Meet the writers, poets and artistes at the upcoming Fairway Galle Lit Fest

 Get to know the writers, poets and artistes who will be here in Januarywith the announcement of the authors who will be at the Fairway Galle Literary Festival 2016. 

Over the course of the next seven weeks we will introduce you to the visiting authors through our column. Keep reading and you will also stand to win two full festival passes in our draw.

Today we feature Tom Holland.

Tom Holland is an award winning historian and the author of Rubicon: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic (winner of the Hessell-Tiltman Prize for History) and Persian Fire, a history of the Graeco-Persian wars (winner of the Runciman Award in 2006).

As the presenter of BBC Radio 4’s Making History he has explored interests as diverse as Roman beards, Catholic martyrs, and the role Pluto, Bambi and Dumbo played in the allied invasion of France in 1944.

Holland is also known for his writings on contemporary politics and Islam. He argued in an extremely controversial piece for the New Statesman in March this year that the ‘religious roots’ of the Islamic State could not be ignored, saying in interviews: “We should not ignore the influence of Islamic scripture on aspects of Islamic behaviour we find reprehensible.”

His other writings include Millennium: The End of the World and the Forging of Christendom, which was published in the autumn of 2008. In the Shadow of the Sword, which covers the collapse of Roman and Persian power in the Near East, he also writes about the emergence of Islam. Dynasty, about the first Caesars, was published in 2015.

He has adapted Homer, Herodotus, Thucydides and Virgil for the BBC.