Hay Festival Digital 2020

National trinket Julian Clary is saddled up to welcome you to his new show on a Wild West theme. “It was only a matter of time before I eased myself into some chaps,” he says. He is sure the men in the audience will be eager to join his posse and the lucky few will play with him on stage in the Hang 'em Low saloon, where Wild Bill Hickok used to meet Raving Clarence la Fruit. But life in the Old West was tough. Not all of Julian’s wild bunch will be around to witness the final shoot-out that will result in Julian giving himself selflessly at high noon to the last man standing.

Performing tracks spanning his entire solo career, the new show from Jools Holland features the outstanding vocals of Ruby Turner and Louise Marshall, as well as the highly talented Sumudu Jayatilaka. Together with his Rhythm & Blues Orchestra, with original Squeeze member Gilson Lavis on drums, the composer, pianist, bandleader and broadcaster presents the greatest boogie-woogie party in town.

From the former Conservative Cabinet minister and co-presenter of 2022's hit podcast The Rest is Politics, a searing insider's account of ten extraordinary years in Parliament. From 2010-2019, Rory Stewart went from being a political outsider to standing for prime minister – before resigning from a Conservative Party he barely recognised. Tackling ministerial briefs on flood response and prison violence, engaging with conflict and poverty abroad as a foreign minister, and Brexit as a Cabinet minister, Stewart learned first-hand how profoundly hollow and inadequate our democracy and government had become, with cronyism, ignorance and sheer incompetence running rampant.

Ten years after it exploded onto the literary scene, this new edition explores the ongoing cultural and historical fascination with Bob Marley. In Jamaica, 1976, seven gunmen storm his house, machine guns blazing. The superstar survives but the gunmen are never caught. Marlon James' novel reimagines an event that has become a modern myth, as he chronicles the lives of slum kids, one-night stands, drug lords, girlfriends, gunmen, journalists and even the CIA. A Brief History of Seven Killings won the 2015 Man Booker Prize. His other publications include The Book of Night Women and John Crow’s Devil.

The Nobel Prize-winning biologist and former president of the Royal Society explores the science of why and how we age and die. The knowledge of death is so terrifying that we live most of our lives in denial of it, and our fear has underpinned our religions, inspired our cultures, and driven our science. Today giant strides are being made in our understanding of death, and immortality might even be within our grasp. But what are the social and ethical costs of attempting to live for ever? In conversation with the Radio 4 broadcaster and president of the British Humanist Association.

The botanist draws on her expertise and experience as an indigenous woman to show how other living beings offer us gifts and lessons, even if we’ve forgotten how to hear their voices. Her subjects range from the Native American legend of the Skywoman to the language of wild strawberries and squash, asters and goldenrod, algae and sweetgrass. This collection of essays weaves together traditional ecological knowledge and scientific knowledge to examine the relationship people have, and can have, with the living environment. Kimmerer lives in New York where she is founder and director of the Centre for Native Peoples and the Environment.

Kimmerer talks to farmer and author James Rebanks.

Why might an orangutan care which toothpaste you choose? What does your mobile phone have to do with wind turbines? And can your morning coffee really power a bus? Economics affects every aspect of our lives and there are huge changes afoot as the global green revolution speeds up. Dharshini David, Chief Economics Correspondent for BBC News, reveals the green changes already taking place in every aspect of our world, from sustainable materials and corporate greenwashing to industrialisation and global trade wars. David explores the industries of energy, food, fashion, technology, manufacturing and finance, showing how the smallest details in our day can tell a bigger economic story.

The British Museum houses more than 60,000 objects from the Americas but only a small percentage have ever been exhibited to the public. To analyse this extensive collection, Hay Festival and the Santo Domingo Centre of Excellence for Latin American Research at the British Museum commissioned six writers, including Juan Gabriel Vásquez (Colombia), Philippe Sands (UK) and Selva Almada (Argentina), with a specialist Museum team to research the documents narrating how certain objects arrived at the institution. These ranged from diaries, letters and sketches to reflections and transactions, with fascinating results.

Daniel Clement has suffered a secret humiliation and to recover, takes respite at the monastery where he was a novice. But there are tensions building there, too, as the dark past of novice master Father Paul emerges, and a murder ensues. Meanwhile back at the village of Champton, Daniel is the subject of gossip, his mother Audrey is up to something again, there's trouble at the dress shop, and the puppies are running riot. This is the third book in the Canon Clement Mystery series from the Anglican priest who co-presented Saturday Live on BBC Radio 4 for 11 years and has won Celebrity Mastermind twice.