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30 MONDAY
MARCH 2009
David J. Hand 206
Paul Quarrie 211
Statistics: A Very Short Introduction
5.15pm (10 minutes) / Blackwell Festival Bookshop
Meadows Marquee, Christ Church / Free
Statistics has evolved into an exciting discipline
which uses deep theory and powerful software to
shed light on the world around us: from clinical trials
in medicine, to economics, sociology and countless
other subjects vital to understanding modern life.
Join David Hand as he briefly explores and explains
how statistics works today.
Donna Leon and
Patrick Neate
“From Heart or Head”
Amit Chaudhuri,
Kamila Shamsie
Chaired by Elleke Boehmer
6pm / Blue Boar Marquee, Christ Church / £7.00
201
6pm / Garden Marquee, Christ Church / £7.50
In this intriguing talk, two very popular novelists talk
about their very different ways of dealing with the
topic of location. Living in Venice, Donna Leon uses
all her love and knowledge of that city in her popular
detective novels; Patrick Neate, on the other hand,
had never been to New Orleans before breathing life
into the city in his Twelve Bar Blues. Why do some
authors choose places close to their heart while
others prefer backgrounds imagined in their head
Sponsored by Cox & Kings
208
How are we defined – politically, historically, artistically,
through our relationships, our place of birth, the journeys
through our lives Amit Chaudhuri, author of The
Immortals, a haunting and meditative new novel on the
refrains and relationships that define us, discusses
the issue with Kamila Shamsie, author of Burnt Shadows,
a powerful, sweeping epic following intersecting lives
of people from different nations and cultures. Chaired by
Elleke Boehmer, novelist, critic and cultural historian.
12
Three Oxford Libraries
6pm / Oriel Senior Library, Oriel, Oriel Square /
£8.00
The three colleges which almost join each other in
Merton Street are Merton, Corpus Christi, and Christ
Church. Founded respectively in 1264, 1517 and
1524, they all have important old libraries, which,
although similar in some ways, differ enormously.
However what they all do is demonstrate very
clearly the influence which individuals have brought
to bear in the creation of these remarkably rich
collections, and how their books illustrate and mirror
the intellectual interests and concerns of certain
periods: the Middle Ages, the age of humanism, and
the early eighteenth century.
Paul Quarrie of Maggs Brothers has been intimately
connected with the dispersal of the celebrated library
of the Earls of Macclesfield at Shirburn Castle. He
is at present at work on a book on early eighteenthcentury
book collecting and collectors.
James Attlee interviewed
by Peter Guttridge
Isolarion:
A Different Oxford Journey
207
7pm / Blackwell, 48-51 Broad Street / £7.50
In this scholarly, engaging and thoroughly diverting
trip up Oxford’s Cowley Road, James Attlee mixes
vivid accounts of everyday life – in the road’s pubs,
porn-shops and homes – with powerful allegorical
reflections on the connections between past and
present, time and space, and high and low culture.
Drawing inspiration from sources ranging from
Robert Burton’s The Anatomy of Melancholy to
contemporary artists, this is a charming and
companionable guide capable of revealing the
extraordinary embedded in the everyday.