You're listening to a London Review of Books podcast.

Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the British Museum. I'm Joanna McElall, I'm the deputy

director here, and I want to especially welcome tonight the London Review of Books

and to thank the editor Mary Kay Wilmers and all of her team for working together with us, for putting on this wonderful lecture series now in its fifth year.

This was conceived, this lecture series was conceived by Mary Kay, I think five or six years ago, on the basis that

we would do it on the three coldest nights of the year, thinking that that would probably

be very good for us to come and hear a very interesting lecture. So I'm just looking over

some of the past highlights very briefly. Jacqueline Rose on Marilyn Monroe, Hillary Mantell

on Royal Bodies, Neil Aschon on Europe.

They've been extraordinary lectures.

And the 2014 season is very especially exciting, starting with James Wood, who,

Nikki Spice, the publisher of the LRB, will introduce you to in a moment.

And Mary Beard on the public voice of women, and Andrew Hagen on Julian Assange, on ghosting Julian Assange.

So I'd just like now to hand over to Nikki Spice and I hope you have a wonderful evening. Joanna, thank you so much.

To know that you feel this way at the British Museum about the LRB is incredibly heartening

for us.

And as we sit down to listen to the first of this fifth series of intellectuals, we can only

marvel once again at your welcome to us, your hospitality and your support.

It is really quite hard to believe that it's already five years since Neil McGregor, the

director of the museum, inaugurated the Winter Lectures venture with his wonderful talk on the

purpose and politics of the British Museum, which so brilliantly anchored the very

biggest questions about the politics

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