Mary Beard

A renowned British scholar, author and presenter, Mary Beard was born in Shropshire and studied Classics at Newnham College, Cambridge, where she completed her BA, MA, and her PhD on Cicero, and later became a Professor of Classics. Both a British Academy fellow and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Beard is the Classics editor for the Times Literary Supplement, for whom she also writes a regular blog, collected in her books It’s a Don’s Life (2008) and All in a Don’s Day (2011).

Beard’s specialist field is ancient Rome, and her other books include Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town (2009), which won the Wolfson History Prize, SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome (2015), Women & Power: A Manifesto (2017), Civilisations (2018) – one of a series of volumes accompanying the major BBC series – and Twelve Caesars (2021).

In 2023, her scintillating book Emperor of Rome was shortlisted for Waterstones Book of the Year 2023.