Lewis Dartnell

Being Human is history made flesh. It will change the way you see the world.

We are a wonder of evolution. Powerful yet dextrous, instinctive yet thoughtful, our exceptional abilities have created life as we know it. But we're also deeply flawed. Our bodies break and fail, diseases thwart our boldest plans, and our psychological biases have triggered terrible decisions.

This extraordinary contradiction between our faculties and frailties is the essence of what it means to be human. And history has played out in the balance between them. Lewis Dartnell tells our story through the lens of this uniquely fragile nature for the first time. He explores how our biology has shaped our relationships, societies, economies and wars, and how it continues to challenge and define our progress.

Lewis Dartnell is the author of the bestselling books The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch and Origins: How the Earth Shaped Human History, which has been translated into 26 languages. He writes for the Guardian, The Times and New Scientist. Copies of The Knowledge exist on the surface of the Moon, and in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. He is an astrobiology researcher and professor at the University of Westminster, and an Honorary Research Associate at University College London (UCL).

Please note that this event will take place upstairs in the bookshop.