The Lonely Century
Even before social distancing, loneliness was becoming the defining condition of the 21st century. But, argues academic and broadcaster Noreena Hertz, it is also one that we have the power to reverse. In her international bestseller The Lonely Century: A Call to Reconnect, she combines a decade of research with first-hand reporting, taking in smartphone […]
The Father: A Revenge
Speakers: Franziska Frank, Philippe Sands Niklas Frank was just seven when his father Hans Frank, Hitler’s legal adviser and governor general of occupied Poland, was executed at Nuremberg as a Nazi war criminal. In the decades since he has attempted to come to terms with the enormity of the horror unleashed; The Father: A Revenge […]
Claudia Roden & Jay Rayner
A unique chance to see two of the most influential figures in British cuisine and best-loved writers in conversation. 30 years after her first Mediterranean cookbook was published Claudia Roden, credited with revolutionising Western attitudes to Middle Eastern and Mediterranean food, returns to the topic. Called “a palpable instant classic” by Nigella Lawson, Med: A […]
Tree of Life: Elif Shafak, Jonathan Drori & Anne Sebba
From Islam’s Tree of Life to Tu BiShvat, trees play a central, often mystical, role in cultures and faiths around the world. Three of our favourite speakers take root here to discuss this unique relationship. The Island of Missing Trees, the latest acclaimed book from Elif Shafak, is a bittersweet tale of the star-crossed love […]
Michael Ignatieff: On Consolation
Speakers: Michael Ignatieff, David Herman How do we console each other and ourselves in an age of unbelief? In On Consolation: Finding Solace in Dark Times, author and academic Michael Ignatieff shows how humans in extremity have looked to each other to recover hope and resilience. From Job and Camus to Anna Akhmatova and Primo […]
Sondheim Tonight
Speakers: Leslie Felperin, David Benedict, Jenna Russell, Nigel Lilley In music and conversation, we celebrate the life and work of one of the most influential cultural figures of the last 70 years, the Tony, Oscar, Grammy, Olivier and Pulitzer winning composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim. Born to a New York Jewish family in 1930, over […]
Marks & Gran
Speakers: Laurence Marks, Maurice Gran, Michael Grade From meeting at the Jewish Lads Brigade (Finsbury Park Company) in 1960 and making their comedy writing debut for Frankie Howerd in the 70s to their current status as BAFTA and Emmy winning elder statesmen of situation comedy, Laurence Marks & Maurice Gran have had a unique career. […]
Cherchez La Femme
Speakers: Lisa Appignanesi, Stephen Frosh, Eva Hoffman, John Launer, Rachel Lasserson Lisa Appignanesi, Stephen Frosh, Eva Hoffman and John Launer discuss how sex became a scandal, not only in the so-called “dangerous method”, psychoanalysis, but also beyond the consulting room. Early 20th century Europe was a cauldron of fertile ideas, Victorian repression, antisemitism and illicit […]
Power Players: Ivor Crewe & Anthony Seldon
Speakers: Ivor Crewe, Anthony Seldon Who wants to be a Macmillan or Blair? 300 years after Robert Walpole became the first Prime Minister of the UK, the title of Anthony Seldon’s new book on the role The Impossible Office? sums up the challenges, while Ivor Crewe’s The Blunders of Our Governments shows that scandal, catastrophe […]
People Love Dead Jews- Dara Horn in Conversation
Speakers: Dar Horn A two-time National Jewish Book Award winner for her fiction, Dara Horn has also been publishing penetrating essays since she was a teenager, for publications including The New York Times, The Paris Review and The Wall Street Journal. Often asked to write on subjects related to Jewish culture – and increasingly in […]
Joshua Cohen: The Netanyahus
Speakers: Joshua Cohen, Josh Glancy A rare UK event for the man The Washington Post called “maybe America’s greatest living writer”. His previous novels Witz, Book of Numbers and Moving Kings were named books of the year by NPR, New York Magazine and the Village Voice, while his short story and essay collections Four New […]
Ethel Rosenburg: An American Tragedy
Speakers: Anne Sebba, Clare Mulley To J. Edgar Hoover it was ‘the trial of the century’; for many more it was a horrifying case of what happens when a government motivated by fear tramples on the rights of its citizens. In June 1953 Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were electrocuted, having been convicted of conspiracy to […]