Christina Hardyment, a well-established Oxford author, will be giving an illustrated talk about her new book, The Serpent of Division, a historical novel about Alyce Chaucer, whose magnificent tomb in Ewelme Church attracts many visitors. All her three husbands met violent ends but tantalisingly little is known about Alyce herself, although there is evidence that she was an independently minded woman with decided opinions. Set in the 1460s, the politically rocky final years of the Wars of the Roses, The Serpent of Division features murder and mystery, Oxford’s colleges and libraries, a charming pirate, a bumptious London bookseller reminiscent of the Wife of Bath and a Persian physician with a fondness for Rumi. Christina will describe the creation of the story, based on what we do know about Alyce’s life and times as well as a little conjecture to recreate missing elements.
