Bettany Hughes

Bettany Mary Hughes OBE (born May 1967 in Oxford, UK) is an English classicist, historian, author, and television broadcaster.

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Quotes

I for one (I am sure there are others) rail against the increasingly mediated world we live in, where experience comes packages and second-hand. But we must acknowledge that the majority of the global population will not have the opportunity to visit Trinity Hall, Cambridge to see a 15th-centry representation of Helen of Troy, or travel to Athens to visit the Kerameikos Museum, or cross the Isthmus Canal to appreciate Corinth's strategic importance. Nor will they have the time in their working day to sit in a quiet room and spend an uninterrupted morning reading and digesting an academic publication as academics can (sometimes).
- "Chapter One: Terrible, Wrong-Headed and Ineffectual: The Perils and Pleasures of Presenting Antiquity to a Television Audience". Classics for all: reworking antiquity in mass culture. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 2009. pp. 2–16edited by Dustan Lowe & Kim Shahabudin, quote on p. 16

[E]ven though, like it or not, women occupy fifty percent of the human story genetically — I as a historian — I noticed that we only occupy about naught point five percent of official, written record in human history. But, my God, we are there.
- Natalie Haynes & Bettany Hughes (May 12, 2021). "Reclaiming the Women of the Ancient World | 5x15". 5x15 Stories, YouTube. (quote at 3:19 of 1:00:33 in video)

As a society we can tolerate questions when things are going well, but when things are going badly we want answers.
- (November 24, 2021)"Socrates and his Athens". The Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation. (quote at 47:55 of 1:00:45 in video)

I was the first female historian to present a history series on TV in the UK in the year 2000. Extraordinary. I had no idea... I did the Huw Wheldon Memorial Lecture on BBC2 and said, "Can you find out who was the first?" They said, "It's you." Young girls write to me all the time to say they want to do things like me and it’s the best thing. It makes everything worthwhile. People ask, what's my proudest moment? That response is…
- (25 February 2023)"Interview. Bettany Hughes: 'I end up in tombs all the time, but I'm scared of the dark and claustrophobic'". The Guardian. (interview by Katherine Hassell)