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Sat 23 Jan 2027Doors 13:45

RIVER - The Thames from source to sea

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

The Thames is England’s longest and most celebrated river. It’s a key part of our history and geography and central to our imaginative life. This new poetry collection, commissioned for the 30th anniversary of the Thames Path, unpacks encounters along its route and explores the emotional pull of this powerful river. Don’t miss this lyrical evocation in words, images and sounds! This is Robert's second visit to StonyWords. He has published nine collections of poetry, was the poet in residence at Kelmscott Manor and is chair of the Poetry Archive.

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Sat 23 Jan 2027Doors 15:15

1000 Tudor People

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

A unique compendium of biographies of people who flourished between 1485 and 1603. Not just a list of monarchs and politicians, it covers courtiers, soldiers, authors, sailors and criminals. Each biography outlines the individual’s achievements – some to amuse but always to inform and illustrate the richness of Tudor society. Melita Thomas is co-founder of Tudor Times (https://www.tudortimes.co.uk/), an online repository of information about the Tudors and Stuarts.

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Mon 25 Jan 2027Doors 18:45

MK at 60

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

2027 is Milton Keynes’ 60th birthday. This talk will explain how and why MK was selected as a new town and what that meant in practice. Looking at other new towns and the aim to set out a new model for housing and town design, it will consider how MK developed compared to other new towns such as Irvine and Peterborough and how it aimed to build the urban society of the future. Alistair Fair is Reader in Architectural History at Edinburgh College of Art. He is the author of two books about the post-war New Towns.

TheatreLiterature

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Wed 27 Jan 2027Doors 18:45

Stalin's Apostles

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Stalin’s Apostles is a radical new look at the way five people allowed their obsession with Communist ideology to overshadow any sense of morality or decency – or loyalty to Britain. Why did Maclean, Burgess, Philby, Blunt and Cairncross choose to betray their country? Their legacy is not just in the graveyards of Eastern Europe but at the heart of Putin’s Kremlin. Antonia Senior is a journalist, critic, podcaster and book reviewer for The Times newspaper. Stalin's Apostles is her first work of non-fiction.

TheatreLiterature

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Sat 30 Jan 2027Doors 13:15

Tudor England

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Across the cities, towns and villages of England, Tudor families and communities lived through a time of great upheaval. Lucy Wooding lets their voices speak showing not just a monarchy under strain but how ordinary men and women thought, wrote and lived and died during that period of turbulence and international unrest. Lucy Wooding is Langford Fellow and Tutor in History at Lincoln College, Oxford.

TheatreLiterature

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Sat 30 Jan 2027Doors 14:45

Holbein

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Hans Holbein was court painter to Henry VIII. He is the artist whose paintings have shaped perceptions of the Tudor court for five hundred years. We know his portraits of Tudor figures such as Henry VIII, his queens and leading courtiers such as Thomas More and Thomas Cromwell. This book situates his art in the broader context of art history and offers a fresh examination of his life and work. Elizabeth Goldring is Honorary Professor at the University of Warwick and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and the Royal Historical Society.

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Sat 30 Jan 2027Doors 16:15

The Mirror of Great Britain - A Life of James VI and I

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

James VI and I was one of Britain’s most consequential and fascinating monarchs. Ruler of Scotland for four decades before his accession to the English throne in 1603, he sought to bring the two kingdoms together in some form of union. Surviving the Gunpowder Plot, he was also a major intellectual, whose preoccupations ranged from witchcraft and theology to hunting, diplomacy, poetry and sartorial fashion. Clare Jackson is Honorary Professor of Early Modern History at Cambridge University and a Fellow of Trinity Hall. "The Mirror of Great Britain" was awarded the Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical Biography 2026.

TheatreLiterature

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Sun 31 Jan 2027Doors 14:45

Nature's Apothecary

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Nature’s Apothecary provides a brief history of the development of medicinal practice in Western Europe. Filled with illustrations from the renowned Herbal by John Gerard, it shows how herbs, spices, flowers, fruit and vegetables have played a vital role through the centuries. It also places in a new light plants, such as basil, still recommended as a natural mosquito repellent. Margaret will be in conversation with StonyWords co-curator, Rob Gifford. Margaret Willes is the author of "A Shakespearian Botanical" and "The Domestic Herbal: Plants for the Home in the Seventeenth Century". This is her fourth visit to StonyWords

TheatreLiterature

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Mon 1 Feb 2027Doors 18:45

The Fiery Spirits

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

The Fiery Spirits tells the story of the MPs and protestors who played a pivotal role in the English Civil Wars. At the start of the wars, very few would have imagined that the country would soon become a republic. Yet Henry Marten and his fellow MPs, nicknamed The Fiery Spirits, formed the nucleus of a movement that defeated the king politically and militarily and changed the country forever. John Rees is a Visiting Research Fellow at Goldsmiths, University of London and author of "The Leveller Revolution".

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Tue 2 Feb 2027Doors 18:45

Gladiators in the Greek World

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

The Greeks under Roman rule took a foreign sport and moulded it into the ultimate celebration of Greekness with more drama and flair than Rome could ever imagine. It may come as a surprise but there are more commemorative monuments for gladiators born in Greece than those born in the rest of the Roman Empire. Prepare to have your perceptions about Rome and Greece changed forever Alexandra Sills is a historian specialising in sports and public spectacles in the ancient Mediterranean. Her work can be found online at https://www.ancientalexandra.co.uk/

TheatreLiterature

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Sat 6 Feb 2027Doors 13:15

Heiresses - Marriage, Inheritance and Caribbean Slavery

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Heiresses are inescapable in British culture. Their portraits crowd our museums and estates pepper our countryside. However. A less genteel story lurks beneath the veneer – the balls, dresses and dowries were funded by the exploitation of enslaved men, women and children. Heiresses offers a vital history of enslavement in Britain and the Caribbean. Miranda Kaufmann is Senior Research Fellow at the University of London's Institute of Commonwealth Studies and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. More about her research can be found at https://www.mirandakaufmann.com/

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Sat 6 Feb 2027Doors 14:45

Offa, King of the Mercians

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Offa ruled Mercia, which stretched from Chester to Dover, between 757 and 796. He cemented Mercia’s position as the dominant force in the southern part of Britain and laid the basis for a new model of kingship. In doing so, he had a lasting influence on the government and infrastructure of medieval England. And Stony Stratford was part of it! Rory Naismith is Professor of Early Medieval History at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Corpus Christi College.

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Sat 6 Feb 2027Doors 16:15

Lying Abroad - Henry Wotton and the Invention of Diplomacy

The Library @ 5-7 Church Street · Stony Stratford

Henry Wotton arrived in Venice in 1604 as England’s ambassador. Charged with restoring relations with Venice, he drew criticism for his breaches of protocol. The man King James called his “honest dissembler” was a maverick who fashioned diplomacy in ways that still inform international relations today. Carol Chillington Rutter is Emerita Professor of Shakespeare and Performance Studies at the University of Warwick.

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The Library @ 5-7 Church Street, Stony Stratford.

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