We are delighted to welcome Professor Greg Claeys, lecturer from Royal Holloway University, and author of “Dystopias: A Natural History” to speak at the Classics Centre about Dystopian Fiction. He will speak between 3.30 – and 4pm, followed by questions, drinks, and an opportunity to look at ideas for utopian and dystopian fiction created by our Year Eight students, who have been exploring ideal and dystopian societies from Plato’s Republic onwards.

From 4.30 – 6.15pm, we will then have a community viewing of the 2010 dystopian romantic drama “Never Let Me Go”, based on the award-winning novel by Kazuo Ishiguro. This film has a 12 rating.

Chief Philologist of the Oxford English Dictionary Edmund Weiner will be presenting his talk, “Thew Grew out of their Name” to the Oxford Tolkien Society

Entry free for members, £2 for non-members

“Many words and names in Tolkien’s words seem to have had a complex inner history in his own mind. This talk will look at how Tolkien’s creative philological mind worked. It will be an unhasty ramble around Ent country, looking at names and topics of language construction and language theory, with even a quick visit to Humpty Dumpty!”

VAL MCDERMID – A Life Of Crime, chaired by Nicolette Jones (The Sunday Times)
Dubbed the Queen of Crime, Val McDermid has sold over 15 million books to date across the globe and is translated into over 40 languages. She is perhaps best known for her ‘Wire in the Blood’ series, featuring clinical psychologist Dr Tony Hill and DCI Carol Jordan, which was adapted for television starring Robson Green. She has written three other series: private detective Kate Brannigan, journalist Lindsay Gordon and, most recently, cold case detective Karen Pirie. She has also published in several award-winning standalone novels, two books of non-fiction, two short story collections and a children’s picture book, ‘My Granny is a Pirate’.

St Hilda’s Writers’ Day 2019 marks its 10th year as the only College to hold its own day of lectures at the Oxford Literary Festival. All authors are College members or alumnae.

CLAIRE HARMAN – Murder By The Book: A Sensational Chapter In Victorian Crime. chaired by Claire Armitstead (The Guardian and the Observer)
When the accused murderer of Lord William Russell blamed the crime on his reading, he fueled an ongoing debate about the appalling damage ‘low’ books could do. This fascinating study details the controversy around William Harrison Ainsworth’s Jack Sheppard, the murder of Russell and the way it affected many of the leading writers of the day, including Dickens and Thackeray. Harman unpacks the evidence, reveals the gossip and the surprisingly literary background to this gory crime.

Chair: Claire Armitstead (The Guardian and the Observer)

KIRSTY GUNN – Action Writing, chaired by Claire Armitstead (The Guardian and the Observer)
Kirsty Gunn is an internationally awarded writer who published her first novel with Faber in 1994 and since then eight works of fiction, including short stories, as well as a collection of fragments and meditations, and essays. Her latest novel is the acclaimed ‘Caroline’s Bikini’. She is Professor of Writing Practice and Study at the University of Dundee.

TESS STIMSON – From Adultery to Murder: A Shorter Journey Than You Think, chaired by Nicolette Jones (The Sunday Times)
Tess Stimson is the British author of ten novels, including top-ten bestseller ‘The Adultery Club’. In 2002, she was appointed Professor of Creative Writing at the University of South Florida. She is transitioning into writing psychological suspense fiction, writing as TJ Stimson. Her first novel in this genre, ‘Picture of Innocence’, is to be published by Avon in Spring 2019.

Anthony Horowitz will be talking about his latest James Bond novel Forever and A Day at Blackwell’s Westgate on Tuesday 9th April at 7pm.

Anthony will be talking about talking about 007 and taking up the Ian Fleming mantle as well as his many other novels. He has written over 40 books including the bestselling teen spy series Alex Rider.

Tickets include a copy of Forever and a Day and are on sale now.

Blackwell’s are delighted to be hosting one of Britain’s most influential literary critics, Terry Eagleton, to talk about his latest book, Humour.

A compelling guide to the fundamental place of humour and comedy within Western culture-by one of its greatest exponents

Written by an acknowledged master of comedy, this study reflects on the nature of humour and the functions it serves. Why do we laugh? What are we to make of the sheer variety of laughter, from braying and cackling to sniggering and chortling? Is humour subversive, or can it defuse dissent? Can we define wit?

Packed with illuminating ideas and a good many excellent jokes, the book critically examines various well-known theories of humour, including the idea that it springs from incongruity and the view that it reflects a mildly sadistic form of superiority to others. Drawing on a wide range of literary and philosophical sources, Terry Eagleton moves from Aristotle and Aquinas to Hobbes, Freud, and Bakhtin, looking in particular at the psychoanalytical mechanisms underlying humour and its social and political evolution over the centuries.

Blackwell’s are delighted to once again invite you to Short Stories Aloud. Listen to actors perform short stories written by Stacey Halls and Jess Kidd. Afterwards, author Sarah Franklin will be interviewing both authors about their latest publications, The Familiars and Things in Jars before taking questions from the audience.

Tuesday 7th May 2019: The Violet Postage Stamp
Thursday 9th May 2019: Landscape in Chains
Tuesday 21st May 2019: The Aerial Warfare of Images
Thursday 23rd May 2019: For the Dying Calves
The lectures will explore the way history impinges on ordinary lives and finds its way
into the literary imagination. Anyone born in the twentieth century – this century of
wars and divisions – will have found themselves already historicised even as a child.
These lectures consciously take account of, and reflect, the breaks and discontinuities
of German history. True to the modus operandi of the author’s own poems, they
employ a collage technique that demands the imaginative collaboration of reader and
audience alike.

In a recent anthropological discussion on the concept of person in Ancient Israel R. Di Vito claimed that in the Old Testament the person is “lacking … ‘inner depths’” and is “’authentic’ precisely in their heteronomy”. However, in a culture where people lack ‘inner depths’ or experience themselves as heteronomous and dependent on others, explicit interior communication within the person is difficult. This paper contributes to this anthropological discussion by dealing with soliloquy in the Psalms. In contrast to the psychological phenomenon of self-talk, soliloquy is a literary device that is widespread in ancient Near Eastern and Old Testament narrative, usually marked by introductory formulas, while explicit passages in the Psalms are not so frequent. This talk gives an overview of the major psalms where a speaker is talking to his “heart” (leb) or “soul” (nefesh) and takes a closer look on their contents and contexts. These psalms dramatize the inner life of the speaker and demonstrate that in their struggles with foes, illness, social isolation, divine absence or wrath they are not alone and their communication with their inner soul is a counterbalance to this.

Tuesday 7th May 2019: The Violet Postage Stamp
Thursday 9th May 2019: Landscape in Chains
Tuesday 21st May 2019: The Aerial Warfare of Images
Thursday 23rd May 2019: For the Dying Calves
The lectures will explore the way history impinges on ordinary lives and finds its way
into the literary imagination. Anyone born in the twentieth century – this century of
wars and divisions – will have found themselves already historicised even as a child.
These lectures consciously take account of, and reflect, the breaks and discontinuities
of German history. True to the modus operandi of the author’s own poems, they
employ a collage technique that demands the imaginative collaboration of reader and
audience alike.

Tuesday 7th May 2019: The Violet Postage Stamp
Thursday 9th May 2019: Landscape in Chains
Tuesday 21st May 2019: The Aerial Warfare of Images
Thursday 23rd May 2019: For the Dying Calves
The lectures will explore the way history impinges on ordinary lives and finds its way
into the literary imagination. Anyone born in the twentieth century – this century of
wars and divisions – will have found themselves already historicised even as a child.
These lectures consciously take account of, and reflect, the breaks and discontinuities
of German history. True to the modus operandi of the author’s own poems, they
employ a collage technique that demands the imaginative collaboration of reader and
audience alike.

Tuesday 7th May 2019: The Violet Postage Stamp
Thursday 9th May 2019: Landscape in Chains
Tuesday 21st May 2019: The Aerial Warfare of Images
Thursday 23rd May 2019: For the Dying Calves
The lectures will explore the way history impinges on ordinary lives and finds its way
into the literary imagination. Anyone born in the twentieth century – this century of
wars and divisions – will have found themselves already historicised even as a child.
These lectures consciously take account of, and reflect, the breaks and discontinuities
of German history. True to the modus operandi of the author’s own poems, they
employ a collage technique that demands the imaginative collaboration of reader and
audience alike.

