of Economics
Anthony Cross, Emeritus Professor of Slavonic Studies at the University of Cambridge
30 April 2009 The Vacuum of Space – a programme about nothing? Frank Close, Professor of Physics at Exeter College, Oxford
Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Visiting Professor in Astrophysics at Oxford University
Ruth Gregory, Professor of Theoretical Physics at Durham University
7 May 2009 Magna Carta – foundation of law or rich man's charter? Nicholas Vincent, Professor of Medieval History at the University of East Anglia
David Carpenter, Professor of Medieval History at King's College London
Michael Clanchy, Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the Institute of Historical Research
14 May 2009 The Siege of Vienna – a clash of civilisations? Jeremy Black, Professor of History at the University of Exeter
Andrew Wheatcroft, Professor of International Publishing at Stirling University
Claire Norton, Lecturer in History at St Mary's University, London
21 May 2009 The Whale: A History Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
Eleanor Weston, a mammalian palaeontologist at the Natural History Museum in London
Bill Amos, Professor of Evolutionary Genetics at Cambridge University
28 May 2009 Saint Paul – the first Christian John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
John Barclay, Lightfoot Professor of Divinity at Durham University
Helen Bond, Senior Lecturer in the New Testament at the University of Edinburgh
4 June 2009 The Trial of Charles I – the original courtroom drama Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
Diane Purkiss, Fellow and Tutor at Keble College, Oxford
David Wootton, Professor of History at the University of York
11 June 2009 The Augustan Age – art and propaganda at the birth of the Roman Empire Mary Beard, Professor of Classics at Cambridge University
Catharine Edwards, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck College, University of Londo
Duncan Kennedy, Professor of Latin Literature at the University of Bristol
18 June 2009 Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy – theatre of blood Jonathan Bate, Professor of Shakespeare and Renaissance Literature at the University of Warwick
Julie Sanders, Professor of English Literature and ama at the University of Nottingham
Janet Clare, Professor of Renaissance Literature at the University of Hull
25 June 2009 The Sunni-Shia Split: after Muhammad Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
Robert Gleave, Professor of Arabic Studies at the University of Exeter
Hugh N. Kennedy, Professor of Arabic in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London
2 July 2009 Logical Positivism – or is it? Barry Smith, Professor of Philosophy at the University of London
Nancy Cartwright, Professor of Philosophy at the London School of Economics
Thomas Uebel, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Manchester
9 July 2009 Ediacara biota – the first animal? Richard Corfield, Senior Lecturer in Earth Sciences at the Open University
Martin Brasier, Professor of Palaeobiology at the University of Oxford
Rachel Wood, Lecturer in Carbonate Geoscience at the University of Edinburgh

2009-2010

Broadcast date
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TitleContributors
17 September 2009 St Thomas Aquinas – his profound influence on Western faith and philosophy Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
Annabel Brett, Lecturer in History at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
24 September 2009 Leibniz vs Newton – who first calculated the calculus? Simon Schaffer, Professor of History of Science at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Darwin College
Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor at Clare College, Cambridge
Jackie Stedall, Departmental Lecturer in History of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
1 October 2009 Akhenaten – history's first individual Richard Parkinson, Egyptologist at the British Museum
Elizabeth Frood, Lecturer in Egyptology at the University of Oxford
Kate Spence, Lecturer in the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt at the University of Cambridge
8 October 2009 The Dreyfus Affair – the scandal that tore France apart Robert Gildea, Professor of Modern History at Oxford University
Robert Tombs, Professor of French History at Cambridge University
Ruth Harris, Lecturer in Modern History at Oxford University
15 October 2009 The Death of Elizabeth I – plots, plague and politics John Guy, Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge
Clare Jackson, Lecturer and Director of Studies in History at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge
Helen Hackett, Reader in English at University College London
22 October 2009 The Geological Formation of Britain – our long journey north Richard Corfield, Visiting Senior Research Fellow at Oxford University
Jane Francis, Professor of Palaeoclimatology, University of Leeds
Sanjeev Gupta, Royal Society-Leverhulme Trust Research Fellow at Imperial College London
29 October 2009 Schopenhauer – the tyranny of the Will A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Beatrice Han-Pile, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Essex
Christopher Janaway, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southampton
5 November 2009 The Siege of Münster – Apocalypse 1535 Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford
Charlotte Methuen, University Research Lecturer in Ecclesiastical History at the University of Oxford and Lecturer in Church History and Liturgy at Ripon College Cuddesdon
Lucy Wooding, Lecturer in Early Modern History at King's College, London
12 November 2009 The Discovery of Radiation – from radio waves to gamma rays Jim Al-Khalili, Professor of Theoretical Physics and Chair in the Public Engagement in Science at the University of Surrey
Frank Close, Professor of Physics at Exeter College, University of Oxford
Frank James, Professor of the History of Science at the Royal Institution
19 November 2009 Sparta – the anti-Athens Paul Cartledge, A G Leventis Professor of Greek Culture and a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge
Edith Hall, Professor of Classics and ama at Royal Holloway, University of London
Angie Hobbs, associate professor of Philosophy and Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
26 November 2009 A Portrait of the Artist as a Young ManJames Joyce's early masterpiece Roy Foster, Carroll Professor of Irish History and Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford
Katherine Mullin, Senior Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Leeds
Jeri Johnson, Senior Fellow in English at Exeter College, Oxford
3 December 2009 The Silk Road – from Dunhuang to Samarkand Frances Wood, Head of the Chinese Section at the British Library
Tim Barrett, Professor of East Asian History at the School of Oriental and African Studies
Naomi Standen, Senior Lecturer in Chinese Studies at Newcastle University
10 December 2009 Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans – maths and mysticism Ian Stewart, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Serafina Cuomo, Reader in Roman History at Birkbeck College, University of London
John O'Connor, Senior Lecturer in Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
24 December 2009 The Samurai – from civil warriors to civil servants Angus Lockyer, Lecturer in Japanese History and Chair of the Japan Research Centre at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

Nicola Liscutin, Programme Director of Japanese Studies, Birkbeck College, University of London
Gregory Irvine, Senior Curator Japan at the Victoria and Albert Museum

31 December 2009 Mary Wollstonecraft – the Vindicator of the Rights of Woman Karen O'Brien, Professor of English at the University of Warwick
John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Barbara Taylor, Professor of Modern History in the School of Humanities
4–7 January 2010 The History of the Royal Society Four daily programmes in documentary format
14 January 2010 The Frankfurt School – why no Revolution? Jonathan Rée, a freelance historian and philosopher, currently Visiting Professor at Roehampton University and at the Royal College of Art
Esther Leslie, Professor in Political Aesthetics at Birkbeck College, University of London
Raymond Geuss, Professor in the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
21 January 2010 The Glencoe Massacre – "Murder Under Trust" Murray Pittock, Bradley Professor of English Literature at the University of Glasgow
Karin Bowie, Lecturer in Scottish History at the University of Glasgow
Daniel Szechi, Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Manchester
28 January 2010 Silas MarnerGeorge Eliot's 1861 novel Rosemary Ashton, Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College, London
Dinah Birch, Professor of English at Liverpool University
Valentine Cunningham, Professor of English Language and Literature at Corpus Christi, University of Oxford.
4 February 2010 Ibn Khaldun Robert Hoyland, Professor of Islamic History at the University of Oxford
Robert Graham Irwin, Senior Research Associate of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London
Hugh N. Kennedy, is Professor of Arabic in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London.
11 February 2010 The Unintended Consequences of Mathematics John D. Barrow, Professor of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Cambridge and Professor of Geometry at Gresham College, London
Colva Roney-Dougal, Lecturer in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Marcus du Sautoy, Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science and Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford.
18 February 2010 The Indian Rebellion Chandrika Kaul, Lecturer in Imperial and Indian History at the University of St Andrews
Faisal Devji, University Reader in Indian History at St Antony's College, University of Oxford
Shruti Kapila, University Lecturer in History and Fellow and Director of Studies at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.
25 February 2010 Calvinism Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
Susan Hardman Moore, Senior Lecturer in Divinity at the University of Edinburgh
Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford.
4 March 2010 The Infant Brain Usha Goswami, Professor of Education at the University of Cambridge and Director of its Centre for Neuroscience in Education
Annette Karmiloff-Smith, Professorial Research Fellow at the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development at the Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck College, University of London
Denis Mareschal, Professor of Psychology at the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development at Birkbeck College, University of London
11 March 2010 Boudica Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in Folklore at Cardiff University
Richard Hingley, Professor of Roman Archaeology at Durham University
Miranda Aldhouse-Green, Professor of Archaeology in the School of History and Archaeology at Cardiff University.
18 March 2010 The Scream and Edvard Munch David Jackson, Professor of Russian and Scandinavian Art Histories at the University of Leeds
Dorothy Rowe, Senior Lecturer in the History of Art at the University of Bristol
Alastair Wright, University Lecturer in the History of Art at St John's College, University of Oxford.
25 March 2010 The History of the City (1 of 2) Peter Hall, Professor of Planning and Regeneration at The Bartlett School of Planning, University College London
Julia Merritt, associate professor of History at the University of Nottingham
Greg Woolfis, Professor of Ancient History at the University of St Andrews
1 April 2010 The History of the City (2 of 2) Peter Hall, Professor of Planning and Regeneration at The Bartlett School of Planning, University College London
Tristram Hunt, lecturer in History at Queen Mary College at the University of London
Ricky Burdett, Professor of Urban Studies at the London School of Economics
8 April 2010 William Hazlitt Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warwick
A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
Uttara Natarajan, Senior Lecturer in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at Goldsmiths College, University of London
15 April 2010 The Rise and Fall of the Zulu Nation Saul David, Professor of War Studies at the University of Buckingham
Saul Dubow, Professor of History at the University of Sussex
Shula Marks, Emeritus Professor of History at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
22 April 2010 Roman Satire Mary Beard, Professor of Classics at Cambridge University
Denis Feeney, Professor of Classics and Giger Professor of Latin at Princeton University
Duncan Kennedy, Professor of Latin Literature and the Theory of Criticism at the University of Bristol
29 April 2010 The Great Wall of China Julia Lovell, Lecturer in Chinese History at Birkbeck College, University of London
Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford
Frances Wood, Head of the Chinese Section at the British Library
6 May 2010 The Cool Universe Carolin Crawford, Member of the Institute of Astronomy, and Fellow of Emmanuel College, at the University of Cambridge
Paul Murdin, Visiting Professor of Astronomy at Liverpool John Moores University's Astronomy Research Institute
Michael Rowan-Robinson, Professor of Astrophysics at Imperial College, London
13 May 2010 The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James Jonathan Rée, Freelance philosopher
John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
Gwen Griffith-Dickson, Emeritus Professor of Divinity at Gresham College and Director of the Lokahi Foundation
20 May 2010 The Cavendish Family Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford
Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor of Clare College, University of Cambridge
Simon Schaffer, Professor of History of Science at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Darwin College, Cambridge
27 May 2010 Giorgio Vasari's Lives of the Artists Evelyn Welch, Professor of Renaissance Studies and Academic Dean for Arts at Queen Mary, University of London
David Ekserdjian, Professor of History of Art and Film at the University of Leicester
Martin Kemp, Emeritus Professor in the History of Art at the University of Oxford
3 June 2010 Edmund Burke Karen O'Brien, Professor of English at the University of Warwick
Richard Bourke, Senior Lecturer in History at Queen Mary, University of London
John Keane, Professor of Politics at the University of Sydney
10 June 2010 Al-Biruni James Montgomery, Professor of Classical Arabic at the University of Cambridge
Hugh Kennedy, Professor of Arabic in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London
Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
17 June 2010 The Neanderthals Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology at the University of Cambridge
Chris Stringer, Research Leader in Human Origins at the Natural History Museum and Visiting Professor at Royal Holloway, University of London
Danielle Schreve, Reader in Physical Geography at Royal Holloway, University of London
24 June 2010 Antarctica Jane Francis, Professor of Paleoclimatology at the University of Leeds
Julian Dowdeswell, Director of the Scott Polar Research Institute and Professor of Physical Geography at the University of Cambridge
David Walton, Emeritus Professor at the British Antarctic Survey and Visiting Professor at the University of Liverpool
1 July 2010 Athelstan Sarah Foot, Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Christ Church, Oxford
John Hines, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University
Richard Gameson, Professor of the History of the Book at Durham University
8 July 2010 Pliny's Natural History (Pliny) Serafina Cuomo, Reader in Roman History at Birkbeck, University of London
Aude Doody, Lecturer in Classics at University College, Dublin
Liba Taub, Reader in the History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge University

