Mary Beard on "The Odyssey", "Gladiator 2" and why popular culture is always in dialogue with the ancient world

Rachel and Simon speak with the author and academic Mary Beard. Mary is a professor emerita of classics at Cambridge University and the Classics editor of the Times Literary Supplement. She has written more than 20 books, including "Pompeii" (the winner of the Wolfson History Prize in 2008), "Confronting the Classics", "SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome" and "Women & Power: A Manifesto". Several of her titles have been bestsellers and her work has been published in more than 35 languages. Mary has also presented many television documentaries, such as "Meet the Romans with Mary Beard" and "Inside Culture". She is a fellow of the British Academy and in 2018 she received a damehood for "services to the study of classical civilisations". We spoke to Mary about her early interest in learning Latin and Greek; moving from an academic career to writing and broadcasting for a wider audience; and her new book, "Talking Classics".