Mrs Holmes Taught Sherlock all he Knew:
Uncovering the Truth About Victorian Women Detectives
Dr Sara Lodge,
School of English, University of St Andrews
Date: 21st of January 2026
Time: 20:00
Venue: Zoom
A revelatory history of the women who brought Victorian criminals to account—and how they became a cultural sensation.
From Wilkie Collins to the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, the traditional image of the Victorian detective is male. Few people realise that women detectives successfully investigated Victorian Britain, working both with the police and for private agencies, which they sometimes managed themselves.
About the speaker:
Sara Lodge is Senior Lecturer in the School of English at the University of St Andrews, specializing in nineteenth-century literature and culture. She is the author of Thomas Hood and Nineteenth-Century Poetry and Jane Eyre: A Reader’s Guide to Criticism. Lodge has also worked as a speechwriter for the United Nations Secretary-General in New York and, as a journalist, writes regularly for the British and American press.
OTHER EVENTS
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Date: 19th of November 2025
Time: 20:00
Venue: Zoom
Speaker: Dr Simon Elliott, Managing Director, Sentinel Communications
Septimius Severus was Rome’s black emperor. Born in the blistering heat of a North African spring in Leptis Magna, AD 145, he died in the freezing cold of a northern British winter in York in AD 211. A giant of an emperor, whose career can be counted in superlatives, Severus was in power at the height of Rome’s might. He led the largest army to ever campaign in Britain, comprising 50,000 men, part of a Roman military establishment which peaked at 33 legions under his rule.
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Date: 17th of December 2025
Time: 20:00
Venue: Zoom
Speaker: Prof Richard Whatmore, School of History, University of St Andrews
The Enlightenment is popularly seen as the Age of Reason, a key moment in human history when ideals such as freedom, progress, natural rights and constitutional government prevailed. In this radical re-evaluation, historian Richard Whatmore shows why, for many at its centre, the Enlightenment was a profound failure.
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Date: 18th of February 2025
Time: 20:00
Venue: Zoom
Speaker: Dr Antony Harkins, Western Kentucky University, USA
The Appalachian region in the United States comprises the range of mountains stretching from north Georgia up to the state of Maine. It has been celebrated as an area of natural beauty and long-distance walks as well as a major centre of bluegrass music. However, it is also a very misunderstoodarea as evidenced by JD Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy.