The Forum: Shaking up Foundations, LSE Literary Festival & BBC World Service

The BBC World Service will set up camp at LSE, attempting to turn a few ideas topsy turvy. Will Self will explore everything we think we know about writing a novel, whilst stand up mathematician Matt Parker will take us to infinity and beyond, proving that numbers can be amusing along the way. They’ll be joined by international politics expert Leslie Vinjamuri and biologist Armand Leroi, shaking up our ideas about peace and philosophy and inviting new perspectives.
The LSE Literary Fetsival: book events and writers' talks, London
120 years ago, playwright, socialist and Nobel Prize winner George Bernard Shaw co-founded the London School of Economics. Seven years ago, the university held its first Literary Festival, which this year takes on ‘foundations’ as its timely theme. Over one week, Elif Shafak, Anne Fine, Ali Smith, Will Self and a heap of other great minds will celebrate Shaw’s inquisitiveness by delving into ‘the causes of things’, which remains the university’s motto to this day. They’ll take some topics we think we understand - such as freedom, identity, politics and memory - and show us that we don’t know quite as much as we think…