2010-2011

Broadcast date
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TitleContributors
23 September 2010 Imaginary numbers Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at Oxford University
Ian Stewart, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Caroline Series, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
30 September 2010 The Delphic Oracle Paul Cartledge, A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at Cambridge University
Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at Royal Holloway, University of London
Nick Lowe, Reader in Classical Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
7 October 2010 The Spanish Armada Diane Purkiss, Fellow and Tutor at Keble College, Oxford
Maria Jose Rodriguez-Salgado, , Professor in International History at the London School of Economics
Nicholas Rodger, senior research fellow at All Souls College, Oxford
14 October 2010 Sturm und Drang T. C. W. Blanning, Emeritus Professor of Modern European History at Cambridge University
Susanne Kord, Professor of German at University College, London
Maike Oergel, associate professor of German at the University of Nottingham
21 October 2010 History of logic A. C. Grayling, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Peter Millican, Gilbert Ryle Fellow in Philosophy at Hertford College, Oxford
Rosanna Keefe, , Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Sheffield
28 October 2010 The Unicorn Juliette Wood, , Associate Lecturer in Folklore at Cardiff University
Lauren Kassell, , Lecturer in the History and philosophy of science at the University of Cambridge
David Ekserdjian, , Professor of the History of Art and Film at the University of Leicester
4 November 2010 Women and Enlightenment Science Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor at Clare College, Cambridge
Karen O'Brien, , Professor of English at the University of Warwick
Judith Hawley, , Professor of 18th Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
11 November 2010 The Volga Vikings James Montgomery, professor of Classical Arabic at the University of Cambridge
Neil Price, Professor of Archaeology at the University of Aberdeen
Elizabeth Ashman Rowe, , Lecturer in Scandinavian History of the Viking Age at Clare Hall, Cambridge
18 November 2010 Foxe's Book of Martyrs Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of Church history at the University of Oxford
Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
Elizabeth Evenden, Lecturer in Book History at Brunel University
25 November 2010 The History of Metaphor Steven Connor, Professor of Modern Literature and Theory at Birkbeck, University of London
Tom Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at the University of Sussex
Julie Sanders, Professor of English Literature at the University of Nottingham
2 December 2010 Cleopatra Catharine Edwards, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck, University of London
Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin at University College London
Susan Walker, Keeper of Antiquities at the Ashmolean Museum at the University of Oxford
9 December 2010 Thomas Edison Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science, University of Cambridge
Kathleen Burk, Professor of History, University College London
Iwan Morus, Reader in History, University of Aberystwyth
16 December 2010 Daoism Tim Barrett, Professor of East Asian History at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
Hilde de Weerdt, Fellow and Tutor in Chinese History at Pembroke College, University of Oxford
23 December 2010 The Industrial Revolution Jeremy Black, Professor of History at the University of Exeter
Pat Hudson, Professor Emerita of History at Cardiff University
William Ashworth, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Liverpool
30 December 2010 Consequences of the Industrial Revolution Jane Humphries, Professor of Economic History and Fellow of All Souls College, University of Oxford
Emma Griffin, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of East Anglia
Lawrence Goldman, Fellow and Tutor in History at St Peter's College, University of Oxford
6 January 2011 Childe Harold's Pilgrimage Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warwick
Jane Stabler, Reader in Romanticism at the University of St Andrews
Emily Bernhard Jackson, Assistant Professor in Nineteenth-Century English Literature at the University of Arkansas
13 January 2011 Random and Pseudorandom Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
Colva Roney-Dougal, Senior Lecturer in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Timothy Gowers, Royal Society Research Professor in Mathematics at the University of Cambridge
20 January 2011 The Mexican Revolution Alan Knight, Professor of the History of Latin America at the University of Oxford
Paul Garner, Cowdray Professor of Spanish at the University of Leeds
Patience Schell, Senior Lecturer in Latin American Cultural Studies at the University of Manchester
27 January 2011 Aristotle's Poetics Angie Hobbs, associate professor of Philosophy and Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Nick Lowe, Reader in Classical Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Stephen Halliwell, Professor of Greek at the University of St Andrews
3 February 2011 The Battle of Bannockburn Matthew Strickland, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Glasgow
Fiona Watson, Honorary Research Fellow in History at the University of Dundee
Michael Brown, Reader in History at the University of St Andrews
10 February 2011 The Nervous System Colin Blakemore, Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Oxford
Vivian Nutton, Emeritus Professor of the History of Medicine at University College, London
Tilli Tansey, Professor of the History of Modern Medical Sciences at Queen Mary, University of London
17 February 2011 Maimonides John Joseph Haldane, Professor of Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
Sarah Stroumsa, Professor of Arabic Studies and currently Rector at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Peter Adamson, Professor of Ancient and Medieval Philosophy at King's College London
24 February 2011 The Taiping Rebellion Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford
Frances Wood, Head of the Chinese Section at the British Library
Julia Lovell, Lecturer in Chinese History at Birkbeck, University of London
3 March 2011 The Age of the Universe Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal and Emeritus Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge
Carolin Crawford, Member of the Institute of Astronomy and Fellow of Emmanuel College at the University of Cambridge
Carlos Frenk, Director of the Institute for Computational Cosmology at the University of Durham
10 March 2011 Free Will (500th programme) Simon Blackburn, Bertrand Russell Professor of Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
Helen Beebee, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Birmingham
Galen Strawson, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading
17 March 2011 The Medieval University Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History at Queen Mary, University of London
Ian Wei, Senior Lecturer in Medieval European History at the University of Bristol
Peter Denley, Reader in History at Queen Mary, University of London
24 March 2011 The Dawn of the Iron Age Barry Cunliffe, Emeritus Professor of European Archaeology at the University of Oxford
Sue Hamilton, Professor of Prehistory at University College London
Timothy Champion, Professor of Archaeology at the University of Southampton
31 March 2011 The Bhagavad Gita Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy at Lancaster University
Julius J. Lipner, Professor of Hinduism and the Comparative Study of Religion and Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge
Jessica Frazier, research fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and Lecturer in Religious Studies at Regent's College, London
7 April 2011 Octavia Hill Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature and Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research at Liverpool University
Lawrence Goldman, Fellow in Modern History at St Peter's College, Oxford
Gillian Darley, Historian and biographer of Octavia Hill
14 April 2011 The Neutrino Frank Close, Professor of Physics at Exeter College at the University of Oxford
Susan Cartwright, Senior Lecturer in Particle Physics and Astrophysics at the University of Sheffield
David Wark, Professor of Particle Physics at Imperial College, London, and the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
21 April 2011 The Pelagian Controversy Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
Caroline Humfress, Reader in History at Birkbeck College, University of London
John Milbank, Professor in Religion, Politics and Ethics and the Director of the Centre for Theology and Philosophy at the University of Nottingham
28 April 2011 Cogito Ergo Sum Susan James, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London
John Cottingham, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Reading and Professorial Research Fellow at Heythrop College, University of London
Stephen Mulhall, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford
5 May 2011 Islamic Law and its Origins Hugh Kennedy, Professor of Arabic in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London
Robert Gleave, Professor of Arabic Studies at the University of Exeter
Mona Siddiqui, Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Glasgow
12 May 2011 The Anatomy of Melancholy Julie Sanders, Professor of English Literature and Drama at the University of Nottingham
Mary Ann Lund, Lecturer in English at the University of Leicester
Erin Sullivan, Lecturer and Fellow at the Shakespeare Institute at the University of Birmingham
19 May 2011 Custer's Last Stand Kathleen Burk, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London
Adam Smith, Senior Lecturer in American History at University College London
Saul David, Professor of War Studies at the University of Buckingham
26 May 2011 Xenophon Paul Cartledge, A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at Cambridge University
Edith Hall, Professor of Classics and ama at Royal Holloway, University of London
Simon Goldhill, Professor in Greek Literature and Culture at the University of Cambridge and Fellow and Director of Studies in Classics at King's College London
2 June 2011 Battle of Stamford Bridge John Hines, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University
Elizabeth Ashman Rowe, Lecturer in Scandinavian History of the Viking Age at Clare Hall, Cambridge
Stephen Baxter, Reader in Medieval History at King's College London
9 June 2011 The Origins of Infectious Disease Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
Roy Anderson, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at Imperial College London
Mark Pallen, Professor of Microbial Genomics at the University of Birmingham
16 June 2011 John Wycliff and the Lollards Anthony Kenny, Philosopher and former Master of Balliol College, Oxford
Anne Hudson, Emeritus Professor of Medieval English at the University of Oxford
Rob Lutton, Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Nottingham
23 June 2011 Malthusianism Karen O'Brien, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Education at the University of Birmingham
Mark Philp, Lecturer in Politics at the University of Oxford
Emma Griffin, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of East Anglia
30 June 2011 Tennyson's In Memoriam Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature and Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research at Liverpool University,
Seamus Perry, Fellow and Tutor in English at Balliol College, University of Oxford,
Jane Wright, Lecturer in English at the University of Bristol
7 July 2011 The Minoan Civilisation John Bennet, Professor of Aegean Archaeology at Sheffield University
Ellen Adams, Lecturer in Classical Art and Archaeology at King's College London
Yannis Hamilakis, Professor of Archaeology at the University of Southampton

2011-2012

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TitleContributors
15 September 2011 The Hippocratic Oath Vivian Nutton, Emeritus Professor of the History of Medicine at University College London
Helen King, Professor of Classical Studies at the Open University
Peter Pormann, Wellcome Trust Associate Professor in Classics and Ancient History at the University of Warwick
22 September 2011 Shinto Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
Richard Bowring, Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Cambridge
Lucia Dolce, Senior Lecturer in Japanese Religion and Japanese at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
29 September 2011 The Etruscan Civilisation Phil Perkins, Professor of Archaeology at the Open University
David Ridgway, senior research fellow at the Institute of Classical Studies at the University of London
Corinna Riva, Lecturer in Mediterranean Archaeology at University College London
6 October 2011 David Hume Peter Millican, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford
Helen Beebee, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Birmingham
James Harris, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
13 October 2011 The Ming Voyages Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford
Julia Lovell, Lecturer in Chinese History at Birkbeck College, University of London
Craig Clunas, Professor of the History of Art at the University of Oxford
20 October 2011 Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People Tim Blanning, Former Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
Tamar Garb, Durning Lawrence Professor in the History of Art at University College London
Simon Lee, Senior Lecturer on the history of art at Reading University
27 October 2011 The Siege of Tenochtitlan Alan Knight, Professor of the History of Latin America at the University of Oxford
Elizabeth Graham, Professor of Mesoamerican Archaeology at University College, London
Caroline Dodds Pennock, Lecturer in International History at the University of Sheffield
3 November 2011 The Moon Paul Murdin, Visiting Professor of Astronomy at Liverpool John Moores University
Carolin Crawford, Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College and Fellow and College Lecturer at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge
Ian Crawford, Reader in Planetary Science and Astrobiology at Birkbeck College, London
10 November 2011 The Continental-Analytic Split Stephen Mulhall, Professor of Philosophy at New College, Oxford
Beatrice Han-Pile, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Essex
Hans Johann-Glock, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Zurich
17 November 2011 Ptolemy and Ancient Astronomy Liba Taub, Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge University
Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford
Charles Burnett, Professor of the History of Islamic Influences on Europe at the Warburg Institute, University of London
24 November 2011 Judas Maccabeus Helen Bond, Senior Lecturer in the New Testament at University of Edinburgh
Tessa Rajak, Emeritus Professor of Ancient History at the University of Reading
Philip Alexander, Emeritus Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Manchester
1 December 2011 Christina Rossetti Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature and Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research at Liverpool University
Rhian Williams, Lecturer in Nineteenth-Century English Literature at the University of Glasgow
Nicholas Shrimpton, Emeritus Fellow of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford
8 December 2011 Heraclitus Angie Hobbs, associate professor of Philosophy and Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Peter Adamson, Professor of Ancient and Medieval Philosophy at King's College London
James Warren, Senior Lecturer in Classics and a Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge
15 December 2011 The Concordat of Worms Henrietta Leyser, Emeritus Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford
Kate Cushing, Reader in Medieval History at Keele University
John Gillingham, Emeritus Professor of History at the London School of Economics and Political Science
22 December 2011 Robinson Crusoe Karen O'Brien, Pro-Vice Chancellor for Education at the University of Birmingham
Judith Hawley, Professor of Eighteenth-Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Bob Owens, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at the Open University
29 December 2011 Macromolecules Tony Ryan, Pro-Vice Chancellor for the Faculty of Science at the University of Sheffield
Athene Donald, Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Robinson College
Charlotte Williams, Reader in Polymer Chemistry and Catalysis at Imperial College, London
2–6 January 2012 The Written World Documentary series
12 January 2012 The Safavid Dynasty Robert Gleave, Professor of Arabic Studies at the University of Exeter
Emma Loosley, Senior Lecturer at the School of Arts, Histories and Cultures at the University of Manchester
Andrew Newman, Reader in Islamic Studies and Persian at the University of Edinburgh.
19 January 2012 1848: Year of Revolution Tim Blanning, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Cambridge
Lucy Riall, Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
Mike Rapport, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Stirling
26 January 2012 The Scientific method Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Cambridge
John Worrall, Professor of the Philosophy of Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science
Michela Massimi, Senior Lecturer in the Philosophy of Science at University College London
2 February 2012 The Kama Sutra Julius Lipner, Professor of Hinduism and the Comparative Study of Religion at the University of Cambridge
Jessica Frazier, Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Kent and research fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies
David Smith, Reader in South Asian Religions at the University of Lancaster
9 February 2012 Erasmus Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford
Eamon Duffy, Professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Cambridge
Jill Kraye, Professor of the History of Renaissance Philosophy and Librarian at the Warburg Institute, University of London
16 February 2012 The An Lushan Rebellion Frances Wood, Lead Curator of Chinese at the British Library
Naomi Standen, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Birmingham
Hilde de Weerdt, Fellow and Lecturer in Chinese History at Pembroke College, Oxford
23 February 2012 Conductors and Semiconductors Frank Close, Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford
Jenny Nelson, Professor of Physics at Imperial College London
Lesley Cohen, Professor of Solid State Physics at Imperial College London
1 March 2012 Benjamin Franklin Simon Middleton, Senior Lecturer in American History at the University of Sheffield
Simon Newman, Sir Denis Brogan Professor of American History at the University of Glasgow
Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor at Clare College, Cambridge
8 March 2012 Lyrical Ballads Judith Hawley, Professor of Eighteenth-Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Jonathan Bate, Provost of Worcester College, Oxford
Peter Swaab, Reader in English Literature at University College London
15 March 2012 Vitruvius and De Architectura Serafina Cuomo, Reader in Roman History at Birkbeck, University of London
Robert Tavernor, Emeritus Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at the London School of Economics
Alice Koenig, Lecturer in Latin and Classical Studies at the University of St Andrews
22 March 2012 Moses Mendelssohn Christopher Clark, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
Abigail Green, Tutor and Fellow in History at the University of Oxford
Adam Sutcliffe, Senior Lecturer in European History at King's College, London
29 March 2012 The Measurement of Time Kristen Lippincott, Former Director of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich
Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford
Jonathan Betts, Senior Curator of Horology at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich
5 April 2012 George Fox and the Quakers Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
John Coffey, Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Leicester
Kate Peters, Fellow in History at Murray Edwards College at the University of Cambridge
12 April 2012 Early Geology Stephen Pumfrey, Senior Lecturer in the History of Science at Lancaster University
Andrew Scott, Professor of Applied Palaeobotany at Royal Holloway, University of London
Leucha Veneer, Research Associate at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester
19 April 2012 Neoplatonism Angie Hobbs, associate professor of Philosophy and Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Peter Adamson, Professor of Ancient and Medieval Philosophy at King's College London
Anne Sheppard, Professor of Ancient Philosophy at Royal Holloway, University of London
26 April 2012 Battle of Bosworth Field Anne Curry, Professor of Medieval History and Dean of Humanities at the University of Southampton
Steven Gunn, Tutor and Fellow in Modern History at Merton College, Oxford
David Grummitt, Lecturer in British History at the University of Kent
3 May 2012 Voltaire's Candide David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Nicholas Cronk, Professor of French Literature and Director of the Voltaire Foundation at the University of Oxford
Caroline Warman, Lecturer in French and Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford
10 May 2012 Game Theory Ian Stewart, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Andrew Colman, Professor of Psychology at the University of Leicester
Richard Bradley, Professor of Philosophy at the London School of Economics and Political Science
17 May 2012 Clausewitz and On War Saul David, Professor of War Studies at the University of Buckingham
Hew Strachan, Chichele Professor of the History of War at the University of Oxford
Beatrice Heuser, Professor of International Relations at the University of Reading
24 May 2012 Marco Polo Frances Wood, Lead Curator of Chinese Collections at the British Library
Joan Pau Rubies, Reader in International History at the London School of Economics and Political Science
Debra Higgs Strickland, Senior Lecturer in the History of Art at the University of Glasgow
31 May 2012 The Trojan War Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at King's College London
Ellen Adams, Lecturer in Classical Art and Archaeology at King's College London
Susan Sherratt, Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Sheffield
7 June 2012 King Solomon Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
Philip Alexander, Emeritus Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Manchester
Katharine Dell, Senior Lecturer in Old Testament Studies at the University of Cambridge, and Fellow of St Catharine's College, Cambridge
14 June 2012 James Joyce's Ulysses Steven Connor, Professor of Modern Literature and Theory at Birkbeck, University of London
Jeri Johnson, Senior Fellow in English at Exeter College, Oxford
Richard Brown, Reader in Modern English Literature at the University of Leeds
21 June 2012 Annie Besant Lawrence Goldman, Fellow in Modern History at St Peter's College, Oxford
David Stack, Reader in History at the University of Reading
Yasmin Khan, Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Royal Holloway, University of London
28 June 2012 Al-Kindi Hugh Kennedy, Professor of Arabic at SOAS, University of London
James Montgomery, Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic Elect at the University of Cambridge
Amira Bennison, Senior Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Cambridge
5 July 2012 Scepticism Peter Millican, Professor of Philosophy at Hertford College, Oxford
Melissa Lane, Professor of Politics at Princeton University
Jill Kraye, Professor of the History of Renaissance Philosophy and Librarian at the Warburg Institute, University of London
12 July 2012 Hadrian's Wall Greg Woolf, Professor of Ancient History at the University of St Andrews
David Breeze, Former Chief Inspector of Ancient Monuments for Scotland and Visiting Professor of Archaeology at the University of Durham
Lindsay Allason-Jones, Former Reader in Roman Material Culture at the University of Newcastle

