Valentine's Day at Oxford

Oscar-winning American film-maker James Ivory will talk about his experiences with the legendary Merchant Ivory productions, in partnership with producer Ismail Merchant and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. Merchant Ivory is celebrated for the rich cultural diversity of its films, which are often set in India, France, England and America, and are distinguished by their visual poetry, fiercely egalitarian attitudes, and quiet wit. The conversation will touch on questions about the use of the historical past in Merchant Ivory films, about his own experiences of literary adaptation as both director and writer, and about the representation of love and cultural diversity. As well as films such as A Room with a View (1985) and The Bostonians (1984), the conversation will consider the recently re-released ground-breaking same-sex romance Maurice (1987), whose screen play features in the Ashmolean’s exhibition No Offence. James Ivory will be joined by three outstanding academics, whose research engages with the themes of diversity, equality, inclusivity, love, desire and storytelling that are central to his life’s work. Richard Parkinson is Professor of Egyptology at the University and the author of A Little Gay History: Desire and Diversity Across the World (2013). Katherine Harloe is Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Reading who is currently working on an edition of the love-letter of Johann Joachim Winkelmann. Jennifer Ingleheart is Professor of Classics at the University of Durham, whose most recent book - Masculine Plural - Queer Classics, Sex, and Education - has just been published by Oxford University Press.

Originally published in the TORCH - The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities series.

Love is in the air - or is it? Companies are advertising that they can find you love through the power of scent! But are pheromones a chemical way to find your true love? Or is it just a myth? In this episode of the Oxford Sparks Big Questions podcast we are looking at the science behind love at first smell and asking does love have a scent?

We visited Dr Tristram Wyatt, Senior Research Fellow, Department of Zoology at The University of Oxford to find out…

Originally published in Big Questions - with Oxford Sparks series

Professor Parkinson discusses how to mobilise historical research into sexuality for maximum impact and the institutional, cultural and political issues that can be at stake, and suggests some of the possible uses of LGBTQ history. Drawing on personal experiences and the gradual development of his recent book “A Little Gay History” as a case study, Professor Parkinson discusses how to mobilise historical research into sexuality for maximum impact and the institutional, cultural and political issues that can be at stake, and suggests some of the possible uses of LGBTQ history.

Originally published in the Oxford LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) History Month Lectures series.

Emma Smith continues her Approaching Shakespeare series with a lecture on the play Love's Labour's Lost. Originally published in the Approaching Shakespeare series.

A public lecture given by Edward Frenkel, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, talking around his best-selling book "Love and Math" followed by a conversation with Marcus du Sautoy and Q&A. "Love and Math" tells two intertwined stories: the wonders of mathematics and one young man's journey learning and living it. The book shows that mathematics - far from occupying a specialist niche - goes to the heart of all matter, uniting us across cultures. Edward works on the Langlands correspondences. Considered by many to be a Grand Unified Theory of mathematics, the Langlands Programme enables researchers to translate findings from one field to another so that they can solve hard problems that had seemed intractable before. "Love and Math" is an invitation to discover the hidden magic universe of mathematics. For more information, visit http://loveandmathbook.com/

Originally from the Secrets of Mathematics series.

Victorian fiction is commonly thought of as treating love sentimentally and lacking all reference to sex. In this talk drawing on material from a book he is writing, Dr David Grylls, Fellow of Kellogg College, will contest such a view. Originally published in the Alumni Weekend series.

Dr Nicholas Perkins talks about how romance functions as a genre in the middle ages, especially about how gifts and tokens were exchanged as signs of fidelity, specifically in Sir Orfeo, Sir Gawain, and King Horn. He also incorporates the manuscripts present in the accompanying display at the Bodleian.

Originally published in The Bodleian Libraries (BODcasts) series.