BIBLIT PROGRAMME 2024
Plan Your Weekend
PETER AND THE WOLF PERFORMED BY THE ARLINGTON WIND QUINTET, NARRATED BY JACKIE SMITH-WOOD
2pm on Fri 19th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
All welcome to attend.
Free entry - Donations appreciated!
SALLY PAGE
10:15am to 11:15am Sat 20th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
Sally Page's debut novel, The Keeper of Stories, was a Sunday Times bestseller. She talks about her most recent novel, The Book of Beginnings; how flowers helped her become a writer and why she is fascinated by fountain pens.
SIR NICHOLAS COLERIDGE
11:20am to 12:20pm Sat 20th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
From the glossy posses of Conde Nast to the playing fields of Eton, Sir Nicholas Coleridge talks about his career, which has spanned publishing, heritage and museums and - from September 2024 - the leadership of one of Britain's most famous public schools.
YSENDA MAXTONE GRAHAM
12:30pm to 1:30pm Sat 20th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
Author and journalist Ysenda Maxtone Grahame is the granddaughter of Jan Struther (Joyce Anstruther), who wrote Mrs Miniver. Her book Jobs For The Girls is a history of British women through the workplace, from twinsets and pearls to the ping of the first email.
JAMES READ
2pm to 3pm Sat 20th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
James Read is on a mission to smuggle bacteria into our kitchens. In Of Cabbages & Kimchi, he takes the ten greatest “living ferments” - fermented foods & drinks that are neither cooked nor pasteurised - and places them under the microscope, before cooking with them in all their delicious versatility. Of Cabbages & Kimchi has just gone into the Fortnum & Mason shortlist for the Food Book award 2024. From kimchi to kefir, James will tell you all you need to know about fermentation’s bubbling magic.
ANDREW GIMSON
3:15pm to 4:15pm Sat 20th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
What sort of a person is Boris Johnson and how did he go from being the darling of British politics to the disreputable figure at the centre of Partygate? In The Rise and Fall of Boris Johnson, Andrew Gimson has got closer than anyone to finding out the answers.
NICHOLAS SHAKESPEARE & JAMES FLEMING
4:30pm to 5:30pm Sat 20th April 2024 in St Mary's Church
Nicholas Shakespeare's biography of Ian Fleming; Ian Fleming The Complete Man, is a new portrait of the man behind James Bond by an award-winning writer with unprecedented access to the Fleming family papers. He is in conversation with writer James Fleming, Ian Fleming's nephew.
EVENING DRINKS & MEMOIR AND BIOGRAPHY DISCUSSION PANEL
6pm to 6:30pm Sat 20th April 2024 Drinks & Canapes
6:30pm to 7:30pm Discussion Panel 2024 in St Mary's Church
Have you ever been inspired to write about one of your forebears? Do you think your family history deserves a wider audience? Historian Jane Ridley is the great-granddaughter and biographer of Edwin Lutyens and knows from personal experience what it is like to trawl through personal letters and archives. Her fellow panellists will be biographers Anne de Courcy (Snowdon; Diana Mosley; Coco Chanel, Nancy Lancaster) and Lady Henrietta Spencer-Churchill, whose new book about her family home, Blenheim Palace comes out this autumn.
ROBERT HARDMAN
11am to 12pm Sunday 21st April 2024 in St Mary's Church
Robert Hardman's book Charles III is a brilliant account of a tumultuous period in British history, full of insider detail and the real stories behind the sadness and the dazzling pomp.
SECRET GARDENS - VICTORIA SUMMERLEY & ABIGAIL WILLIS
12:30pm to 1:30pm Sunday 21st April 2024 in St Mary's Church
There’s nothing more fascinating than a glimpse of a private world and garden writers Abigail Willis and Victoria Summerley will be talking about their experiences while writing Secret Gardens of the Cotswolds and Secret Gardens of Somerset.
Abigail’s Somerset book features a range of gardens from a working flower farm to private retreats while Victoria’s Cotswolds book celebrates a rich tradition of garden-making in this beautiful area.
ARLINGTON WIND QUINTET PLAY MUSIC BY ELGAR & HIS CONTEMPORARIES
1:30pm to 2:30pm Sunday 21st April 2024 in St Mary's Church
All welcome to attend.
Free entry - Donations appreciated!
The Arlington Wind Quintet celebrates the special relationship between the “two Arlingtons,” – Arlington, Virginia, and the place after which it was named, Bibury/Arlington, Gloucestershire. The Arlington Wind Quintet’s members come from across the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Area, including Northern Virginia, Suburban Maryland, and, of course, Arlington, Virginia. The players are: Rick Smith, clarinet; Andrea Schewe, oboe; Deborah Thomson, flute; Kathleen Emery, bassoon; and Mark Stanga, horn (Mark and his wife Jane own The Steps Cottage in Bibury). The ensemble members all belong to the DC Chamber Musicians and perform regularly at chamber music concerts around Washington.
ARTHUR REYNOLDS
2:30pm to 3:30pm Sunday 21st April 2024 in St Mary's Church
Providence catapulted King Edward and the composer Edward Elgar onto the world stage at roughly the same moment, offering each the opportunity to reinvent himself. For the profligate prince, reinvention made possible monarchical greatness; for the provincial musician, reinvention brought international acclaim as the greatest British composer since Purcell. Both brought to their new standing painful memories of perceived youthful injustice, but neither would have contradicted Churchill’s observation that “kites fly highest against the wind, not with it”.
CAROLINE MONTAGUE
3:30pm to 4:30pm on Sunday 21st April 2024 in St Mary's Church
Caroline Montague's latest novel, The Pieces of Us, is set in the Potteries. She talks to Theodora Clarke, MP for Stafford, and her daughter-in-law, about the inspiration behind the story.