Books & Music

'As we contemplate the coming months, not knowing when we can breathe again, it's worth thinking about how already the foundations have been laid for whatever new opportunities God has for us on the far side of this crisis.'Rowan Williams offers these...

Getty Images Royal Photographer Chris Jackson has a unique insight into the world's most famous family, and it has never been more exciting than now, on the eve of the Coronation of a new British monarch, the first in an incredible seventy years...

Edward the Confessor was the son of King Aethelred the Unready of the House of Wessex. The family was exiled to Normandy when the Danish invaded England in 1013 but, with the nation in crisis on the death of King Harthacnut twenty-nine years later,...

Who made modern Britain the country it is today? How do we sum up the kind of people we are? What does it mean to be the new Elizabethans? In this wonderfully told history, spanning back to when Queen Elizabeth became queen in 1953, Andrew Marr traces...

On the Origin of Species outlines Charles Darwin's world-changing theory that life on Earth had not been brought into being by a creator, but had arisen from a single common ancestor and had evolved over time through the process of natural selection...

The Choir of Westminster Abbey and James O’Donnell bring composer John Taverner to the fore in this new release, as they present two of the undisputed choral masterpieces from sixteenth-century England: Missa Mater Christi sanctissima and Western Wynde...

The Westminster Abbey Choir continues their exploration of the rich repertoire of the liturgy in its historical context in the Abbey with music for the Feast of the Ascension. Ascension Day is a particular moment of celebration within the annual round of...

The first performance of Handel’s 'Messiah' in Dublin in 1742 is now legendary. Gentlemen were asked to leave their swords at home and ladies to come without hoops in their skirts in order to fit more people into the audience. Why then, did this now...

This brilliant new book explores the lives of eight generations of the greatest kings and queens that this country has ever seen, and the worst. The Plantagenets  – their story is the story of Britain. England’s greatest royal...

Journalism has the vital function to defend and promote truth in public discourse. And yet the news media has never been under so much pressure to move away from this critical role into more partial campaigns or commercial public relations. Here four of...

The Power of Politicians is an account of Tessa Jowell’s experience of entering politics and making effective sense of her role. Here, with Frances D’Souza, she gives fascinating insights into the workings of Parliament, the successful development of...

The Sonnets of William Shakespeare, a cycle of 154 linked poems, were first published in 1609. Filled with ideas about love, beauty and mortality, the sonnets are written in the same beautiful and innovative language that we have come to know from...