Thank you all for coming tonight.

I am really, really happy that we can host such an incredible event with two of the very finest minds this country has to offer.

The person I'll be speaking to first, Joe Quinn, and the person

that Ash Sark will be speaking to, William Dalarimple, I think, are the best of Britain. They're

thoughtful, intelligent, cosmopolitan, kind and progressive. And they're the exact kind of thought

of thought leaders, forgive me for that term, that we need in

this country if we want to go in a better direction and have better days ahead.

Joe Quinn is the professor of ancient history at Cambridge.

She's the first woman to hold that position.

She's an incredible person.

Ash was talking to her about Shack Kilmary,

Constantine Trajan, and I don't know, somebody else, Augustus.

And she gave a really good answer.

You know, not many historians of antiquity necessarily going to do that.

Her latest book, her most recent book, How the World Made the West,

I think is a must read, an extraordinary overview of 4,000 years of history, really undoes

a lot of the shibolets that are core to ultra-nationalist right-wing and reactionary thinking.

So with no further ado, please welcome Joe Quinn.

Thank you so much.

Please.

I'm loving this soundtrack.

I know, it's great. I've never had such exciting music to go on to before.

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