Bee Rowlatt, one of the main presenters of the BBC docuseries Austen: Rise of a Genius, talks to Kate Slotover, about women’s voices in literature, class and society, and their meaning for readers today from middle England to the Middle East.       

Bee, now based at the British Library, is a writer and a passionate advocate of women’s writing. She was awarded an MBE for services to women's rights in 2025.  Her books include the best-selling Talking About Jane Austen in Baghdad dramatised by the BBC, and In Search of Mary inspired by Mary Wollstonecraft.  She also runs the human rights charity, the Wollstonecraft Society.  Bee will be signing copies of her debut novel, One Woman Crime Wave, a darkly comic thriller, after the talk.   Kate Slotover is presenter of the Book Club Review podcast.

 Interviewer: What Austen character or novel do you most identify with?

Bee Rowlatt: I will forever be in love with the explosive scene where Lizzie Bennet stands up to the bullying Lady Catherine, insisting that "we are equal." It's so intense that I can't read it sitting down.