2012-2013

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TitleContributors
13 September 2012 The Cell Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College London
Cathie Martin, MBE, [3] Group Leader at the John Innes Centre and Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of East Anglia
Nick Lane, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London
20 September 2012 The Druids Barry Cunliffe, Emeritus Professor of Archaeology at the University of Oxford
Miranda Aldhouse-Green, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University
Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
27 September 2012 The Ontological Argument John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
Peter Millican, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford
Clare Carlisle, Lecturer in Philosophy of religion at King's College London
4 October 2012 Gerald of Wales Henrietta Leyser, Emeritus Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford
Michelle Brown, Professor Emerita of Medieval Manuscript Studies at the School of Advanced Study, University of London
Huw Pryce, Professor of Welsh History at Bangor University
11 October 2012 Hannibal Ellen O'Gorman, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Bristol
Mark Woolmer, Senior Tutor in the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Durham
Louis Rawlings, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History at Cardiff University
18 October 2012 Caxton and the Printing Press Richard Gameson, Professor of the History of the Book at the University of Durham
Julia Boffey, Professor of Medieval Studies in the English Department at Queen Mary, University of London
David Rundle, Member of the History Faculty at the University of Oxford
25 October 2012 Fermat's Last Theorem Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics & Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford
Vicky Neale, Fellow and Director of Studies in Mathematics at Murray Edwards College at the University of Cambridge
Samir Siksek, Professor at the Mathematics Institute at the University of Warwick
1 November 2012 The Anarchy John Gillingham, Emeritus Professor of History at the London School of Economics and Political Science
Louise Wilkinson, Reader in Medieval History at Canterbury Christ Church University
David Carpenter, Professor of Medieval History at King's College London
8 November 2012 The Upanishads Jessica Frazier, Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Kent and a research fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies at the University of Oxford
Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy at Lancaster University
Simon Brodbeck, Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Cardiff
15 November 2012 Simone Weil Beatrice Han-Pile, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Essex
Stephen Plant, Runcie Fellow and Dean of Trinity Hall at the University of Cambridge
David Levy, Teaching Fellow in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh
22 November 2012 The Borgias Evelyn Welch, Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
Catherine Fletcher, Lecturer in Public History at the University of Sheffield
Christine Shaw, Honorary Research Fellow at Swansea University
29 November 2012 Crystallography Judith Howard, Director of the Biophysical Sciences Institute and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Durham
Chris Hammond, Life Fellow in Material Science at the University of Leeds
Mike Glazer, Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford and Visiting Professor of Physics at the University of Warwick
6 December 2012 Bertrand Russell A. C. Grayling, Master of the New College of the Humanities and a Supernumerary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford
Mike Beaney, Professor of Philosophy at the University of York
Hilary Greaves, Lecturer in Philosophy and Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford
13 December 2012 Shahnameh of Ferdowsi Narguess Farzad, Senior Fellow in Persian at SOAS, University of London
Charles Melville, Professor of Persian History at Pembroke College, Cambridge
Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis, Curator of Middle Eastern Coins at the British Museum
20 December 2012 The South Sea Bubble Anne Murphy, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Hertfordshire
Helen Paul, Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton
Roey Sweet, Head of the School of History at the University of Leicester
27 December 2012 The Cult of Mithras Greg Woolf, Professor of Ancient History at the University of St Andrews
Almut Hintze, Zartoshty Professor of Zoroastrianism at SOAS, University of London
John North, Acting Director of the Institute of Classical Studies, University of London
10 January 2013 Le Morte d'Arthur Helen Cooper, Professor of Medieval and Renaissance English at the University of Cambridge
Helen Fulton, Professor of Medieval Literature and Head of Department of English and Related Literature at the University of York
Laura Ashe, CUF Lecturer and Tutorial Fellow at Worcester College at the University of Oxford
17 January 2013 Comets Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University
Paul Murdin, Senior Fellow at the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Cambridge
Don Pollacco, Professor of Astronomy at the University of Warwick
24 January 2013 Romulus and Remus Mary Beard, Professor of Classics at the University of Cambridge
Peter Wiseman, Emeritus Professor of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Exeter
Tim Cornell, Emeritus Professor of Ancient History at the University of Manchester
31 January 2013 The War of 1812 Kathleen Burk, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London
Lawrence Goldman, Fellow in Modern History at St Peter's College, Oxford
Frank Cogliano, Professor of American History at the University of Edinburgh
7 February 2013 Epicureanism Angie Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Sheffield
David Sedley, Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
James Warren, Reader in Ancient Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
14 February 2013 Ice ages Jane Francis, Professor of Paleoclimatology at the University of Leeds
Richard Corfield, research fellow in Geology at the University of Oxford
Carrie Lear, Senior Lecturer in Palaeoceanography at Cardiff University
21 February 2013 Decline and Fall David Bradshaw, Professor of English Literature at Worcester College, Oxford
John Bowen, Professor of Nineteenth-Century Literature at the University of York
Ann Pasternak Slater, senior research fellow at St Anne's College, Oxford
28 February 2013 Pitt Rivers Adam Kuper, Visiting Professor of Anthropology at Boston University
Richard Bradley, Professor in Archaeology at the University of Reading
Dan Hicks, University Lecturer & Curator of Archaeology at the Pitt Rivers Museum at the University of Oxford
7 March 2013 Absolute Zero Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Cambridge
Stephen Blundell, Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford
Nicola Wilkin, Lecturer in Theoretical Physics at the University of Birmingham
14 March 2013 Chekhov Catriona Kelly, Professor of Russian at the University of Oxford
Cynthia Marsh, Emeritus Professor of Russian ama and Literature at the University of Nottingham
Rosamund Bartlett, Founding Director of the Anton Chekhov Foundation and former Reader in Russian at the University of Durham
21 March 2013 Alfred Russel Wallace Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at University College London
George Beccaloni, Curator of Cockroaches and Related Insects and Director of the Wallace Correspondence Project at the Natural History Museum
Ted Benton, Professor of Sociology at the University of Essex
28 March 2013 Water Hasok Chang, Hans Rausing Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Andrea Sella, Professor of Chemistry at University College London
Patricia Hunt, research fellow of Queens' College and Research Associate at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cambridge
4 April 2013 Japan's Sakoku Period Richard Bowring, Emeritus Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Cambridge
Andrew Cobbing, associate professor of History at the University of Nottingham
Rebekah Clements, Senior Lecturer in Chemistry at Imperial College London
11 April 2013 Amazons Paul Cartledge, A.G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at Cambridge University
Chiara Franceschini, Teaching Fellow at University College London and an Academic Assistant at the Warburg Institute
Caroline Vout, University Senior Lecturer in Classics and Fellow and Director of Studies at Christ's College, Cambridge
18 April 2013 Putney Debates Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London
Ann Hughes, Professor of Early Modern History at Keele University
Kate Peters, Fellow in History at Murray Edwards College, Cambridge
25 April 2013 Montaigne David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at York University
Terence Cave, Emeritus Professor of French Literature at the University of Oxford
Felicity Green, Chancellor's Fellow in History at the University of Edinburgh
2 May 2013 Gnosticism Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
Caroline Humfress, Reader in History at Birkbeck College, University of London
Alastair Logan, Honorary University Fellow of the Department of Theology and Religion at the University of Exeter
9 May 2013 Icelandic Sagas Carolyne Larrington, Fellow and Tutor in Medieval English Literature at St John's College, Oxford
Elizabeth Ashman Rowe, Lecturer in Scandinavian History at the University of Cambridge
Emily Lethbridge, Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies in Reykjavík
16 May 2013 Cosmic rays Carolin Crawford, Gresham Professor of Astronomy and a member of the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Cambridge
Alan Watson, Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Leeds
Tim Greenshaw, Professor of Physics at the University of Liverpool
23 May 2013 Lévi-Strauss Adam Kuper, Visiting Professor of Anthropology at Boston University
Christina Howells, Professor of French at Oxford University
Vincent Debaene, associate professor of French Literature at Columbia University
30 May 2013 Queen Zenobia Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at King's College London
Kate Cooper, Professor of Ancient History at the University of Manchester
Richard Stoneman, Honorary Visiting Professor in the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Exeter
6 June 2013 Relativity Ruth Gregory, Professor of Mathematics and Physics at Durham University
Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal and Emeritus Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge
Roger Penrose, Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford
13 June 2013 Prophecy Mona Siddiqui, Professor of Islamic and Interreligious Studies at the University of Edinburgh
Justin Meggitt, University Senior Lecturer in the Study of Religion and the Origins of Christianity at the University of Cambridge
Jonathan Stökl, Post-Doctoral Researcher at Leiden University
20 June 2013 The Physiocrats Richard Whatmore, Professor of Intellectual History & the History of political thought at the University of Sussex
Joel Felix, Professor of History at the University of Reading
Helen Paul, Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton
27 June 2013 Romance of the Three Kingdoms Frances Wood, Former Lead Curator of Chinese Collections at the British Library
Craig Clunas, Professor of the History of Art at the University of Oxford
Margaret Hillenbrand, University Lecturer in Modern Chinese Literature at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Wadham College
4 July 2013 The Invention of Radio Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Cambridge
Elizabeth Bruton, Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Leeds
John Liffen, Curator of Communications at the Science Museum, London

