Berkhamsted Town Hall
196 High Street
Berkhamsted HP4 3AP
from 10.00AM – 7.00PM
Robin Ince - 10.00am
Robin will deliver 4 of his own poems and some in-between chat about his 3 latest books. His session starts at 10.00am.
Robin Ince is many things. A comedian, an author, a broadcaster and a populariser of scientific ideas. The Guardian once declared him a ‘becardiganed polymath’ which seems about right.
He is probably best known as the co-host of the Sony Gold Award winning BBC Radio 4 series The Infinite Monkey Cage with Professor Brian Cox. He also co-hosts the podcast Robin and Josie’s Book Shambles, which gains over 100,000 listeners a month, which is part of The Cosmic Shambles Network, which he also co-created.
Robin quickly abandoned science at school, bored by a fog of dull lessons and intimidated by the barrage of equations. But, twenty years later, he fell in love and he now presents one of the world’s most popular science podcasts. Every year he meets hundreds of the world’s greatest thinkers. In this erudite and witty book, Robin reveals why scientific wonder isn’t just for the professionals. Filled with interviews featuring astronauts, comedians, teachers, quantum physicists, neuroscientists and more – as well as charting Robin’s own journey with science – The Importance of Being Interested explores why many wrongly think of the discipline as distant and difficult. From the glorious appeal of the stars above to why scientific curiosity can encourage much needed intellectual humility; this optimistic and profound book will leave you filled with a thirst for intellectual adventure
Robin's latest book entitled Bibliomaniac: An Obsessive’s Tour of the Bookshops of Britain – Out October 2022
Why play to 12,000 people when you can play to 12? In Autumn 2021, Robin Ince’s stadium tour with Professor Brian Cox was postponed due to the pandemic. Rather than do nothing, he decided instead to go on a tour of over a hundred bookshops in the UK, from Wigtown to Penzance; from Swansea to Margate.
Packed with witty anecdotes and tall tales, Bibliomaniac takes the reader on a journey across Britain as Robin explores his lifelong love of bookshops and books – and also tries to find out just why he can never have enough of them.
It is the story of an addiction and a romance, and also of an occasional points failure just outside Oxenholme
His previous book to above, I’m a Joke and So Are You, was described by Chortle as ‘one of the best books ever written about what it means to be a comedian’. He also wrote the book, The Bad Book Club, and has edited and written short stories for two volumes of Dead Funny: Horror Stories by Comedians, as well as writing and presenting documentaries about the history of self-help, comedians and melancholy, Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds, Richard Feynman, General Relativity and Dr Seuss.
As a stand up he has toured the world and won three Chortle Awards, the Time Out Outstanding Achievement Award and was nominated for the British Comedy Awards Best Live show. The Guardian once wrote that, ‘When someone writes a history of modern comedy, they should make room for Robin Ince’ and of his latest show The Scotsman described it as an ‘alchemic mix of enthusiasm, knowledge and observation’.
He has created, curated, pioneered and hosted numerous nights mixing science, music and comedy at some of the most celebrated venues around the world from the Hammersmith Apollo to the Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto and the Royal Albert Hall. His brainchild Nine Lessons and Carols for Curious People continues to sell out theatres every year, over a decade after its first appearance, and in 2019 he embarks on a world tour of arenas with Professor Brian Cox.
He has received an Honorary Fellowship of UCL, an honorary doctorate from Royal Holloway College (University of London), and is a fellow of the British Science Association.