The 5th Annual Oxford Business and Poverty Conference will feature a diverse range of speakers addressing the Paradoxes of Prosperity. Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/5th-annual-oxford-business-poverty-conference-tickets-57733957822
Hosted at the Sheldonian Theatre, the conference will feature keynotes by:
Lant Pritchett: RISE Research Director at the Blavatnik School of Government, former Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development
Efosa Ojomo: Global Prosperity Lead and Senior Researcher at the Clayton Christensen Institute
John Hoffmire: Director of Center on Business and Poverty and Research Associate at Kellogg Colleges at Center For Mutual and Employee-owned Business at Oxford University
Ananth Pai: Executive Director, Bharath Beedi Works Pvt. Ltd. and Director, Bharath Auto Cars Pvt
Laurel Stanfield: Assistant Professor of Marketing at Bentley College in Massachusetts
Grace Cheng: Greater China’s Country Manager for Russell Reynolds Associates
Madhusudan Jagadish: 2016 Graduate MBA, Said Business School, University of Oxford
Tentative Schedule:
2:15-2:20 Welcome
2:20-2:50 Efosa Ojomo, co-author of The Prosperity Paradox, sets the stage for the need for innovation in development
2:50-3:20 John Hoffmire, Ananth Pai and Mudhusudan Jagadish explain how the Prosperity Paradox can be used in India as a model to create good jobs for poor women
3:20-3:40 Break
3:40-4:10 Laurel Steinfeld speaks to issues of gender, development and business – addressing paradoxes related to prosperity
4:10-4:40 Grace Cheng, speaks about the history of China’s use of disruptive innovations to develop its economy
4:40-5:15 Break
5:15-6 Lant Pritchett talks on Pushing Past Poverty: Paths to Prosperity
6:30-8 Dinner at the Rhodes House – Purchase tickets after signing up for the conference
Sponsors include: Russell Reynolds, Employee Ownership Foundation, Ananth Pai Foundation and others

The Wife’s Tale is a ‘beautiful, complicated [and] sensual account’, according to Ondaatje prize judge and novelist Michèle Roberts. Its ‘original form and newly minted language create a strong, delicate structure embodying her grandmother’s spirit and will to survive.’ The book tells the story of Aida’s grandmother, Yetemegnu, through her marriage to a cleric and poet two decades older than her, fascist occupation, and the rise and fall of Haile Selassie.

At Wolfson, Aida will talk about The Wife’s Tale and explore the following questions: How do you record the life in English of a woman who did not speak English? How do you do justice to her singular voice, while also providing the context that informs that singularity? How do you tell the history of a rich and ancient culture, as far as possible on its own terms? What do you listen to and when do you really start to hear?

Four talks starting at 10am

10am: Alice’s Nightmare in Wonderland: an innovative adventure gamebook with a dangerous twist from Jon Green
11am: Alice in Guinness-time: a 1960s’ advertising campaign using Lewis Carroll’s characters from Brian Sibley
1pm: Alice in Fashion-land: over a century of changing trends and designs inspired by Wonderland by Kiera Vaclavik
2pm: Timeless Alice: adventures in modernity: from the fourth dimension to climate change by Franziska Kohlt

For this event, 12 artists from all over the country will be presenting work that they have been making as part of the Sound Diaries open call.

The presenting artists are:

Richard Bentley, Hannah Dargavel-Leafe, Aisling Davis, Atilio Doreste, Marlo De Lara, Beth Shearsby, Kathryn Tovey, Jacek Smolicki, James Green, Lucia Hinojosa, Sena Karahan, Fi.Ona

Sound Diaries expands awareness of the roles of sound and listening in daily life. The project explores the cultural and communal significance of sounds and forms a research base for projects executed both locally and Internationally, in Beijing, Brussels, Tallinn, Cumbria and rural Oxfordshire.

Blackwell’s is delighted to be hosting an event with Philip Pullman at the Sheldonian Theatre to celebrate the launch of The Secret Commonwealth: The Book of Dust Volume Two. The event will be recorded live for the Penguin Podcast.

The Secret Commonwealth: The Book of Dust Volume Two is a timely exploration of what it is to be human, to grow up and make sense of the world around us, from one of the UK’s greatest writers. It opens seven years after readers left Lyra Silvertongue and Will Parry on a park bench in Oxford’s Botanic Gardens in The Amber Spyglass, the final book in the His Dark Materials sequence. Lyra Silvertongue is now a 20-year-old Oxford student, about to embark on an epic journey across Europe and into Asia as she seeks out an elusive town said to be haunted by dæmons. Commenting on the plot earlier this year, Pullman said: “Things have been biding their time, waiting for the right moment to reveal their consequences for Lyra Silvertongue. The Secret Commonwealth tells the continuing story of the impact on Lyra’s life of the search for, and the fear of, Dust.”