2013-2014

Broadcast date
Listen again
TitleContributors
19 September 2013 Blaise Pascal David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Michael Moriarty, Professor of French at the University of Cambridge
Michela Massimi, Senior Lecturer in the Philosophy of Science at the University of Edinburgh
26 September 2013 The Mamluks Amira Bennison, Reader in the History and Culture of the Maghrib at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Magdalene College, Cambridge
Robert Irwin, Former Senior Research Associate in the Department of History at SOAS, University of London
Doris Behrens-Abouseif, Nasser Khalili Professor of Islamic Art and Archaeology at SOAS, University of London
3 October 2013 Exoplanets Carolin Crawford, Gresham Professor of Astronomy and a member of the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Cambridge
Don Pollacco, Professor of Astronomy at the University of Warwick
Suzanne Aigrain, Lecturer in Astrophysics at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford
10 October 2013 Galen Vivian Nutton, Emeritus Professor of the History of Medicine at University College London
Helen King, Professor of Classical Studies at the Open University
Caroline Petit, Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow in Classics at the University of Warwick
17 October 2013 The Book of Common Prayer Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford
Alexandra Walsham, Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge
Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
24 October 2013 The Corn Laws Lawrence Goldman, Fellow in Modern History at St Peter's College, Oxford
Boyd Hilton, Former Professor of Modern British History at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
Cheryl Schonhardt-Bailey, Reader in Political Science at the London School of Economics
31 October 2013 The Berlin Conference Richard Ayton, Rhodes Professor of Imperial History at King's College London
Richard Rathbone, Emeritus Professor of African History at SOAS, University of London
Joanna Lewis, assistant professor of Imperial History at the London School of Economics, University of London
7 November 2013 Ordinary language philosophy Stephen Mulhall, Professor of Philosophy at New College, Oxford
Ray Monk, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southampton
Julia Tanney, Reader in Philosophy of Mind at the University of Kent
14 November 2013 The Tempest Jonathan Bate, Provost of Worcester College, Oxford
Erin Sullivan, Lecturer and Fellow at the Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham
Katherine Duncan-Jones, emeritus fellow of Somerville College, Oxford
21 November 2013 Pocahontas Susan Castillo, Harriet Beecher Stowe Emeritus Professor of American Studies at King's College London
Tim Lockley, Reader in American Studies at the University of Warwick
Jacqueline Fear-Segal, Reader in American History and Culture at the University of East Anglia
28 November 2013 The Microscope Jim Bennett, Visiting Keeper at the Science Museum, London
Colin Humphreys, Professor of Materials Science and Director of Research at the University of Cambridge
Michelle Peckham, Professor of Cell Biology at the University of Leeds
5 December 2013 Hindu Ideas of Creation Jessica Frazier, Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Kent and a research fellow of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies at the University of Oxford
Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy at Lancaster University
Gavin Flood, Professor of Hindu Studies and Comparative Religion at the University of Oxford
12 December 2013 Pliny the Younger Catharine Edwards, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck, University of London
Roy Gibson, Professor of Latin at the University of Manchester
Alice König, Lecturer in Latin and Classical Studies at the University of St Andrews
19 December 2013 Complexity Ian Stewart, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the University of Warwick
Jeff Johnson, Professor of Complexity Science and Design at the Open University
Eve Mitleton-Kelly, Director of the Complexity Research Group at the London School of Economics
26 December 2013 The Medici Evelyn Welch, Professor of Renaissance Studies at King's College London
Robert Black, Professor of Renaissance History at the University of Leeds
Catherine Fletcher, Lecturer in Public History at the University of Sheffield
3 January 2014 Plato's Symposium Angie Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Sheffield
Richard L. Hunter, Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge
Frisbee Sheffield, Director of Studies in Philosophy at Christ's College, Cambridge
16 January 2014 The Battle of Tours Hugh N. Kennedy, Professor of Arabic at SOAS, University of London
Rosamond McKitterick, Professor of Medieval History, University of Cambridge
Matthew Innes, Vice Master and Professor of History, Birkbeck, University of London
23 January 2014 Sources of Early Chinese History Roel Sterckx, Joseph Needham Professorship of Chinese History, Science, and Civilization at the University of Cambridge
Tim Barrett, Professor of East Asian History at SOAS, University of London
Hilde de Weerdt, Professor of Chinese History at Leiden University
30 January 2014 Catastrophism Andrew Scott, Leverhulme Emeritus Fellow in the Department of Earth Sciences at Royal Holloway, University of London
Jan Zalasiewicz, Senior Lecturer in Geology at the University of Leicester
Leucha Veneer, Visiting Scholar at the Faculty of Life Sciences at the University of Manchester
6 February 2014 The Phoenicians Mark Woolmer, at Durham University
Josephine Quinn, Martin Frederiksen Fellow and Tutor in Ancient History, Worcester College, Oxford
Cyprian Broodbank, at University College London
13 February 2014 Chivalry Miri Rubin, Professor of Early Modern History at Queen Mary University of London
Matthew Strickland, Professor at School of Humanities / Sgoil nan Daonnachdan, University of Glasgow
Laura Ashe, University Lecturer and Tutorial Fellow Worcester College, University of Oxford
20 February 2014 Social Darwinism Adam Kuper, Centennial Professor of Anthropology at the LSE, University of London
Gregory Radick, Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Leeds
Charlotte Sleigh, Reader in the History of Science at the University of Kent
27 February 2014 The Eye Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor and Director of Studies Clare College, Cambridge
William Ayliffe, FRCS PhD, Consultant Ophthalmologist at Lister Hospital, London, Professor at Gresham College
Robert Iliffe, , Professor of Intellectual History and History of Science, University of Sussex
6 March 2014 Spartacus Mary Beard, Professor of Classics Newnham College, Cambridge
Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin, co-director of the Centre for Research into the Dynamics of Civilisation, University College London
Theresa Urbainczyk, Associate Professor of Classics (Scoil na gClasaicí UCD), University College Dublin
13 March 2014 The Trinity Janet Soskice, Professor of Philosophical Theology at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge
Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
The Reverend Graham Ward, Regius Professor of Divinity at the University of Oxford and a Canon of Christ Church
20 March 2014 Bishop Berkeley Peter Millican, Gilbert Ryle Fellow and Professor of Philosophy at Hertford College, Oxford
Tom Stoneham, Professor of Philosophy at the University of York
Michela Massimi, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy of Science at the University of Edinburgh
27 March 2014 Weber's The Protestant Ethic Peter Ghosh, Fellow in History at St Anne's College, Oxford
Sam Whimster, Honorary Professor in Sociology at the University of New South Wales
Linda Woodhead, Professor of Sociology of Religion at Lancaster University
3 April 2014 States of Matter Andrea Sella, Professor of Materials and Inorganic Chemistry at University College London
Athene Donald, Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Cambridge
Justin Wark, Professor of Physics and Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford
10 April 2014 Strabo's Geographica Paul Cartledge, A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at the University of Cambridge
Maria Pretzler, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History at Swansea University
Benet Salway, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History at University College London
17 April 2014 The Domesday Book Stephen Baxter, Reader in Medieval History at King's College London
Elisabeth van Houts, Honorary Professor of Medieval European History at the University of Cambridge
David Bates, Professorial Fellow in Medieval History at the University of East Anglia
24 April 2014 Tristram Shandy Judith Hawley, Royal Holloway, University of London
John Mullan, University College London
Mary Newbould, University of Cambridge
1 May 2014 The Tale of Sinuhe Richard B. Parkinson, Professor of Egyptology and Fellow of The Queen's College, Oxford
Roland Emmarch, Senior Lecturer in Egyptology at the University of Liverpool
Aidan Dodson, Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Bristol
8 May 2014 Second Sino-Japanese War Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China; Fellow of St Cross College University of Oxford
Barak Kushner, University of Cambridge
Tehyun Ma, Lecturer in Chinese History at University of Exeter
15 May 2014 Photosynthesis Sandra Knapp, the Natural History Museum, London
Nick Lane, at University College London
John F Allen, Professor of Biochemistry at Queen Mary, University of London
22 May 2014 The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Charles Melville, Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cambridge
Daniel Karlin, Winterstoke Professor of English at the University of Bristol
Kirstie Blair, Professor at the University of Stirling
29 May 2014 The Talmud Philip Alexander, Professor of Post-Biblical Jewish Literature at the University of Manchester
Norman Solomon, Rabbi
Laliv Clenman,com_qcontacts/catid,10551/id,362/view, contact/ Lecturer in Rabbinic Literature at Leo Baeck College
5 June 2014 The Bluestockings Karen O'Brien, Professor of English Literature at King's College London
Elizabeth Eger, Reader at King's College London
Nicole Pohl, Reader in Early Modern Literature and Critical Theory at Oxford Brookes University
12 June 2014 Robert Boyle Simon Schaffer, Professor the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge
Michael Hunter, Professor at the Department of History, Classics and Archaeology at Birkbeck College, University of London
Anna Marie Roos, Senior Lecturer in Faculty of Media Humanities and Performance at the University of Lincoln
19 June 2014 The Philosophy of Solitude Melissa Lane, Professor of Politics at Princeton University
Simon Blackburn, Fellow of University of Cambridge
John Haldane, Professor of Philosophy at University of St Andrews
26 June 2014 Hildegard of Bingen Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History and Head of the School of History at Queen Mary, University of London
William Flynn, Lecturer in Medieval Latin at the University of Leeds
Almut Suerbaum, Lecturer in German, Fellow of Somerville at the University of Oxford
3 July 2014 Mrs Dalloway Dame Hermione Lee, President of Wolfson College, Oxford
Jane Goldman, Reader in English Literature at the University of Glasgow
Kathryn Simpson, Senior Lecturer in English Literature at Cardiff Metropolitan University
10 July 2014 The Sun Carolin Crawford, Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College
Yvonne Elsworth, Professor of Helioseismology, Poynting Professor of Physics at the University of Birmingham
Louise Harra, Professor of solar physics at Mullard Space Science Laboratory, UCL

2014-2015

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TitleContributors
25 September 2014 e Colva Roney-Dougal, Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
June Barrow-Green, Senior Lecturer in the History of Maths at the Open University
Vicky Neale, Whitehead Lecturer at the Mathematical Institute and Balliol College, Oxford
2 October 2014 Julius Caesar Christopher Pelling, Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Oxford
Catherine Steel, Professor of Classics at the University of Glasgow
Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin at University College London
9 October 2014 The Battle of Talas Hilde de Weerdt, Professor of Chinese History at Leiden University
Michael Höckelmann, British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of History at King's College London
Hugh Kennedy, Professor of Arabic at SOAS, University of London
16 October 2014 Rudyard Kipling Howard Booth, Senior Lecturer in English Literature, University of Manchester
Daniel Karlin, Research Fellow in English, William Wills of English, University of Bristol
Jan Montefiore, Professor of 20th Century English Literature, University of Kent
23 October 2014 The Haitian Revolution Kate Hodgson, Doctor of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies, University of Liverpool
Tim Lockley, School of Comparative American Studies, University of Warwick
Karen Salt, Research Fellow at School of Divinity, History and philosophy, University of Aberdeen
30 October 2014 Nuclear Fusion Philippa Browning, Professor of Astrophysics, Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manchester
Steve Cowley, Professor in Plasma Physics, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Department of Physics Imperial College, London
Justin Wark, Professor of Physics, University of Oxford
6 November 2014 Hatshepsut Elizabeth Frood, Associate Professor of Egyptology; Fellow of St Cross College the University of Oxford
Kate Spence, Lecturer in Egyptian Archaeology at the University of Cambridge
Campbell Price, Curator of Department of Egypt & Syria, Manchester Museum (The University of Manchester)
13 November 2014 Brunel Julia Elton, Past President of the Newcomen Society
Ben Marsden, Senior Lecturer, School of Divinity, History and philosophy, University of Aberdeen
Crosbie Smith, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Kent
20 November 2014 Aesop Pavlos Avlamis, Faculty of Classics Research Lecturer, Trinity College, Oxford
Lucy Grig, Senior Lecturer in Roman History at the University of Edinburgh
Simon Goldhill, Professor of Greek Literature and Culture, Fellow and Director of Studies in Classics at King's College, Cambridge
27 November 2014 Kafka's The Trial Elizabeth Boa, Emeritus Professor of German, University of Nottingham
Steve Connor, Professor of English, Peterhouse, Cambridge
Ritchie Robertson, Taylor Professor of the German Language and Literature, The Queen's College, Oxford
4 December 2014 Zen Tim Barrett, Emeritus Professor at Department of the Study of Religions, SOAS, University of London
Lucia Dolce, Numata Reader in Japanese Buddhism at SOAS, University of London
Eric Greene, Lecturer in East Asian Religions at the University of Bristol
11 December 2014 Behavioural ecology Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics, School of Life and Medical Sciences at University College London
Rebecca Kilner, Professor of Evolutionary biology at Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge
John Krebs, Principal at Jesus College Oxford
18 December 2014 Truth Simon Blackburn, Fellow of Trinity College, University of Cambridge, and Professor of Philosophy at the New College of the Humanities
Jennifer Hornsby, Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
Crispin Wright, Regius Professor of Logic at the University of Aberdeen, and Professor of Philosophy at New York University
15 January 2015 Bruegel's The Fight Between
Carnival and Lent
Louise Milne, Lecturer in Visual Culture in the School of Art at the University of Edinburgh and Edinburgh Napier University
Jeanne Nuechterlein, Senior Lecturer in the Department of History of Art, University of York
Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History and Head of the School of History at Queen Mary, University of London
22 January 2015 Phenomenology Simon Glendinning, Professor of European Philosophy in the European Institute at the London School of Economics
Joanna Hodge, Professor of Philosophy at Manchester Metropolitan University
Stephen Mulhall, Professor of Philosophy and Tutor at New College, Oxford
29 January 2015 Thucydides Paul Cartledge, Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture and AG Leventis Senior Research Fellow at Clare College, Cambridge
Katherine Harloe, Associate Professor in Classics and Intellectual History at the University of Reading
Neville Morley, Professor of Ancient History at the University of Bristol
5 February 2015 Ashoka the Great Jessica Frazier, Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Kent and a research fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies
Naomi Appleton, Chancellor's Fellow in Religious Studies at the University of Edinburgh
Richard Gombrich, Founder and Academic Director of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies and Emeritus Professor of Sanskrit at the University of Oxford
12 February 2015 The Photon Frank Close, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Oxford
Wendy Flavell, Professor of Surface Physics at the University of Manchester
Susan Cartwright, Senior Lecturer in Physics and Astronomy at the University of Sheffield
19 February 2015 Wealth of Nations Richard Whatmore, Professor of Modern History and Director of the Institute of Intellectual History at the University of St Andrews
Donald Winch, Emeritus Professor of Intellectual History at the University of Sussex
Helen Paul, Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton
26 February 2015 The Eunuch Karen Radner, Professor of Ancient Near Eastern History at University College London
Shaun Tougher, Reader in Ancient History at Cardiff University
Michael Hoeckelmann, British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of History at King's College London
5 March 2015 Beowulf Laura Ashe, Associate Professor in English at the University of Oxford and Fellow of Worcester College
Clare Lees, Professor of Medieval English Literature and History of the Language at King's College London
Andy Orchard, Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford
12 March 2015 Dark matter Carolin Crawford, Public Astronomer at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge
Gresham Professor of Astronomy Carlos Frenk, Ogden Professor of Fundamental Physics and Director of the Institute for Computational Cosmology at the University of Durham
Anne Green, Reader in Physics at the University of Nottingham
19 March 2015 Al-Ghazali Peter Adamson, Professor of Late Ancient and Arabic Philosophy at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
Carole Hillenbrand, Professor of Islamic History at Edinburgh and St Andrews Universities
Robert Gleave, Professor of Arabic Studies at the University of Exeter
26 March 2015 The Curies Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor of Clare College, University of Cambridge
Robert Fox, [4] Emeritus Professor of the History of Science at the University of Oxford
Steven T Bramwell, Professor of Physics and former Professor of Chemistry at University College London
2 April 2015 The California Gold Rush Kathleen Burk, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London
Jacqueline Fear-Segal, Reader in American History and Culture at the University of East Anglia
Frank Cogliano, Professor of American History at the University of Edinburgh
9 April 2015 Sappho Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at King's College, London
Margaret Reynolds, Professor of English at Queen Mary University of London
Dirk Obbink, Professor of Papyrology and Greek Literature at the University of Oxford
16 April 2015 Matteo Ricci and the Ming dynasty Mary Laven, Reader in Early Modern History at the University of Cambridge
Craig Clunas, Professor of the History of Art at the University of Oxford
Anne Gerritsen, Reader in History at the University of Warwick
23 April 2015 Fanny Burney Nicole Pohl, Reader in English Literature at Oxford Brookes University
Judith Hawley, Professor of Eighteenth-Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
30 April 2015 The Earth's core Stephen Blundell, Professor of Physics and Fellow of Mansfield College, University of Oxford
Arwen Deuss, associate professor in Seismology at Utrecht University
Simon Redfern, Professor of Mineral Physics at the University of Cambridge
7 May 2015 Rabindranath Tagore Chandrika Kaul, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of St Andrews
Bashabi Fraser, Professor of English Literature and Creative Writing at Edinburgh Napier University
John Stevens, Leverhulme Postdoctoral Fellow at SOAS, University of London
14 May 2015 Lancashire Cotton Famine Chandrika Kaul, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of St Andrews
Emma Griffin, Professor of History at the University of East Anglia
David Brown, Senior Lecturer in American Studies at University of Manchester
21 May 2015 Josephus Tessa Rajak, Professor Emeritus of Ancient History, University of Reading
Philip Alexander, Professor Emeritus of Jewish Studies, University of Manchester
Martin Goodman, Professor of Jewish Studies, University of Oxford and President of the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies
28 May 2015 The Science of Glass Paul McMillan, Professor of Chemistry at University College London
Dame Athene Donald, Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Cambridge and Master of Churchill College, Cambridge
Jim Bennett, Former Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford and Keeper Emeritus at the Science Museum
4 June 2015 Prester John Marianne O'Doherty, associate professor in English at the University of Southampton
Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
Amanda Power, Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Sheffield
11 June 2015 Utilitarianism Melissa Lane, The Class of 1943 Professor of Politics at Princeton University
Janet Radcliffe Richards, Professor of Practical Philosophy at the University of Oxford
Brad Hooker, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading
18 June 2015 Jane Eyre Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature and Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research at the University of Liverpool
Karen O'Brien, Vice Principal and Professor of English Literature at King's College London
Sara Lyons, Lecturer in Victorian Literature at the University of Kent
25 June 2015 Extremophiles Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University
Ian Crawford, Professor of Planetary Science and Astrobiology at Birkbeck, University of London
Nick Lane, Reader in Evolutionary Biochemistry at University College London
2 July 2015 Frederick the Great Tim Blanning, Emeritus Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
Katrin Kohl, Professor of German Literature at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Jesus College
Thomas Biskup, Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of Hull
9 July 2015 Frida Kahlo Patience Schell, Chair in Hispanic Studies at the University of Aberdeen
Valerie Fraser, Emeritus Professor of Latin American Art at the University of Essex
Alan Knight, Emeritus Professor of the History of Latin America at the University of Oxford

2015-2016

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TitleContributors
24 September 2015 Perpetual motion Ruth Gregory, Professor of Mathematics and Physics at Durham University
Frank Close, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Oxford
Steven Bramwell, Professor of Physics and former Professor of Chemistry at University College London
1 October 2015 Alexander the Great Paul Cartledge, Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture and AG Leventis Senior Research Fellow at Clare College, University of Cambridge
Diana Spencer, Professor of Classics at the University of Birmingham
Rachel Mairs, Lecturer in Classics at the University of Reading
15 October 2015 Holbein at the Tudor Court Susan Foister, Curator of Early Netherlandish, German and British Painting at the National Gallery
John Guy, a fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge
Maria Hayward, Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Southampton
22 October 2015 Simone de Beauvoir Christina Howells, Professor of French and Fellow of Wadham College at the University of Oxford
Margaret Atack, Professor of French at the University of Leeds
Ursula Tidd, Professor of Modern French Literature and Thought at the University of Manchester
29 October 2015 The Empire of Mali Amira Bennison, Reader in the History and Culture of the Maghrib at the University of Cambridge
Marie Rodet, Senior Lecturer in the History of Africa at SOAS
Kevin MacDonald, Professor of African Archaeology, Chair of the African Studies Programme at University College London
5 November 2015 P v NP Colva Roney-Dougal, Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Timothy Gowers, Royal Society Research Professor in Mathematics at the University of Cambridge
Leslie Ann Goldberg, Professor of Computer Science and Fellow of St Edmund Hall, University of Oxford
12 November 2015 Battle of Lepanto Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford
Kate Fleet, Director of the Skilliter Centre for Ottoman Studies and Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge
Noel Malcolm, senior research fellow in History at All Souls College, University of Oxford
19 November 2015 Emma Janet Todd, Professor Emerita of Literature, University of Aberdeen, and Honorary Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge
John Mullan, Professor of English at University College London
Emma Clery, Professor of English at the University of Southampton
29 November 2015 The Salem Witch Trials Susan Castillo, Harriet Beecher Stowe Professor of American Studies at King's College London
Simon Middleton, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Sheffield
Marion Gibson, Professor of Renaissance and Magical Literatures at the University of Exeter
3 December 2015 Voyages of James Cook Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Cambridge
Rebekah Higgitt, Lecturer in the History of Science at the University of Kent
Sophie Forgan, Retired Principal Lecturer at the University of Teesside, and Chairman of Trustees of the Captain Cook Museum, Whitby
10 December 2015 Chinese Legalism Frances Wood, Former Curator of the Chinese Collections at the British Library
Hilde de Weerdt, Professor of Chinese History at Leiden University
Roel Sterckx, Joseph Needham Professor of Chinese History at the University of Cambridge
17 December 2015 Circadian rhythms Russell Foster, Professor of Circadian Neuroscience at the University of Oxford
Debra Skene, Professor of Neuroendocrinology at the University of Surrey
Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at University College London
25 December 2015 Michael Faraday Geoffrey Cantor, Professor Emeritus of the History of Science at the University of Leeds
Laura Herz, Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford
Frank James, Professor of the History of Science at the Royal Institution
31 December 2015 Tristan and Iseult Laura Ashe, associate professor of English at Worcester College, Oxford
Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the School of Welsh at Cardiff University
Mark Chinca, Reader in Medieval German Literature at the University of Cambridge
14 January 2016 Saturn Carolin Crawford, Public Astronomer at the Institute of Astronomy and Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Michele Dougherty, Professor of Space Physics at Imperial College London
Andrew Coates, Deputy Director in charge of the Solar System at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory at University College London
21 January 2016 Thomas Paine's Common Sense Kathleen Burk, Professor Emerita of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London
Nicholas Guyatt, University Lecturer in American History at the University of Cambridge
Peter Thompson, associate professor of American History at the University of Oxford and Fellow of St Cross College
28 January 2016 Eleanor of Aquitaine Lindy Grant, Professor of Medieval History at the University of Reading
Nicholas Vincent, Professor of Medieval History at the University of East Anglia
Julie Barrau, University Lecturer in British Medieval History at the University of Cambridge
4 February 2016 Chromatography Andrea Sella, Professor of Chemistry at University College London
Apryll Stalcup, Professor of Chemical Sciences at Dublin City University
Leon Barron, Senior Lecturer in Forensic Science at King's College London
11 February 2016 Rumi's Poetry Alan Williams, British Academy Wolfson Research Professor at the University of Manchester
Carole Hillenbrand, Professor of Islamic History at the University of St Andrews and Professor Emerita of University of Edinburgh
Lloyd Ridgeon, Reader in Islamic Studies at the University of Glasgow
18 February 2016 Robert Hooke David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Patricia Fara, President Elect of the British Society for the History of Science
Rob Iliffe, Professor of History of Science at University of Oxford
25 February 2016 Mary Magdalene Joanne Anderson, Lecturer in Art History at the Warburg Institute, School of Advanced Study, University of London
Eamon Duffy, Emeritus Professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Magdalene College
Joan Taylor, Professor of Christian Origins and Second Temple Judaism at King's College London
3 March 2016 The Dutch East India Company Anne Goldgar, Reader in Early Modern European History at King's College London
Chris Nierstrasz, Lecturer in Global History at Erasmus University, Rotterdam, formerly at the University of Warwick
Helen Paul, Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton
10 March 2016 The Maya Civilization Elizabeth Graham, Professor of Mesoamerican Archaeology at University College London
Matthew Restall, Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Latin American History and Anthropology at Pennsylvania State University
Benjamin Vis, Eastern ARC Research Fellow in Digital Humanities at the University of Kent
17 March 2016 Bedlam Hilary Marland, Professor of History at the University of Warwick
Justin Champion, Professor of the History of Early Modern Ideas at Royal Holloway, University of London and President of the Historical Association
Jonathan Andrews, Reader in the History of Psychiatry at Newcastle University
24 March 2016 Aurora Leigh Margaret Reynolds, Professor of English at Queen Mary University of London
Daniel Karlin, Winterstoke Professor of English Literature at the University of Bristol
Karen O'Brien, Professor of English Literature at King's College London
31 March 2016 Agrippina the Younger Catharine Edwards, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck, University of London
Alice König, Lecturer in Latin and Classical Studies at the University of St Andrews
Matthew Nicholls, associate professor of Classics at the University of Reading
7 April 2016 The Sikh Empire Gurharpal Singh, Professor in Inter-Religious Relations and Development at SOAS, University of London
Chandrika Kaul, Lecturer in Modern History at the University of St Andrews
Susan Stronge, Senior Curator in the Asian Department of the Victoria and Albert Museum
14 April 2016 The Neutron Val Gibson, Professor of High Energy Physics at the University of Cambridge and fellow of Trinity College
Andrew Harrison, chief executive officer of Diamond Light Source and Professor in Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh
Frank Close, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Oxford
21 April 2016 1816, the Year Without a Summer Clive Oppenheimer, Professor of Volcanology at the University of Cambridge
Jane Stabler, Professor in Romantic Literature at the University of St Andrews
Lawrence Goldman, Director of the Institute of Historical Research at the University of London
28 April 2016 Euclid's Elements Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics and Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford
Serafina Cuomo, Reader in Roman History at Birkbeck, University of London
June Barrow-Green, Professor of the History of Mathematics at the Open University
5 May 2016 Tess of the d'Urbervilles Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature and Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and Impact at the University of Liverpool
Francis O'Gorman, Professor of Victorian Literature at the University of Leeds
Jane Thomas, Reader in Victorian and early Twentieth Century literature at the University of Hull
12 May 2016 Titus Oates and his Popish Plot Clare Jackson, Senior Tutor and Director of Studies in History at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge
Mark Knights, Professor of History at the University of Warwick
Peter Hinds, associate professor of English at Plymouth University
19 May 2016 The Muses Paul Cartledge, Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture and A. G. Leventis Senior Research Fellow at Clare College, Cambridge
Angie Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy, University of Sheffield
Penelope Murray, Founder member and retired Senior Lecturer, Department of Classics, University of Warwick
26 May 2016 The Gettysburg Address Catherine Clinton, Denman Chair of American History at the University of Texas and International Professor at Queen's University Belfast
Susan-Mary Grant, Professor of American History at Newcastle University
Tim Lockley, Professor of American History at the University of Warwick
2 June 2016 Margery Kempe and English Mysticism Miri Rubin, Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History at Queen Mary, University of London
Katherine Lewis, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Huddersfield
Anthony Bale, Professor of Medieval Studies at Birkbeck, University of London
9 June 2016 Penicillin Laura Piddock, Professor of Microbiology at the University of Birmingham
Christoph Tang, Professor of Cellular Pathology and Professorial Fellow at Exeter College at the University of Oxford
Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at University College London
16 June 2016 The Bronze Age Collapse John Bennet, Director of the British School at Athens and Professor of Aegean Archaeology at the University of Sheffield

Linda Hulin, Fellow of Harris Manchester College and Research Officer at the Oxford Centre for Maritime Archaeology at the University of Oxford
Simon Stoddart, Fellow of Magdalene College and Reader in Prehistory at the University of Cambridge

23 June 2016 Songs of Innocence and of Experience Jonathan Bate, Provost of Worcester College, Oxford
Sarah Haggarty, Lecturer at the Faculty of English and Fellow of Queens' College, Cambridge
Jon Mee, Professor of Eighteenth-Century Studies at the University of York
30 June 2016 Sovereignty Melissa Lane, Class of 1943 Professor of Politics at Princeton University
Richard Bourke, Professor in the History of Political Thought at Queen Mary, University of London
Tim Stanton, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics at the University of York
7 July 2016 The Invention of Photography Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Cambridge
Elizabeth Edwards, Emeritus Professor of Photographic History at De Montfort University
Alison Morrison-Low, Research Associate at National Museums of Scotland

