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Using contemporary print and theatre, this lecture will discuss how England and Englishness was defined, even as the boundaries between the home and the world became increasingly diffuse.
In celebrating 500 years since the birth of Sir Thomas Gresham, Professor Jones will examine how changes since the sixteenth century have affected the evolution of human beings.
London was crucially dependent on continental Europe for its economic resilience in the mid-sixteenth century, and Sir Thomas Gresham’s fortune piggy-backed off the special relationship with Antwerp.
2018 saw a seismic change in the willingness of women to speak out about sexual abuse. This lecture frankly confronts the anecdotal evidence and suggests ways in which we can learn from it.
It is well known that Shakespeare lived in an age of monarchy and wrote powerfully in his English history plays about the duties of the sovereign. In this lecture, Jonathan Bate will tell another, forgotten story: of how Shakespeare was also fascinated by Roman political models.
The campaign to achieve the parliamentary vote for women (6 February 1918) took 52 years, from 1866 to 1918. During that time women and their male supporters employed both parliamentary and extra-parliamentary tactics, ranging from the presentation of petitions to the detonation of bombs.
The Rape of Lucrece set the mould for Shakespeare’s exploration of the tragic consequences of sexual desire turning to violence. Jonathan Bate will show how Shakespeare developed these themes from his reading of the great Roman poet Ovid.