This is one of only two author events this autumn to mark publication of this highly-anticipated book, and the only one to take place in Philip Pullman – and Lyra’s – hometown. There will be signed copies of The Secret Commonwealth available to purchase at the event, or as part of a book and ticket bundle, as well as a special independents’ edition of the book, priced £20 and featuring a frontispiece illustration by Chris Wormell and bespoke endpapers.

Philip Pullman is one of the most highly respected children’s authors writing today. Winner of many prestigious awards, including the Carnegie of Carnegies and the Whitbread Award, Pullman’s epic fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials has been acclaimed as a modern classic. It has sold 17.5 million copies worldwide and been translated into 40 languages. In 2005 he was awarded the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award. He lives in Oxford.

Tickets for this event are £10, or £25 for the book and ticket bundle. For more information please contact our Customer Service Department on 01865 333 623 or email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk.

The poppy as a recurring image in poetry and art, and as a symbol of wartime loss, is powerfully resonant in our culture. Dr Andrew Lack, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Biology at Oxford Brookes University, will talk about the poppy plant and its ancient and more recent historical associations.

Tenor Mark Padmore is preparing to take on the role of Aschenbach in David McVicar’s production of Benjamin Britten’s Death in Venice at the Royal Opera House. Join Mark and a panel of experts, including Colin Matthews, Ray Ockenden, John Hopkins, Henry Bacon, and Philip Bullock to explore this many-faceted character through literature, film, and opera.

Marking 70 years of Nineteen Eighty-Four. An interdisciplinary symposium involving Joshua Dienstag, political scientist from UCLA; political historian Greg Claeys (RHUL); literary scholars Anna Vaninskaya (Edinburgh) and Nathan Waddell (Birmingham); novelist Joanna Kavenna; Dorian Lynskey, journalist and author of the recently published Ministry of Fear; Jean Seaton, media historian who runs the Orwell Prize among other things; and Victoria Bateman (the so-called ‘Naked Economist’) who will be talking about the politics of clothes and the uses of the naked body in political activism.

We are delighted to announce a very special Philosophy in the Bookshop event to mark our fifth anniversary in the series.

Host Nigel Warburton will be joined by philosopher Philip Goff and author Sir Philip Pullman to discuss the influence that Philosophy (Consciousness and Panpsychism in particular) has had on their respective works. Philip Goff’s new book ‘Galileo’s Error’ and Sir Philip Pullman’s ‘The Book of Dust: The Secret Commonwealth’ are both released in 2019 and will be available to purchase on the day.

This event is FREE to attend and will take place in the Philosophy department in the Norrington Room. Registration MUST be made and proof brought with you on the day to gain access to the seating/viewing area. Seating is very limited and will be available on a first come, first served basis. Please note, this area is only accessible via a small set of stairs. Please note neither of the authors will be signing after the talk.

Please call 01865 333623 if you have any enquiries.

Join Oxford Hospitals Charity in celebrating ten years since the Oxford Heart Centre was first opened.

You will hear from our brilliant clinicians about the difference the new Oxford Heart Centre has made, as well as future developments that will benefit heart and lung patients across Oxfordshire, only possible thanks to your generous donations.

Author Mark Haddon also joins us to tell us about his experience as patient in the John Radcliffe.

The event is free to attend and all are welcome.

This month at Short Stories Aloud you can listen to stories by Sophie Hardach (Confession With Blue Horses) and Fanny Blake (A Summer Reunion) read aloud by trained actors. The authors will then be interviewed by Sarah Franklin (Shelter) before taking questions from the audience.

Confession with Blue Horses

Tobi and Ella’s childhood in East Berlin is shrouded in mystery. Now adults living in London, their past in full of unanswered questions. Both remember their family’s daring and terrifying attempt to escape, which ended in tragedy; but the fall-out from that single event remains elusive. Where did their parents disappear to, and why? What happened to Heiko, their little brother? And was there ever a painting of three blue horses?

In contemporary Germany, Aaron works for the archive, making his way through old files, piecing together the tragic history of thousands of families. But one file in particular catches his eye; and soon unravelling the secrets at its heart becomes an obsession.

When Ella is left a stash of notebooks by her mother, and she and Tobi embark on a search that will take them back to Berlin, her fate clashes with Aaron’s, and together they piece together the details of Ella’s past… and a family destroyed.

Devastating and beautifully written, funny and life-affirming, Confession with Blue Horses explores intimate family life and its strength in the most difficult of circumstances.

Sophie Hardach worked as a correspondent for Reuters news agency in Tokyo, Paris and Milan and has written for a number of publications including the Atlantic, the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph. She has previously written two critically acclaimed novels, The Registrar’s Manual for Detecting Forced Marriages, about Kurdish refugees, and Of Love and Other Wars, about pacifists during World War Two.

A Summer Reunion

One perfect villa, four old friends, and a holiday that will change everything…

Amy, Linda, Kate and Jane were best friends at school. Now, years later, they have grown apart. When Amy discovers her husband has been stealing from her successful interiors business, and with a milestone birthday looming, she decides it is the time to reach out to her old friends once again.

So, she decides to invite the other three to her beautiful villa in Mallorca for a reunion weekend. As the four friends gather, secrets are unearthed, old scores settled and new friendships forged. Will this holiday bring them together or tear them apart? And will each of them grasp their second chance for happiness…?

Fanny Blake was a publisher for many years, editing both fiction and non-fiction before becoming a freelance journalist and writer. She has written various non-fiction titles, as well as acting as ghost writer for a number of celebrities. She was Books Editor of Woman & Home magazine has been a judge for the Costa Novel Award, the British Book Awards, the Comedy Women in Print Award among others. She has written eight novels, including An Italian Summer and A Summer Reunion.

Tickets for this event cost £5. Doors will open at 6.45pm and there will be a small bar available at which to purchase drinks. For more information please call our Customer Service Department on 01865 333 623 or email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk

For twenty years New York Review Books Classics have been devoted to two causes: discovering important, previously untranslated books from all over the world and rediscovering wonderful books in English that have fallen into undeserved obscurity. Fiction and non-fiction and books in a wide variety of genres can be found among the more than 500 NYRB Classics now in print, and it may be that what, as much as anything, unites the books in the series is that they hail from the past, however remote or recent. What does the past have to say to the present is the question that the series as a whole may be said to raise, and nowadays, when the authority of tradition is diminished and indeed suspect, it is a question of peculiar urgency. How do books haunt us? The novelist Rachel Cusk, the philosopher John Gray, the critic and writer Victoria Nelson, together with the founder and editor of NYRB Classics, Edwin Frank, will discuss.

Edwin Frank was born in Boulder, Colorado and educated at Harvard College and Columbia University. He is the founder of the New York Review Books Classics series, the author of Snake Train: Poems 1984-2013 (Shearsman Books), and the editor of The Red Thread: 20 Years of NYRB Classics (NYRB).

Victoria Nelson is a writer of fiction, criticism and memoir. Her books include Gothicka and The Secret Life of Puppets, a stude of the supernatural grotesque in Western culture that won the Modern Language Association’s Scaglione Prize for Comparative Literary Studes in 2001, and Wild California, a collection of stories. She edited NYRB’s collection of Robert Aickman stories Compulsory Games. She teaches in Goddard College’s MFA creative writing programme.

Rachel Cusk was born in 1967 and is the author of eight novels: Saving Agnes, which won the Whitbread First Novel Award, The Temporary, The Country Life, which won a Somerset Maugham Award, The Lucky Ones, which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel Award, In the Fold, Arlington Park, which was shortlisted for the Orange Prize, The Bradshaw Variations and Outline. Her non-fiction books are A Life’s Work, The Last Supper and Aftermath. In 2003 she was chosen as one of Granta’s Best of Young Novelists.

John Gray is an English political philosopher with interests in analytic philosophy and the history of ideas. He retired in 2008 as School Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Gray contributes regularly to The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement and the New Statesman, where he is the lead book reviewer.

Tickets for this event cost £5. Doors will open at 6.45pm, at which time there will be a small bar available from which to purchase drinks. For more information please call our Customer Service Desk on 01865 333 623 or email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk.

Join Oxford University Press for a special science-themed “speed dating” event. Mingle with a range of topics, including reptiles, psychopathy, environmental law, synaesthesia and circadian rhythms with expert authors from the Very Short Introductions series. Make an impression and get your questions in before the bell rings!