2016-2017

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TitleContributors
22 September 2016 Zeno's paradoxes Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics and Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford
Barbara Sattler, Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of St Andrews
James Warren, Reader in Ancient Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
29 September 2016 Animal Farm Steven Connor, Grace 2 Professor of English at the University of Cambridge
Mary Vincent, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Sheffield
Robert Colls, Professor of Cultural History at De Montfort University
6 October 2016 Lakshmi Jessica Frazier, Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Kent, research fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies at the University of Oxford
Jacqueline Suthren-Hirst, Senior Lecturer in South Asian Studies at the University of Manchester
Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, Professor of Comparative Religion and Philosophy at Lancaster University
13 October 2016 Plasma Justin Wark, Professor of Physics and Fellow of Trinity College at the University of Oxford
Kate Lancaster, research fellow for Innovation and Impact at the York Plasma Institute at the University of York
Bill Graham, Professor of Physics at Queen's University Belfast
20 October 2016 The 12th Century Renaissance Laura Ashe, associate professor of English at Worcester College, Oxford
Elisabeth van Houts, Honorary Professor of Medieval European History at the University of Cambridge
Giles Gasper, Reader in Medieval History at Durham University
27 October 2016 John Dalton Jim Bennett, Associate Former Director of the Museum of the History of Science at the University of Oxford and Keeper Emeritus at the Science Museum
Aileen Fyfe, Reader in British History at the University of St Andrews
James Sumner, Lecturer in the History of Technology at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester
3 November 2016 Epic of Gilgamesh Andrew George, Professor of Babylonian at SOAS, University of London
Frances Reynolds, Shillito Fellow in Assyriology at the Oriental Institute, University of Oxford and Fellow of St Benet's Hall
Martin Worthington, Lecturer in Assyriology at the University of Cambridge
10 November 2016 The Fighting Temeraire Susan Foister, Curator of Early Netherlandish, German and British Painting at the National Gallery
David Blayney Brown, Manton Curator of British Art 1790–1850 at Tate Britain
James Davey, Curator of Naval History at the National Maritime Museum
17 November 2016 Justinian's Legal Code Caroline Humfress, Professor of Medieval History at the University of St Andrews
Simon Corcoran, Lecturer in Ancient History at Newcastle University
Paul du Plessis, Senior Lecturer in Civil law and European legal history at the School of Law University of Edinburgh
24 November 2016 Baltic Crusades Aleks Pluskowski, associate professor of Archaeology at the University of Reading
Nora Berend, Fellow of St Catharine's College and Reader in European History at the Faculty of History at the University of Cambridge
Martin Palmer, Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture
1 December 2016 Garibaldi and the Risorgimento Lucy Riall, Professor of Comparative History of Europe at the European University Institute and Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London
Eugenio Biagini, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at the University of Cambridge
David Laven, associate professor of History at the University of Nottingham
8 December 2016 Harriet Martineau Valerie Sanders, Professor of English at the University of Hull
Karen O'Brien, Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford
Ella Dzelzainis, Lecturer in 19th Century Literature at Newcastle University
15 December 2016 The Gin Craze Angela McShane, research fellow in History at the Victoria and Albert Museum and University of Sheffield
Judith Hawley, Professor of 18th century literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Emma Major, Senior Lecturer in English at the University of York
21 December 2016 Four Quartets David Moody, Emeritus Professor of English and American Literature at the University of York
Fran Brearton, Professor of Modern Poetry at Queen's University Belfast
Mark Ford, Professor of English and American Literature at University College London
29 December 2016 Johannes Kepler David Wootton, Professor of History at the University of York
Ulinka Rublack, Professor of Early Modern European History at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of St John's College
Adam Mosley, associate professor in the Department of History at Swansea University
12 January 2017 Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morality Stephen Mulhall, Professor of Philosophy and a Fellow and Tutor at New College, Oxford
Fiona Hughes, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Essex
Keith Ansell-Pearson, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
19 January 2017 Mary, Queen of Scots David Forsyth, Principal Curator, Scottish Medieval-Early Modern Collections at National Museums Scotland
Anna Groundwater, Teaching Fellow in Historical Skills and Methods at the University of Edinburgh
John Guy, Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge
26 January 2017 Parasitism Steve Jones, Emeritus Professor of Genetics at University College, London
Wendy Gibson, Professor of Protozoology at the University of Bristol
Kayla King, associate professor in the Department of Zoology at the University of Oxford
2 February 2017 Hannah Arendt Lyndsey Stonebridge, Professor of Modern Literature and History at the University of East Anglia
Frisbee Sheffield, Lecturer in Philosophy at Girton College, University of Cambridge
Robert Eaglestone, Professor of English at Royal Holloway, University of London
9 February 2017 John Clare Jonathan Bate, Professor of English Literature at the Worcester College, Oxford University
Mina Gorji, Senior Lecturer in the English Faculty and fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge
Simon Kövesi, Professor of English Literature at Oxford Brookes University
16 February 2017 Maths in the Early Islamic World Colva Roney-Dougal, Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Peter Pormann, Professor of Classics & Graeco-Arabic Studies at the University of Manchester
Jim Al-Khalili, Professor of Physics at the University of Surrey
23 February 2017 Seneca the Younger Mary Beard, Professor of Classics at the University of Cambridge
Catharine Edwards, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Birkbeck, University of London
Alessandro Schiesaro, Professor of Classics at the University of Manchester
2 March 2017 Kuiper belt Carolin Crawford, Public Astronomer at the Institute of Astronomy and Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Monica Grady, Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University
Stephen Lowry, Reader in Planetary and Space Sciences, University of Kent
9 March 2017 Elizabeth Gaskell's novel North and South Sally Shuttleworth, Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford
Dinah Birch, Pro-vice Chancellor for Research and Professor of English Literature at the University of Liverpool
Jenny Uglow, Biographer of Elizabeth Gaskell
16 March 2017 Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum Dame Jane Francis, Professor of Palaeoclimatology at the British Antarctic Survey
Mark Maslin, Professor of Palaeoclimatology at University College London
Tracy Aze, Lecturer in Marine Micropaleontology at the University of Leeds
23 March 2017 Battle of Salamis Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones, Professor in Ancient History at Cardiff University
Lindsay Allen, Lecturer in Greek and Near Eastern History, King's College London
Paul Cartledge, Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture and AG Leventis Senior Research Fellow at Clare College, Cambridge
30 March 2017 Hokusai Angus Lockyer, Lecturer in Japanese History at SOAS University of London
Rosina Buckland, Senior Curator of Japanese Collections at the National Museum of Scotland
Ellis Tinios, Honorary Lecturer in the School of History, University of Leeds
6 April 2017 Pauli exclusion principle Frank Close, Fellow Emeritus at Exeter College, Oxford
Michela Massimi, Professor of Philosophy of Science at the University of Edinburgh
Graham Farmelo, Bye-Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge
13 April 2017 Rosa Luxemburg Jacqueline Rose, Co-Director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, Birkbeck, University of London
Mark Jones, Irish Research Council fellow at the Centre for War Studies, University College Dublin
Nadine Rossol, Senior lecturer in Modern European History at the University of Essex
20 April 2017 Roger Bacon Jack Cunningham, Academic Coordinator for Theology at Bishop Grosseteste University, Lincoln
Amanda Power, associate professor of Medieval History at the University of Oxford
Elly Truitt, associate professor of Medieval History at Bryn Mawr College
27 April 2017 Egyptian Book of the Dead John Taylor, Curator at the Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum
Kate Spence, Senior Lecturer in Egyptian Archaeology at Cambridge University and Fellow of Emmanuel College
Richard Parkinson, Professor of Egyptology at the University of Oxford and Fellow of the Queen's College
4 May 2017 Battle of Lincoln (1217) Louise Wilkinson, Professor of Medieval History at Canterbury Christ Church University
Stephen Church, Professor of Medieval History at the University of East Anglia
Thomas Asbridge, Reader in Medieval History at Queen Mary College, University of London
11 May 2017 Emily Dickinson Fiona Green, Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Jesus College
Linda Freedman, Lecturer in English and American Literature at University College London
Paraic Finnerty, Reader in English and American Literature at the University of Portsmouth
18 May 2017 Louis Pasteur Andrew Mendelsohn, Reader in the School of History at Queen Mary, University of London
Anne Hardy, Honorary Professor at the Centre for History in Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
Michael Worboys, Emeritus Professor in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester
25 May 2017 Purgatory Laura Ashe, associate professor of English and fellow of Worcester College at the University of Oxford
Matthew Treherne, Professor of Italian Literature at the University of Leeds
Helen Foxhall Forbes, associate professor of Early Medieval History at Durham University
1 June 2017 Enzymes Nigel Richards, Professor of Biological Chemistry at Cardiff University
Sarah Barry, Lecturer in Chemical Biology at King's College London
Jim Naismith, Director of the Research Complex at Harwell. Bishop Wardlaw Professor of Chemical Biology at the University of St Andrews, Professor of Structural Biology at the University of Oxford
8 June 2017 Christine de Pizan Helen Swift, Associate Professor of Medieval French at the University of Oxford and Fellow of St Hilda's College
Miranda Griffin, Lecturer in French and Fellow of St Catharine's College, Cambridge
Marilynn Desmond, Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Binghamton University
15 June 2017 American Populists Lawrence Goldman, Professor of History at the Institute of Historical Research, University of London
Mara Keire, Lecturer in US History at the University of Oxford
Christopher Phelps, Associate Professor of American Studies at the University of Nottingham
22 June 2017 Eugene Onegin Andrew Kahn, Professor of Russian Literature at the University of Oxford and Fellow of St Edmund Hall
Emily Finer, Lecturer in Russian and Comparative Literature at the University of St Andrews
Simon Dixon, The Sir Bernard Pares Professor of Russian History at University College London
29 June 2017 Plato's Republic Angie Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Sheffield
M.M. McCabe, Professor of Ancient Philosophy Emerita at King's College London
James Warren, Fellow of Corpus Christi College and a Reader in Ancient Philosophy at the University of Cambridge
6 July 2017 Bird migration Barbara Helm, Reader at the Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health and Comparative Medicine at the University of Glasgow
Tim Guilford, Professor of Animal Behaviour and Tutorial Fellow of Zoology at Merton College, Oxford
Richard Holland, Senior Lecturer in Animal Cognition at Bangor University

2017-2018

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TitleContributors
21 September 2017 Kant's Categorical Imperative Alison Hills, Professor of Philosophy at St John's College, Oxford
David S. Oderberg, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading
John Callanan, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at King's College London
28 September 2017 Wuthering Heights Karen O'Brien, Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford
John Bowen, Professor of Nineteenth Century Literature at the University of York
Alexandra Lewis, Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Aberdeen
5 October 2017 Constantine the Great Christopher Kelly, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Cambridge and President of Corpus Christi College
Lucy Grig, Senior Lecturer in Roman History at the University of Edinburgh
Greg Woolf, Director of the Institute of Classical Studies, University of London
12 October 2017 Aphra Behn Janet Todd, Former President of Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge University
Ros Ballaster, Professor of 18th Century Literature at Mansfield College, University of Oxford
Claire Bowditch, Post-doctoral Research Associate in English and Drama at Loughborough University
19 October 2017 Congress of Vienna Tim Blanning, Emeritus Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge
Kathleen Burk, Professor Emerita of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London
John Bew, Professor in History and Foreign Policy at the War Studies Department at King's College London
26 October 2017 Feathered dinosaurs Mike Benton, Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology at the University of Bristol
Steve Brusatte, Reader and Chancellor's Fellow in Vertebrate Palaeontology at the University of Edinburgh
Maria McNamara, Senior Lecturer in Geology at University College Cork
2 November 2017 Picasso's Guernica Mary Vincent, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Sheffield
Gijs van Hensbergen, Historian of Spanish Art and Fellow of the LSE Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish Studies
Dacia Viejo Rose, Lecturer in Heritage in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Cambridge Fellow of Selwyn College
9 November 2017 The Picts Katherine Forsyth, Reader in the Department of Celtic and Gaelic at the University of Glasgow
Alex Woolf, Senior Lecturer in Dark Age Studies at the University of St Andrews
Gordon Noble, Reader in Archaeology at the University of Aberdeen
16 November 2017 Germaine de Staël Catriona Seth, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature at the University of Oxford
Alison Finch, Professor Emerita of French Literature at the University of Cambridge
Katherine Astbury, Associate Professor and Reader in French Studies at the University of Warwick
23 November 2017 Thebes Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at King's College London
Samuel Gartland, Lecturer in Ancient History at Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford
Paul Cartledge, Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture and A. G. Leventis Senior Research Fellow at Clare College, University of Cambridge
30 November 2017 Carl Friedrich Gauss Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics and Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford
Colva Roney-Dougal, Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Nick Evans, Professor of Theoretical Physics at the University of Southampton
7 December 2017 Moby Dick Bridget Bennett, Professor of American Literature and Culture at the University of Leeds
Katie McGettigan, Lecturer in American Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Graham Thompson, Associate Professor of American Studies at the University of Nottingham
14 December 2017 Thomas Becket Laura Ashe, Associate Professor of English at Worcester College, University of Oxford
Michael Staunton, Associate Professor in History at University College Dublin
Danica Summerlin, Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Sheffield
21 December 2017 Ludwig van Beethoven Laura Tunbridge, Professor of Music and Henfrey Fellow, St Catherine's College, Oxford
John Deathridge, Emeritus King Edward Professor of Music at King's College London
Erica Buurman, Senior Lecturer in Music, Canterbury Christ Church University
28 December 2017 Hamlet Jonathan Bate, Provost of Worcester College, Oxford
Carol Rutter, Professor of Shakespeare and Performance Studies at the University of Warwick
Sonia Massai, Professor of Shakespeare Studies at King's College London
11 January 2018 The Siege of Malta, 1565 Helen Nicholson, Professor of Medieval History at Cardiff University
Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford
Kate Fleet, Director of the Skilliter Centre for Ottoman Studies and Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge
18 January 2018 Anna Akhmatova Katharine Hodgson, Professor in Russian at the University of Exeter
Alexandra Harrington, Reader in Russian Studies at Durham University
Michael Basker, Professor of Russian Literature and Dean of Arts at the University of Bristol
25 January 2018 Cicero Melissa Lane, Professor of Politics at Princeton University. Carlyle Lecturer at the University of Oxford
Catherine Steel, Professor of Classics at the University of Glasgow
Valentina Arena, Reader in Roman History at University College London
1 February 2018 Cephalopods Louise Allcock, Lecturer in Zoology at the National University of Ireland, Galway
Paul Rodhouse, Emeritus Fellow of the British Antarctic Survey
Jonathan Ablett, Senior Curator of Molluscs at the Natural History Museum
9 February 2018 Frederick Douglass Celeste-Marie Bernier, Professor of Black Studies in the English Department at the University of Edinburgh
Karen Salt, Assistant Professor in Transnational American Studies at the University of Nottingham
Nicholas Guyatt, Reader in North American History at the University of Cambridge
15 February 2018 Fungi Lynne Boddy, Professor of Fungal Ecology at Cardiff University
Sarah Gurr, Professor of Food Security in the Biosciences Department at the University of Exeter
David Johnson, N8 Chair in Microbial Ecology at the University of Manchester
22 February 2018 Rosalind Franklin Patricia Fara, President of the British Society for the History of Science
Jim Naismith, Interim lead of the Rosalind Franklin Institute, Director of the Research Complex at Harwell and Professor at the University of Oxford
Judith Howard, Professor of Chemistry at Durham University
1 March 2018 Sun Tzu and The Art of War Hilde de Weerdt, Professor of Chinese History at Leiden University
Tim Barrett, Professor Emeritus of East Asian History at SOAS, University of London
Imre Galambos, Reader in Chinese Studies at the University of Cambridge
8 March 2018 Highland Clearances Tom Devine, Professor Emeritus of Scottish History at the University of Edinburgh
Marjory Harper, Professor of History at the University of Aberdeen and Visiting Professor at the University of the Highlands and Islands
Murray Pittock, Bradley Professor of English Literature and Pro Vice Principal at the University of Glasgow
15 March 2018 Augustine's Confessions Kate Cooper, Professor of History at the University of London and Head of History at Royal Holloway
Morwenna Ludlow, Professor of Christian History and Theology at the University of Exeter
Martin Palmer, Visiting Professor in Religion, History and Nature at the University of Winchester
22 March 2018 Tocqueville: Democracy in America Robert Gildea, Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford
Susan-Mary Grant, Professor of American History at Newcastle University
Jeremy Jennings, Professor of Political Theory and Head of the School of Politics & Economics at King's College London
5 April 2018 Roman Slavery Neville Morley, Professor of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Exeter
Ulrike Roth, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Edinburgh
Myles Lavan, Senior lecturer in Ancient History at the University of St Andrews
11 April 2018 George and Robert Stephenson Michael Bailey, Railway historian and editor of the most recent biography of Robert Stephenson
Julia Elton, Past President of the Newcomen Society for the History of Engineering and Technology
Colin Divall, Professor Emeritus of Railway Studies at the University of York
18 April 2018 Middlemarch Rosemary Ashton, Emeritus Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College London
Kathryn Hughes, Professor of Life Writing at the University of East Anglia
John Bowen, Professor of Nineteenth-Century Literature at the University of York
26 April 2018 Proton Frank Close, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Oxford
Helen Heath, Reader in Physics at the University of Bristol
Simon Jolly, Lecturer in High Energy Physics at University College London
3 May 2018 Almoravid Empire Amira Bennison, Professor in the History and Culture of the Maghreb at the University of Cambridge
Nicola Clarke, Lecturer in the History of the Islamic World at Newcastle University
Hugh Kennedy, Professor of Arabic at SOAS, University of London
10 May 2018 Mabinogion Sioned Davies, Professor in the School of Welsh at Cardiff University
Helen Fulton, Professor of Medieval Literature at the University of Bristol
Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the School of Welsh at Cardiff University
17 May 2018 Emancipation of the Serfs Sarah Hudspith, Associate Professor in Russian at the University of Leeds
Simon Dixon, The Sir Bernard Pares Professor of Russian History at University College London
Shane O'Rourke, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of York
25 May 2018 Margaret of Anjou Katherine Lewis, Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Huddersfield
James Ross, Reader in Late Medieval History at the University of Winchester
Joanna Laynesmith, Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Reading
31 May 2018 Henrik Ibsen Tore Rem, Professor of English Literature at the University of Oslo
Kirsten Shepherd-Barr, Professor of English and Theatre Studies and Tutorial Fellow, St Catherine's College at the University of Oxford
Dinah Birch, Professor of English Literature and Pro-Vice Chancellor for Cultural Engagement at the University of Liverpool
7 June 2018 Persepolis Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones, Professor of Ancient History at Cardiff University
Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis, Curator of Middle Eastern Coins at the British Museum
Lindsay Allen, Lecturer in Greek and Near Eastern History at King's College London
14 June 2018 Montesquieu Richard Bourke, Professor in the History of Political Thought at Queen Mary, University of London
Rachel Hammersley, Senior Lecturer in Intellectual History at Newcastle University
Richard Whatmore, Professor of Modern History at the University of St Andrews and Director of the St Andrews Institute of Intellectual History
21 June 2018 Echolocation Kate Jones, Professor of Ecology and Biodiversity at University College London
Gareth Jones, Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol
Dean Waters, Lecturer in the Environment Department at the University of York
28 June 2018 The Mexican-American War Frank Cogliano, Professor of American History at the University of Edinburgh
Jacqueline Fear-Segal, Professor of American and Indigenous Histories at the University of East Anglia
Thomas Rath, Lecturer in Latin American History at University College London
5 July 2018 William Morris Ingrid Hanson, Lecturer in 18th and 19th Century Literature at the University of Manchester
Marcus Waithe, University Senior Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Magdalene College
Jane Thomas, Professor of Victorian and Early 20th Century Literature at the University of Hull

2018-2019

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TitleContributors
13 September 2018 The Iliad Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at King's College London
Barbara Graziosi, Associate Professor of Medieval History at Princeton University
Paul Cartledge, A.G. Leventis Senior Research Fellow and Emeritus Professor of Greek Culture at Clare College, Cambridge
20 September 2018 Automata Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at Cambridge University
Elly Truitt, Professor of Classics at Bryn Mawr College
Franziska Kohlt, Doctoral Researcher in English Literature and the History of Science at the University of Oxford
27 September 2018 Dietrich Bonhoeffer Stephen Plant, Dean and Runcie Fellow at Trinity Hall at the University of Cambridge
Eleanor McLaughlin, Lecturer in Theology and Ethics at the University of Winchester and Lecturer in Ethics at Regent's Park College at the University of Oxford
Tom Greggs, Marischal Chair of Divinity at the University of Aberdeen
4 October 2018 Edith Wharton Hermione Lee, Biographer, former President of Wolfson College, Oxford
Bridget Bennett, Professor of American Literature and Culture at the University of Leeds
Laura Rattray, Reader in North American Literature at the University of Glasgow
11 October 2018 Is Shakespeare History: The Plantagenets Emma J. Smith, Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Hertford College, University of Oxford
Gordon McMullan, Professor of English at King's College London and Director of the London Shakespeare Centre
Katherine Lewis, Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Huddersfield
18 October 2018 Is Shakespeare History: The Romans Sir Jonathan Bate, Provost of Worcester College, University of Oxford
Catherine Steel, Professor of Classics and Dean of Research in the College of Arts at the University of Glasgow
Patrick Gray, Associate Professor of English Studies at Durham University
25 October 2018 The Fable of the Bees David Wootton, Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Helen Paul, Lecturer in Economics and Economic History at the University of Southampton
John Callanan, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at King's College London
1 November 2018 Free Radicals Nick Lane, Professor of Evolutionary Biochemistry at University College London
Anna Croft, Associate Professor at the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at the University of Nottingham
Mike Murphy, Professor of Mitochondrial Redox Biology at Cambridge University
8 November 2018 Marie Antoinette Catriona Seth, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature at the University of Oxford
Katherine Astbury, Professor of French Studies at the University of Warwick
David McCallam, Reader in French Eighteenth-Century Studies at the University of Sheffield
15 November 2018 Horace Emily Gowers, Professor of Latin Literature at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge
William Fitzgerald, Professor of Latin Language and Literature at King's College London
Ellen O’Gorman, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Bristol
22 November 2018 Hope Beatrice Han-Pile, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Essex
Robert Stern, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sheffield
Judith Wolfe, Professor of Philosophical Theology at the University of St Andrews
29 November 2018 Long March Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China and Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford
Sun Shuyun, historian, writer and film maker
Julia Lovell, Professor in Modern Chinese History and Literature at Birkbeck, University of London
6. December 2018 Thirty Years War Peter Wilson, Chichele Professor of the History of War at the University of Oxford
Ulinka Rublack, Professor of Early Modern European History at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of St John's College
Toby Osborne, Associate Professor in History at Durham University
13 December 2018 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Laura Ashe, Professor of English Literature at Worcester College, University of Oxford
Ad Putter, Professor of Medieval English Literature at the University of Bristol
Simon Armitage, Poet and Professor of Poetry at the Universities of Leeds and Oxford
20 December 2018 Poor Laws Emma Griffin, Professor of Modern British History at the University of East Anglia
Samantha Shave, Lecturer in Social Policy at the University of Lincoln
Steven King, Professor of Economic and Social History at the University of Leicester
27 December 2018 Venus Carolin Crawford, Public Astronomer at the Institute of Astronomy and Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Colin Wilson, Senior Research Fellow in Planetary Science at the University of Oxford
Andrew Coates, Professor of Physics at Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London
10 January 2019 Papal Infallibility Tom O’Loughlin, Professor of Historical Theology at the University of Nottingham
Rebecca Rist, Professor in Medieval History at the University of Reading
Miles Pattenden, Departmental Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of Oxford
17 January 2019 Samuel Beckett Steven Connor, Professor of English at the University of Cambridge
Laura Salisbury, Professor of Modern Literature at the University of Exeter
Mark Nixon, Associate Professor in Modern Literature at the University of Reading and co-director of the Beckett International Foundation
24 January 2019 Emmy Noether Colva Roney-Dougal, Professor of Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
David Berman, Professor in Theoretical Physics at Queen Mary, University of London
Elizabeth Mansfield, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Kent
31 January 2019 Owain Glyndŵr Huw Pryce, Professor of Welsh History at Bangor University
Helen Fulton, Professor of Medieval Literature at the University of Bristol
Chris Given-Wilson, Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the University of St Andrews
7 February 2019 Aristotle's biology Armand Leroi, Professor of Evolutionary Development Biology at Imperial College London
Myrto Hatzimichali, Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge
Sophia Connell, Lecturer in Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London
14 February 2019 Judith beheading Holofernes Susan Foister, Curator of Early Netherlandish, German and British Painting at the National Gallery
John Gash, Senior Lecturer in History of Art at the University of Aberdeen
Ela Nutu Hall, Research Associate at the Sheffield Institute for Interdisciplinary Biblical Studies, at the University of Sheffield
21 February 2019 Pheromones Tristram Wyatt, Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Zoology at the University of Oxford
Jane Hurst, William Prescott Professor of Animal Science at the University of Liverpool
Francis Ratnieks, Professor of Apiculture and Head of the Laboratory of Apiculture and Social Insects at the University of Sussex
28 February 2019 Antarah ibn Shaddad James Montgomery, Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic at the University of Cambridge
Marlé Hammond, Senior Lecturer in Arabic Popular Literature and Culture at SOAS, University of London
Harry Munt, Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of York
7 March 2019 William Cecil Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at the University of Oxford
Susan Doran, Professor of Early Modern British History at the University of Oxford
John Guy, Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge
14 March 2019 Authenticity Sarah Richmond, Associate Professor in Philosophy at University College London
Denis McManus, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southampton
Irene McMullin, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Essex
21 March 2019 Gerard Manley Hopkins Catherine Phillips, R J Owens Fellow in English at Downing College, University of Cambridge
Jane Wright, Senior Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Bristol
Martin Dubois, Assistant Professor in Nineteenth Century Literature at Durham University
28 March 2019 Danelaw Judith Jesch, Professor of Viking Studies at the University of Nottingham
John Hines, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University
Jane Kershaw, ERC Principal Investigator in Archaeology at the University of Oxford
4 April 2019 Great Irish Famine Cormac O'Grada, Professor Emeritus in the School of Economics at University College Dublin
Niamh Gallagher, University Lecturer in Modern British and Irish History at the University of Cambridge
Enda Delaney, Professor of Modern History and School Director of Research at the University of Edinburgh
11 April 2019 The Evolution of Teeth Gareth Fraser, Assistant Professor in Biology at the University of Florida
Zerina Johanson, Merit Researcher in the Department of Earth Sciences at the Natural History Museum
Philip Donoghue, Professor of Palaeobiology at the University of Bristol
18 April 2019 A Midsummer Night's Dream Helen Hackett, Professor of English Literature and Leverhulme Research Fellow at University College London
Tom Healy, Professor of Renaissance Studies at the University of Sussex
Alison Findlay, Professor of Renaissance Drama at Lancaster University and Chair of the British Shakespeare Association
25 April 2019 Nero Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin at University College London
Matthew Nicholls, Fellow and Senior Tutor at St John’s College, University of Oxford
Shushma Malik, Lecturer in Classics at the University of Roehampton
2 May 2019 Gordon Riots Ian Haywood, Professor of English at the University of Roehampton
Catriona Kennedy, Senior Lecturer in Modern British and Irish History and Director of the Centre for Eighteenth Century Studies at the University of York
Mark Knights, Professor of History at the University of Warwick
9 May 2019 Bergson and Time Keith Ansell-Pearson, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick
Emily Thomas, Assistant Professor in Philosophy at Durham University
Mark Sinclair, Reader in Philosophy at the University of Roehampton
16 May 2019 Frankenstein Karen O'Brien, Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford
Michael Rossington, Professor of Romantic Literature at Newcastle University
Jane Thomas, Professor of Victorian and Early 20th Century Literature at the University of Hull
23 May 2019 Kinetic Theory Steven Bramwell, Professor of Physics at University College London
Isobel Falconer, Reader in History of Mathematics at the University of St Andrews
Ted Forgan, Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Birmingham
30 May 2019 President Ulysses S Grant Erik Mathisen, Lecturer in US History at the University of Kent
Susan-Mary Grant, Professor of American History at Newcastle University
Robert Cook, Professor of American History at the University of Sussex
6 June 2019 Thomas Browne Claire Preston, Professor of Renaissance Literature at Queen Mary, University of London
Jessica Wolfe, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Kevin Killeen, Professor of English at the University of York
13 June 2019 Inca Empire Frank Meddens, Visiting Scholar at the University of Reading
Helen Cowie, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of York
Bill Sillar, Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Archaeology at University College London
20 June 2019 Mytilenian Debate Angela Hobbs, Professor of the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of Sheffield
Lisa Irene Hau, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Glasgow
Paul Cartledge, Emeritus AG Leventis Professor of Greek Culture, University of Cambridge and Senior Research Fellow of Clare College
27 June 2019 Doggerland Vincent Gaffney, Anniversary Professor of Landscape Archaeology at the University of Bradford
Carol Cotterill, Marine Geoscientist at the British Geological Survey
Rachel Bynoe, Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Southampton
4 July 2019 Federico Garcia Lorca Maria Delgado Professor of Creative Arts at the Royal Central of Speech and Drama, University of London
Federico Bonaddio Reader in Modern Spanish at King’s College London
Sarah Wright Professor of Hispanic Studies and Screen Arts at Royal Holloway, University of London

