Hay Festival Colombia Digital

Fighting Women is a compilation of interviews of Spanish women who took part in the civil war. Some took up arms and fought at the front, others participated in organizations such as POUM, Mujeres Libres or other anarchist groups. All of them fought against the nationalist forces and for women’s emancipation, and together they achieved social progress such as free, legal abortion. They started a revolution, and to do so they not only had to fight fascism, but sometimes also their own brothers-in-arms. The great impact of these testimonies invites us to reflect on a struggle that belongs to another time and yet is relevant today. Diego Rabasa (Mexico) talks to the film director Ken Loach (United Kingdom) and Isabella Lorusso (Italy), about this extraordinary message of rebellion and justice.

Why did humans live in stasis throughout most of their existence? What lit the touchpaper of the enormous transformation of our lifestyles just a few hundred years ago? And why has this progress resulted in a vast inequality gap in our world? Asking these questions, the economist and thinker Oded Galor (United States/Israel) reveals, in his influential book, The Journey of Humanity, the keys to understanding two of the great mysteries in the evolution of humanity: progress and inequality. Galor is a Professor at Brown University (United States) and has researched, in depth, processes of change and their impacts, linking them to the economy and social organization. In conversation with José Manuel Acevedo.

Simultaneous interpreting from English to Spanish available

Oded Galor will participate remotely

We humans like to believe that we act rationally, but the emotions are a much more important part of experience that most of us think. Richard Firth-Godbehere has put his thoughts on this matter into his book A Human History of Emotion, which analyses and studies the role of human emotions throughout history and in different cultures. In conversation with Daniel Pardo, the author will talk about how the emotions, in all their complexity and diversity, have modelled the world that we live in over the course of history. This fascinating work of non-fiction weaves together psychology, neuroscience, art, philosophy and religion.

Simultaneous interpreting from English to Spanish available

In the shadows behind official versions of Spanish history, are countless sensational episodes, replete with carnal passions, that altered the course of events or changed them completely without ever being officially documented. In her latest book, Lo que la primavera hace con los cerezos, journalist and writer Marta Robles has travelled through the history of this country in search of all the amorous and sexual adventures that marked power relationships and secret decisions that influenced the course of events.

She talks about the intricacies of love and power with Juan José Güemes, former Minister for Employment and Health of the Madrid Region, who has chaired IE Business School's Centre for Entrepreneurship and Innovation since 2010.

Event in Spanish

On the 25th of July this year, the city of Santiago de Queretaro will celebrate its 490th anniversary: almost five centuries of history involving indigenous peoples, colonialism, the city’s crucial role in Mexican independence, and contemporary culture. For these reasons, Queretaro has been a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1995. However, there are a series of myths and legends regarding the prehispanic origins of the city, who were its first peoples who came in contact with the Spaniards and how its founding took place. Fiorella Fenoglio, a research archaeologist at the INAH Queretaro Centre, a heritage expert and a tireless promoter of cultural patrimony, will present a lecture on Queretaro’s material culture, in this very special year.

Event for university students

Two giants of historical fiction discuss their stories, and how and why they tell them. Follett’s latest novel The Armour of Light is set in his fictional Kingsbridge in 1792, with revolution in the air. As industrial change sweeps the land and a tyrannical government is determined to make England a mighty commercial empire, a small group of spinners and weavers fight for a future free from oppression. Mosse’s The Ghost Ship is an epic story of concealed identity, piracy and revenge, ranging from Paris to Amsterdam and the Canary Islands in the early 1600s. The Ghost Ship hunts pirates to liberate those enslaved during the course of their merciless raids – but now it is under attack.

The acclaimed Colombian writer Juan Gabriel Vásquez, whose stories and novels have been translated into 30 languages, has won numerous awards, including the 2011 Alfaguara Novel Prize, the IMPAC Prize for The Sound of Things Falling and the 6th Biblioteca de Narrativa Colombiana Prize for the short story collection Songs for the Flames. His most recent novel, Volver la vista atrás, is based on the life of the famous Colombian film director, Sergio Cabrera. This portrait of a half century that changed the world is a fascinating social investigation, one that is intimate and political at the same time. Vásquez presents his book together with Cabrera, in conversation with Yael Weiss.

