Esme Rhodes: Esme Rhodes is an actress featuring herein as Eloise Weaver. She recently graduated from the University of Oxford with a degree in History. Recent credits include 'Skeleton Crew' at the Edinburgh Fringe (2024), the Weston Library's 'A New Power: Photography in Britain 1800-1850' (2023), and 'Having the Last Word' (2024).
Judith Bunting: Judith Bunting is a screenwriter, with a background as a writer, director, and producer of award-winning content for TV and VOD.
Writers:
Benjamin Obadiah Iqbal Zephaniah: Benjamin Zephaniah was born in Birmingham, and grew up in Jamaica and in Handsworth, where he was sent to an approved school. He left school at 13 unable to read or write and was imprisoned for burglary. His political anger stayed with him, channelled into protest, music and performance. Benjamin Zephaniah was a candidate for Oxford’s poetry professorship, and talked of as a possible Poet Laureate. But when offered an OBE in 2003, he declined, because the word Empire reminded him of how his foremothers were raped and his forefathers brutalised (from The Poetry Archive).
In 1998, he took home the BBC Radio 4 Young Playwrights Festival Award, and throughout his career, he received at least sixteen honorary doctorates. Ealing Hospital also honored him by naming a ward after him. His second book, Refugee Boy, earned the 2002 Portsmouth Book Award for Best Longer Novel. In 1982, he released Rasta, an album that featured the Wailers’ first performance since Bob Marley’s death, celebrating Nelson Mandela. The album soared to the top of the charts in Yugoslavia, and in recognition of its impact, Mandela invited him to host the prestigious Two Nations Concert at London’s Royal Albert Hall in 1996. On screen, he became well-known for his significant role in the BBC drama Peaky Blinders, where he appeared from 2013 to 2022.
Dr. April Elisabeth Pawar: April Pawar is the Founder of the Oxford Writers’ House. She graduated from St. Anne’s College, Oxford in 2016 with a DPhil in English Literature. She writes fiction, essays, and poetry.
Thomas Stopford: Tom is an Events Director and an Oxford-based artist and writer. When not organising events, he is illustrating winning stories for the Peregrine Prize for Young Authors, or working on his forthcoming graphic novel.
Interviewed Expert:
Jess Baudet is a member of the Guild of Guides, and serves as an expert and guide for visitors to the Bodleian Libraries.