2019-2020

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TitleContributors
19 September 2019 Napoleon's Retreat from Russia Janet Hartley, Professor emeritus of International History, LSE
Michael Rowe, Reader in European History, King's College London
Michael Rapport, Reader in Modern European History, University of Glasgow
26 September 2019 The Rapture Elizabeth Phillips, research Fellow at the Margaret Beaufort Institute at the University of Cambridge and Honorary Fellow in the Department of Theology and Religion at Durham University
Crawford Gribben, professor of Early Modern British History at Queen's University Belfast
Nicholas Guyatt, reader in North American History at the University of Cambridge
3 October 2019 Dorothy Hodgkin Georgina Ferry, science writer and biographer of Dorothy Hodgkin
Judith Howard, professor of Chemistry at Durham University
Patricia Fara, fellow of Clare College, Cambridge
10 October 2019 Rousseau on Education Richard Whatmore, Professor of Modern History at the University of St Andrews and Co-Director of the St Andrews Institute of Intellectual History
Caroline Warman, Professor of French Literature and Thought at Jesus College, Oxford
Denis McManus, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southampton
17 October 2019 The Time Machine Simon Schaffer, Professor of History of Science at Cambridge University
Amanda Rees, Historian of science at the University of York
Simon James, Professor in the Department of English Studies at Durham University
24 October 2019 Robert Burns Robert Crawford, Professor of Modern Scottish Literature and Bishop Wardlaw Professor of Poetry at the University of St Andrews
Fiona Stafford, Professor of English at the University of Oxford
Murray Pittock, Bradley Professor of English Literature and Pro Vice Principal at the University of Glasgow
31 October 2019 Hybrids Sandra Knapp, Tropical Botanist at the Natural History Museum
Nicola Nadeau, Lecturer in Evolutionary Biology at the University of Sheffield
Steve Jones, Senior Research Fellow in Genetics at University College London
7 November 2019 The Treaty of Limerick Jane Ohlmeyer, Chair of the Irish Research Council and Erasmus Smith’s Professor of Modern History at Trinity College Dublin
Clare Jackson, Member of the History Faculty at the University of Cambridge and Senior Tutor of Trinity Hall
Thomas O'Connor, Professor of History at Maynooth University
14 November 2019 Crime and Punishment Sarah Huspith, Associate Professor in Russian at the University of Leeds
Oliver Ready, Lecturer in Russian at the University of Oxford, Research Fellow at St Antony’s College and a translator of this novel
Sarah Young, Associate Professor in Russian at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London
21 November 2019 Melisende, Queen of Jerusalem Natasha Hodgson, Senior Lecturer in Medieval History and Director of the Centre for the Study of Religion and Conflict at Nottingham Trent University
Katherine Lewis, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Huddersfield
Danielle Park, Visiting Lecturer at Royal Holloway, University of London
28 November 2019 Li Shizhen Craig Clunas, Professor Emeritus in the History of Art at the University of Oxford
Anne Gerritsen, Professor in History at the University of Warwick
Roel Sterckx, Joseph Needham Professor of Chinese History at the University of Cambridge
5 December 2019 Lawrence of Arabia Hussein Omar, Lecturer in Modern Global History, University College Dublin
Catriona Pennell, Associate Professor of Modern History and Memory Studies, University of Exeter
Neil Faulkner, Director of Military History Live and Editor of the magazine Military History Matters
12 December 2019 Coffee Judith Hawley, Professor of 18th Century Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
Markman Ellis, Professor of 18th Century Studies at Queen Mary University of London
Jonathan Morris, Professor in Modern History at the University of Hertfordshire
19 December 2019 Auden Mark Ford, Poet and Professor, English at University College London
Janet Montefiore, Professor Emerita of 20th Century English Literature at the University of Kent
Jeremy Noel-Tod, Senior Lecturer in Literature and Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia
26 December 2019 Tutankhamun Elizabeth Frood, Associate Professor of Egyptology, Director of the Griffith Institute and Fellow of St Cross at the University of Oxford
Christina Riggs, Professor of the History of Visual Culture at Durham University and a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford
John Taylor, Curator at the Department of Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum
11 January 2020 Catullus Gail Trimble, Brown Fellow and Tutor in Classics at Trinity College at the University of Oxford
Simon Smith, Reader in Creative Writing at the University of Kent, poet and translator of Catullus
Maria Wyke, Professor of Latin at University College London
16 January 2020 Siege of Paris (1870–71) Karine Varley, Lecturer in French and European History at the University of Strathclyde
Robert Gildea, Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford
Julia Nicholls, Lecturer in French and European Studies at King’s College London
23 January 2020 Solar Wind Andrew Coates, Professor of Physics and Deputy Director in charge of the Solar System at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London
Helen Mason, Reader in Solar Physics at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge, Fellow at St Edmund's College, Cambridge
Tim Horbury, Professor of Physics at Imperial College London
30 January 2020 Alcuin Joanna Story, Professor of Early Medieval History at the University of Leicester
Andy Orchard, Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Pembroke College
Mary Garrison, Lecturer in History at the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of York
6 February 2020 George Sand Belinda Jack, Fellow and Tutor in French at Christ Church, University of Oxford
Angela Ryan, Senior Lecturer in French at University College Cork
Nigel Harkness, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Humanities and Social Sciences and Professor of French at Newcastle University
13 February 2020 Battle of the Teutoburg Forest Matthew Nicholls, Professor of Medieval History King's College London
Ellen O'Gorman, Senior Lecturer in Classics University of Bristol
Peter Heather, Fellow and Senior Tutor St. John's college, Oxford
20 February 2020 Valladolid Debate Caroline Dodds Pennock, Senior Lecturer in International History at the University of Sheffield
John Edwards, Faculty Fellow in Spanish at the University of Oxford
Julia McClure, Lecturer in Late Medieval and Early Modern Global History at the University of Glasgow
27 February 2020 Evolution of the horse Alan Outram, Professor of Archaeological Science at the University of Exeter
Christine Janis, Honorary Professor in Palaeobiology at the University of Bristol and Professor Emerita in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Brown University
John Hutchinson, Professor in Evolutionary Biomechanics at the Royal Veterinary College
5 March 2020 Paul Dirac Graham Farmelo, Biographer of Dirac and Fellow at Churchill College, Cambridge
Valerie Gibson, Professor of High Energy Physics at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Trinity College
David Berman, Professor of Theoretical Physics at Queen Mary University of London
12 March 2020 Covenanters Roger Mason, Professor of Scottish History at the University of St Andrews
Laura Stewart, Professor of Early Modern British History at the University of York
Scott Spurlock, Professor of Scottish and Early Modern Christianities at the University of Glasgow

The 2019-2020 series was truncated because of the Coronavirus Crisis

2020-2021

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TitleContributors
17 September 2020 Pericles Edith Hall, Professor of Classics at King's College London.
Paul Cartledge, AG Leventis Senior Research Fellow at Clare College, University of Cambridge
Peter Liddel, Senior Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Manchester
24 September 2020 Cave Art Alistair Pike, Professor of Archaeological Sciences at the University of Southampton
Chantal Conneller, Senior Lecturer in Early Pre-History at Newcastle University
Paul Pettitt, Professor of Palaeolithic Archaeology at Durham University
1 October 2020 Macbeth Emma Smith, Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Hertford College, University of Oxford
Kiernan Ryan, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
David Schalkwyk, Professor of Shakespeare Studies and Director of Global Shakespeare at Queen Mary, University of London
8 October 2020 Deism Richard Serjeantson, Fellow and Lecturer in History, Trinity College, University of Cambridge
Katie East, Lecturer in History with the School of History, Classics and Archaeology at Newcastle University
Thomas Ahnert, Professor of Intellectual History at the University of Edinburgh
15 October 2020 Alan Turing Leslie Ann Goldberg, Professor of Computer Science and Fellow of St Edmund Hall, University of Oxford
Simon Schaffer, Professor of the History of Science at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Darwin College
Andrew Hodges, Biographer of Turing and Emeritus Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford
22 October 2020 Maria Theresa Catriona Seth, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature at the University of Oxford
Martyn Rady, Professor of Central European History at University College London
Thomas Biskup, Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of Hull
29 October 2020 Piers Plowman Laura Ashe, Professor of English Literature at Worcester College, University of Oxford
Lawrence Warner, Professor of Medieval English at King’s College London
Alastair Bennett, Lecturer in Medieval Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London
5 November 2020 Mary Astell Hannah Dawson, Senior Lecturer in the History of Ideas at King’s College London
Mark Goldie, Professor Emeritus of Intellectual History at the University of Cambridge
Teresa Bejan, Associate Professor of Political Theory at Oriel College, University of Oxford
12 November 2020 Albrecht Dürer Susan Foister, Deputy Director and Curator of German Paintings at the National Gallery
Giulia Bartrum, Freelance art historian and Former Curator of German Prints and Drawings at the British Museum
Ulinka Rublack, Professor of Early Modern European History and Fellow of St John’s College, University of Cambridge
26 November 2020 Zong Massacre Vincent Brown, Charles Warren Professor of American History and Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University
Bronwen Everill, Class of 1973 Lecturer in History and Fellow at Gonville & Caius College, University of Cambridge
Jake Subryan Richards, Assistant Professor of History at the London School of Economics
3 December 2020 Fernando Pessoa Cláudia Pazos-Alonso, Professor of Portuguese and Gender Studies and Senior Research Fellow at Wadham College, University of Oxford
Juliet Perkins, Visiting Senior Research Fellow in Portuguese Studies at King’s College London
Paulo de Medeiros, Professor of English and Comparative Literary Studies at the University of Warwick
10 December 2020 John Wesley and Methodism Stephen Plant, Dean and Runcie Fellow at Trinity Hall at the University of Cambridge
Eryn White, Reader in Early Modern History at Aberystwyth University
William Gibson, Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Oxford Brookes University and Director of the Oxford Centre for Methodism and Church History
17 December 2020 Chinese Cultural Revolution Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China and Fellow of St Cross College, University of Oxford
Sun Peidong, Visiting Professor at the Center for International Studies at Sciences Po
Julia Lovell, Professor in Modern Chinese History and Literature at Birkbeck, University of London
31 December 2020 Eclipses Carolin Crawford, Public Astronomer based at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge and a fellow of Emmanuel College
Frank Close, Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford
Lucie Green, Professor of Physics and a Royal Society University Research Fellow at Mullard Space Science Laboratory at University College London
14 January 2021 Great Gatsby Sarah Churchwell, Professor of American Literature and Public Understanding of the Humanities at the University of London
Philip McGowan, Professor of American Literature at Queen’s University, Belfast
William Blazek, Associate Professor and Reader in American Literature at Liverpool Hope University
21 January 2021 Plague of Justinian John Haldon, Professor of Byzantine History and Hellenic Studies Emeritus at Princeton University
Rebecca Flemming, Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge
Greg Woolf, Director of the Institute of Classical Studies, University of London
28 January 2021 Saint Cuthbert Jane Hawkes, Professor of Medieval Art History at the University of York
Sarah Foot, The Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the University of Oxford and Canon of Christ Church Cathedral
John Hines, Professor of Archaeology at Cardiff University
4 February 2021 Emilie du Châtelet Patricia Fara,Emeritus Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge
David Wootton,Anniversary Professor of History at the University of York
Judith Zinsser, Professor Emerita of History at Miami University of Ohio and biographer of Emilie du Châtelet.
11 February 2021 The Rosetta Stone Penelope Wilson, Associate Professor of Egyptian Archaeology at Durham University
Campbell Price,Curator of Egypt and Sudan at the Manchester Museum
Richard Bruce Parkinson, Professor of Egyptology and Fellow of The Queen’s College, University of Oxford

References

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