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Anna Beer
Anna, a celebrated biographer, is best-known for her entertaining, accessible accounts of female creatives. She is a regular media presence, and enjoys speaking about history, the arts, and the creative life.
About Anna Beer
With a string of ‘smart, funny and highly readable’ books to her name, Anna Beer brings a mix of entertainment and insight to any occasion. A regular media presence (film, TV, radio and podcasts), Anna has extensive public speaking experience nationally and internationally, from appearances at all the major literature and history festivals to guest lecturing for Cunard, from after-dinner speeches at Oxford University, where she is a Fellow of Kellogg College, to keynote addresses for leading cultural institutions.
Anna has written extensively about notable figures in English history (John Milton, Sir Walter Ralegh, William Shakespeare, Jane Austen) but is best-known for her feisty, accessible books about remarkable – but neglected – women, from Tudor noblewomen to Victorian novelists, from medieval mystics to twentieth-century radicals.
Over the last year, Anna’s given pre- and post- screening talks for Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn | Dartmouth Films; been interviewed about Shakespeare for BBC News (and discussed his sex life for the Betwixt the Sheets podcast); told the truth about Sir Walter Ralegh for the Noiser podcast; and showcased her insights into classical music live on stage as part of the Surrey Hills Music Festival. Anna’s range of potential subjects is unusually large, a reflection of the wide range of her interests, experience and publications. But at the heart of all she does is the desire to uncover and communicate powerful stories the past, and inspire people in the present.
New areas of interest continue to open up. Anna is developing her literary mentoring work, and is open to speaking engagements which explore, with humour and honesty, managing and developing one’s creative life and career. She herself is entering new ground as an author. Her first novel, a traditional murder mystery with a very contemporary edge, appears in May 2025.
To book Keynote Speaker Anna Beer, contact The Speakers Agency on +44(0)1332 810481 or email enquiries@thespeakersagency.com
Testimonials
"Anna has star quality. Not always a quality seen in eminent academics. She brings humour, clarity and huge energy to her talks and will entertain and fascinate anyone lucky enough to hear her."
Judith Holder
"Anna is a natural communicator, whether in after-dinner speeches, global alumni events, or public lectures. She carries her learning lightly, and always makes her audience feel welcome, entertained and enlightened."
Professor Jonathan Michie, President, Kellogg College, Oxford
"I’ve known Anna for nearly a decade, and am always struck by how her speaking style mirrors her writing style: eloquent, intelligent but also warm and witty. I’ve seen her in informal settings, semi formal ones such as book launches, and in front of the camera on my recent film about the composer Fanny Mendelssohn; she handles them all with equal ease. She has a passionate enthusiasm for information and ideas, which she delivers clearly and with enjoyment and brio. I can’t imagine a gathering she would not engage and entertain."
Sheila Hayman, BAFTA-winning documentary filmmaker
"Dr. Anna Beer combines scholarship with enthusiasm to fantastic effect. Whether Milton, Raleigh, Kempe, Sappho or Mendelssohn (Fanny, of course), she presents her material with a killer combination of erudition and warmth. I have seen audiences, from teenagers to pensioners, lean in, laugh and ask for more. To hear her speak is to know that you are in the hands of an expert who is also the kind of person you would like to sit next to at dinner."
Rebecca de Pelet
