Based on the highly acclaimed podcast with over 1 million subscribers, this presentation brilliantly explores how a range of ancient societies rose to power and sophistication, and how they tipped over into collapse. Across the centuries, we journey from the great empires of Mesopotamia to those of Khmer and Vijayanagara in Asia and Songhai in West Africa; from Byzantium to the Maya, Inca and Aztec empires of the Americas; from Roman Britain to Rapa Nui. With meticulous research, breathtaking insight and dazzling, empathic storytelling, historian and novelist Paul Cooper evokes the majesty and jeopardy of these civilizations and asks what it might have felt like for a person alive at the time as they witnessed the end of their world. Paul Cooper has worked as an archivist, editor and journalist, and has a PhD in the cultural and literary significance of ruins. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, The BBC, The Atlantic, National Geographic, New Scientist and Discover Magazine. His first novel, River of Ink, was published in January 2016, and his second novel, All Our Broken Idols was released in May 2020. He writes, produces and hosts the Fall of Civilizations podcast, which has charted in the top ten British podcasts, and gained upwards of 100 million listens since it launched in 2019. A Q&A Session will follow.