Some structures transcend time and borders, and have an enormous effect on the future of their surroundings. So it is with the Segovia Aqueduct, a magnificent example of the grandeur and vision of the Roman Empire in the lands it conquered. Dominica Contreras from the San Quirce de Segovia Royal Academy of History and Art, and leading expert in the dating of Segovia’s Aqueduct, is the author of the book El misterio del Acueducto de Segovia: vicisitudes y datación. She will explore this theme with the Professor of Archaeology at Madrid’s Autonóma University, Joaquín Barrio. Originally from Segovia, Barrio is a specialist in archaeological heritage conservation and restoration.

There will be a book signing after the event in the room next to the main entrance of IE University.

Event in Spanish

They walk among us. And they are part of our everyday lives. The gods of Mount Olympus and the heroes of classical antiquity are the protagonists of a fascinating series of myths that underpin what we call Western culture. And they never cease to amaze us. Modernising these myths and making them accessible to all is the aim of Pequeña historia de la mitología clásica by Emilio del Río, with illustrations by Julius. Del Río will talk about modernity and the relevance of myths in our lives with writer and journalist Carlos Aganzo.

Del Río is an academic, writer, communicator, and professor of Latin Language and Linguistics at Madrid’s Complutense University. His feature on RNE, Verba volant, has become a real radio success, after the success of books such as Latin lovers, Calamares a la romana or Locos por los clásicos. Aganzo is the author of some twenty books of poetry and as many travel books. Former director of Diario de Ávila and El Norte de Castilla, he is currently director of the Vocento Foundation.

Event in Spanish

Historian, television presenter, fiction writer and essayist, Simon Sebag Montefiore was present for the last days of the Soviet Union and travelled around the region during the 1990s. He has written on Russia for The Sunday Times, The New York Times and The Spectator, among other magazines and newspapers. A number of his book, including Stalin>: The Court of the Red Tsar, Titans of History and Jerusalem: The Biography have been translated into Spanish. The last book published in Spain by this writer, a descendent of a distinguished family of Sephardic Jews that had branches all over Europe, has been Written in History, a compilation of important letters written about politics, culture and art by great figures who have influenced our past.

Sebag Montefiore will talk to the British journalist Martin Ivens, Editor of The Times Literary Supplement.

Once the event has finished, the author will sign books in the booth outside IE University.

With simultaneous translation from English into Spanish

David J. Remnick is an American journalist, writer, and editor, Pulitzer Prize winner for his book Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire, and author of Resurrection and King of the World: Muhammad Ali and the Rise of an American Hero. He talks to journalist Kristina Berdinskykh about geopolitics and US elections.

David Remnick will join the event digitally

Russia is the latest work by the British historian and novelist, Antony Beevor. This World War II specialist returns to non-fiction, and to an area he knows well: Russia after the tsars. The struggle that took place between 1917 and 1921 between an alliance of moderate socialists and reactionary monarchists, and Trotsky’s Red Army, as well as Lenin’s subsequent dictatorship, are the themes of this work, which draws on the latest scholarship in the field. The book depicts this period and its conflicts as a world war by proxy, through the eyes of different figures, including a worker in the streets of Petrograd, a cavalry officer, and a woman doctor in a makeshift hospital. This multi-award winning author, translated into over thirty languages (published in Spanish by Crítica), will talk to one of our most prestigious writers, the academic Antonio Muñoz Molina, the author of titles such as El jinete polaco and Volver a dónde.

The event will be presented by Carmen Esteban, CEO of Crítica publishing house.

Once the event has finished, the authors will sign books in the booth outside IE University.

With simultaneous translation from English into Spanish and vice versa

The work of Myroslav Shkandrij, professor emeritus at the Department of German and Slavic Studies, University of Manitoba, and author of Revolutionary Ukraine, 1917-2017: Flashpoints in History and Contemporary Memory Wars, prompted Ukrainians to reflect on serfdom as a form of slavery that existed in Ukrainian territory. Terrell Jermaine Starr is an American journalist and activist who writes about Ukraine, foreign policy and race. Chaired by Bohdana Romantsova, editor at Tempora Publishing House.