IF Oxford is operating a Pay What You Decide (PWYD) ticketing system. This works by enabling you to pre-book events without paying for a ticket beforehand. Afterwards, you have the opportunity to pay what you decide you want to, or can afford. If you prefer, you can make a donation to IF Oxford when you book. All funds raised go towards next year’s Festival.

We are honoured to announce that Elif Shafak will give this year’s Annual Blackwell’s Lecture on Thursday 24th October 2019 at 7.30pm in the Sheldonian Theatre.

Elif Shafak will deliver this year’s Annual Blackwell’s Lecture on the subject of literature, social change and politics.

Elif Shafak is an award-winning British-Turkish novelist and the most widely read female author in Turkey. She writes in both Turkish and English, and has published seventeen books, eleven of which are novels, including the bestselling ‘The Bastard of Istanbul’, ”The Forty Rules of Love’, and ‘Three Daughters of Eve’. Her latest book is ’10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World.’

Her work has been translated into fifty languages, published by Penguin/Random House and represented by Curtis Brown globally. She was awarded the title of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres. In 2017 Elif was chosen by Politico as one of the twelve people who would make the world better.

Elif Shafak is also a political scientist and an academic. She holds a degree in International Relations, a masters’ degree in Gender and Women’s Studies and a PhD in Political Science and Political Philosophy. She has taught at various universities in Turkey, the UK and the USA, including St Anne’s College, Oxford University, where she is an honorary fellow.

Elif Shafak is a member of Weforum Global Agenda Council on Creative Economy and a founding member of ECFR (European Council on Foreign Relations). An advocate for women’s rights, LGBT rights and freedom of speech, Shafak is an inspiring public speaker and twice a TED Global speaker, each time receiving a standing ovation.

Her writing has been longlisted for the Orange Prize, MAN Asian Prize; the Baileys Prize and the IMPAC Dublin Award, and shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize and RSL Ondaatje Prize. She judged numerous prestigious literary prizes.

Tickets cost just £5 are available from the Blackwell’s Eventbrite website or from Blackwell’s Bookshop, 50 Broad Street, Oxford.

Blackwell’s are delighted to be hosting a special Hallowe’en event exploring black magic, with Thomas Waters and Lucie McKnight Hardy as they discuss their books ‘Cursed Britain: A History of Witchcraft and Black Magic in Modern Times’ and ‘Water Shall Refuse Them’.

‘Cursed Britain’

Historian Thomas Waters here explores the lives of cursed or bewitched people, along with the witches and witch-busters who helped and harmed them. Waters takes us on a fascinating journey from Scottish islands to the folklore-rich West Country, from the immense territories of the British Empire to metropolitan London. We learn why magic caters to deep-seated human needs but see how it can also be abused, and discover how witchcraft survives by evolving and changing. Along the way, we examine an array of remarkable beliefs and rituals, from traditional folk magic to diverse spiritualities originating in Africa and Asia.

This is a tale of cynical quacks and sincere magical healers, depressed people and furious vigilantes, innocent victims and rogues who claimed to possess evil abilities. Their spellbinding stories raise important questions about the state’s role in regulating radical spiritualities, the fragility of secularism and the true nature of magic.

Thomas Waters is lecturer in history at Imperial College London and a specialist in the modern history of witchcraft and magic.

‘Water Shall Refuse Them’

The heatwave of 1976. Following the accidental drowning of her sister, sixteen-year-old Nif and her family move to a small village on the Welsh borders to escape their grief. But rural seclusion doesn’t bring any relief. As her family unravels, Nif begins to put together her own form of witchcraft – collecting talismans from the sun-starved land. That is, until she meets Mally, a teen boy who takes a keen interest in her, and has his own secret rites to divulge.

Lucie McKnight Hardy is the debut author of ‘Water Shall Refuse Them’, an atmospheric coming-of-age novel, full of magical suspense.

Tickets cost £5. There will be a bar serving an array of magical potions from 6:45pm – 7pm. Fancy dress is welcomed. For all enquiries please email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk or call our Customer Service Department on 01865 333623.

Join prize-winning author Olivia Laing in conversation with Professor Dame Hermione Lee.

Olivia Laing is the author of To the River, The Trip to Echo Spring and The Lonely City. Her latest book, Crudo, is a real-time novel about the turbulent summer of 2017. It was a Sunday Times top ten bestseller and a New York Times notable book of 2018 and was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize and the Gordon Burn Prize. In 2019 it won the 100th James Tait Black Memorial Prize.