The author of the phenomenally successful Young Bond series talks about his writing and the fifth instalment in his bestselling zombie adventure series, The Fallen. A writer, actor and comedian, Charlie studied gothic literature at university and is a huge fan of horror.
12+ years (YA)

Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) is famous as  “The first programmer” for her prescient writings about Charles Babbage’s unbuilt mechanical computer, the Analytical Engine. Biographers have focused on her tragically short life and her supposed poetic approach – in this talk we unpick the myths and look at her scientific education, what she really did, and why it is important, placing her in the rich context of nineteenth century science, and the contemporary misremembering of  female scientists.

Ursula Martin CBE is a Professor in Mathematics and Computer Science in the University of Oxford, and leads Oxford’s project to digitize Lovelace’s mathematics.

Rosanna Davison talks about how she came to study nutrition. She gives us the skinny on her own diet and lifestyle, and shares her top tips from her new book Eat Yourself Beautiful on cutting out sugar and including more fruit and vegetables in your diet.

Photo by Miki Barlok

Using archaeological and DNA evidence Cunliffe tells the story of the origins of the British and the Irish peoples, from the retreat of the last Ice Age around 10,000bc to the eve of the Norman Conquest.

Rob Penn cut down an ash tree to see how many things could be made from it. Journeying from Wales and Ireland across Europe to the US, he finds that the ancient skills and knowledge of the properties of ash, developed over millennia making wheels and arrows, furniture and baseball bats, are far from dead. He chronicles how the urge to appreciate trees still runs through us like grain through wood.

Digital disruption and innovation are like any tools: capable of being used and abused. How are these technologies already influencing our attitudes, beliefs and behaviours and how do we ensure that these tools bring real and lasting benefits to society? Rahaf Harfoush is a digital anthropologist and best-selling author of The Decoded Company, and Yes We Did: An Insider’s Look at How Social Media Built the Obama Brand. Rahaf is the founder of Red Thread, a think-tank specialising in digital culture. She is currently working on her third book called Hustle and Float about  the intersections of technology, contemporary work culture and a post-work society. Formerly, Rahaf was the Associate Director of the Technology Pioneer Programme at the World Economic Forum, and the Research Coordinator on Don Tapscott’s Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. She was recognised by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Shaper, and by the Women’s Forum for the Economy and Society as a Rising Talent for her thought-leadership in the fields of digital culture and technology.

O’Toole examines how trivial journalistic lies became far-from-trivial national obsessions; how the pose of indifference to truth and historical fact has come to define the style of an entire political elite; how a country that once had colonies is redefining itself as an oppressed nation requiring liberation; the strange gastronomic and political significance of prawn-flavoured crisps; the dreams of revolutionary deregulation and privatisation that drive Arron Banks, Nigel Farage and Jacob Rees-Mogg; and the silent rise of English nationalism, the force that dare not speak its name. O’Toole is an investigative journalist, historian, biographer, literary critic and political commentator. His acclaimed columns on Brexit for the Irish Times, the Guardian and the New York Review of Books have been awarded both the Orwell Prize and the European Press Prize. Chaired by Sarfraz Manzoor.

The novelist discusses contemporary American culture, so presciently imagined in his latest novel The Golden House, freedom of speech, language, literature, love and death. Few writers have such a keen sense of human absurdity, and such a spectacular gift for telling its stories.

Welsh introduces his elegant, electrifying novel, which marks the return of one of modern fiction’s most infamous, terrifying characters, the incendiary Francis Begbie from Trainspotting. Welsh talks about gangland violence, drug culture and the vitality of language with the Man Booker prize-winning author of A Brief History of Seven Killings.

From the NHS to corporate tax evasion, from climate change to immigration, Honourable Friends? tells the story of five years in Westminster and offers bold and practical suggestions for a fairer British political system. Caroline Lucas is MP for Brighton Pavilion. She was the leader of the Green Party from 2008 to 2012 and was voted MP of the Year in 2014. Caroline talks to Hay on Earth Director Andy Fryers.

Timchenko is the executive editor of the independent news platform Meduza. Zygar is the editor-in-chief of TV RAIN, Russia’s only independent television channel. Bullough is author of The Last Man in Russia and Let Our Fame Be Great and has reported over the last two years from the Ukraine. Vasiliyeva writes about press freedom and politics for Associated Press in Moscow.