What causes empires to fall, can they fall without casualties, and which are the modern empires? Natalia Kryvda is a philosopher and a director of Academic Programmes at Edinburgh Business School Eastern Europe; James Alan Robinson is a British economist and political scientist, Vakhtang Kebuladze is a philosopher, writer and translator; Oleksandr Komarov is a philosopher currently working on the frontline giving psychological support to Ukrainian service men and women; Adrian Karatnycky is author of Battleground Ukraine: From Independence to the War with Russia. Chaired by British investigative journalist Oliver Bullough.

Oliver Bullough, Adrian Karatnycky and James Alan Robinson will join the event digitally.

What path should be chosen by one group that has long been subordinated to another, stronger one? Is the cancel culture the only way to break free from the domination of the aggressor?. And what if this aggressor is an empire?

A discussion on how we make sense of the post-imperial heritage, and whether it is necessary to renounce it, with the Dutch writer Simone Atangana Bekono, Indian literary critic and feminist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak; Brazilian feminist philosopher and journalist Djamila Ribeiro; Nigerian writer and activist Lola Shoneyin; and Ukrainian philosopher and writer Oksana Zabuzhko. Chaired by philosopher Vakhtanh Kebuladze.

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Djamila Ribeiro, Simone Atangana Bekono and Lola Shoneyin will join the event digitally.

Philippe Sands (United Kingdom) is a well-known human rights lawyer and author of acclaimed works such as East West Street and The Ratline, and at this event he will talk to Felipe Gálvez about his most recent book, The Last Colony. Sands tells the painful story of the forced displacement of Liseby Elysé and other inhabitants of the Chagos archipelago in 1973, due to the strategic interests of the Cold War. Displaced to Mauritius in order to make room for a US military base, this book condemns British colonial injustice and its effects. With a story that includes history, essay and personal drama, Sands reveals the human tragedies behind the great historical events, underlining the need for justice and reparation, exploring the recent history of Chile and taking as a point of departure the lives and works of iconic figures such as Bruce Chatwin, Roberto Bolaño and the dictator Augusto Pinochet.

Simultaneous translation from English to Spanish available

Historical archives are sources of an incalculable value for understanding the past, present and future of nations. Natalia Sobrevilla is a historian, researcher and lecturer in the History of Latin America at the University of Kent (United Kingdom), and is also the author of Independence and Nation Building in Latin America. In the context of the crisis affecting the National General Archive, we want to highlight the importance of protecting this legacy, which belongs to all citizens. In her contemporary classic, Papyrus: The Invention of Books in the Ancient World, Irene Vallejo explores the development of the book and libraries in the ancient world, and how they became effective ways for transmitting and preserving ideas, while also pointing out that “a dislike of books is a tradition with strong roots in our history”. In conversation with the Head of the Riva-Agüero Institute’s Historical Archive, Magally Alegre Henderson.

Four experts on the classical world will talk to Toni Celia about the lessons we can take from that period, so far off in time, but so influential for Western culture, and whose echoes can still be heard in our legal systems, the philosophical tradition, and in the sciences and arts. Charlotte Higgins (United Kingdom), Chief Culture Writer at The Guardian, is the author of Greek Myths. A New Retelling, about the influence of ancient Greece on our times; Pablo Montoya (Colombia) is the author of Marco Aurelio y los límites del imperio which portrays the last of the five “good emperors” of Rome; and with John Sellars (United Kingdom), philosopher and the author of books such as Lessons in Stoicism, Epicurus and the Art of Happiness and now Aristotle: Understanding the World’s Greatest Philosopher.

John Sellars will participate in this event digitally

Simultaneous interpretation from English to Spanish available

Nikole Hannah-Jones (United States) is a journalist who specialises in racial justice, and who received the Pulitzer Prize for the 1619 Project, a collaborative effort that has also published a book and made a documentary film exploring the history of slavery in the United States. She will speak to Colombian academic Aurora Vergara about the 1619 Project and the new movements for historical reparation which are arising all over the Americas, working to recover the silenced histories of racialized groups who have been left out of official history.

Simultaneous interpretation from English to Spanish