Hay Festival 2022

Come to Andrew and Rachel Giles’ farm with local vet Barney Sampson to see how their herd of dairy cows produces most of their milk from grass.  Visitors can enter the milking parlour and help to milk the cows and see the calves. Find out how their four stomachs enable them to digest grass. Samples of dairy products will be provided for tasting and a local cheese maker will explain the art and science beneath the rind.

With thanks to Andrew and Rachel Giles

A little light ridicule, mockery and fun to start the day as the satirists read the tabloids and surf the social media storms for an irreverent look at what’s tickling the nation’s fancy – and driving it to splenetic fury – today. The team are joined by TikTok comedians the Sugarcoated Sisters (Chloe Tingey and Tabby Tingey, Best Newcomer Musical Comedy Awards 2022) -- real-life siblings with over 400,000 followers online, who cover topics such as living with bipolar and diabetes, partygate, feminism and dating in their musical comedy sketches.

Sophie Hannah is author of the Poirot continuation mysteries: The Couple at the Table has everything you want in a mystery – a cryptic threat, a murder, a closed circle of suspects and an unguessable solution. SJ Parris (aka Stephanie Merritt)’s Storm is set in a beautiful French château, where long-buried secrets begin to unravel at a party… and no one is safe. Sarah Vaughan’s Reputation is a timely, thought-provoking novel about women, perception and power. The three masters of the art of crime fiction present their new thrillers.

Zillah has left behind the shadowy slums of St Giles to become the star of Stratton’s Variety Show, cast as ‘The Great Amazonia’. When a new act is introduced – a black woman with vitiligo exhibited as the ‘The Leopard Lady’ – Zillah is forced to confront the dark side of her profession. Featuring a defiant heroine and a theatrical world of fragile dreams and ruthless ambition, Dillsworth’s book shines a light on the experience of being Black and British in Victorian London through one woman’s journey to live her life on her own terms. She talks to author of The Foundling Stacey Halls.

Join the author of Walking the Old Ways of East Breconshire and the Black Mountains and two guides from Brecon Beacons National Park on a gentle walk through the beautiful surrounds of Hay-on-Wye.

Discover the joy of dancing and the importance of family, whatever your culture, ability or style with Luna, brought to life by author Joseph Coelho and illustrator Fiona Lumbers. When Luna dances, she feels like the world’s volume turns up, like all colours brighten, like sunlight sparkles behind every cloud. But when she takes her dance exam she ducks, dives, spins and... falls. Luna thinks she can’t be a real dancer now. Can Luna’s family convince her otherwise?

Join Fiona Danks and Jo Schofield, authors of The Stick Book and many other outdoor adventure favourites, for a fun interactive workshop. Try some wild activities taken from their new book to make a creative scrapbook. Cut things out, doodle, stick in natural materials. How wild can you make yours?

How best can we support children and young people with their mental health and wellbeing? Join the Strong Young Minds champions and wellbeing ambassadors for a panel discussion about ways we can provide support to our young people.

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative: your imagination is the limit.

Book for the session and you can drop in at any point during the 2.5 hour duration. An accompanying adult must attend at all times but does not require a ticket.

The actor seemed to be managing old age. She had weathered widowhood, she had energy, friends, a devoted family, a lovely home. So why, at 89, did she suddenly feel furious? Shocking diagnoses, Brexit and bereavement knocked her from every quarter. And that was before lockdown. Home alone, classified as ‘extremely vulnerable’, she finds herself yelling at the TV. But she can at least take a long look at life – her work and family, her beliefs and her future. She reflects on her life as a daughter, a sister, a mother, an actor, a friend, and looks at a world so different from that of her wartime childhood. Despite age, despite rage, she finds there are always reasons for joy.

Over the past two years, our need for nature has become clearer than ever. But we’ve learned how unequal access to it is. Key spokespeople behind the Nature is a Human Right campaign share facts and stats, discuss the socio-political influences excluding millions from green spaces, and put forward ideas for what we can do about it.

Nick Hayes is co-founder of the Right to Roam campaign and author of The Book of Trespass; Ellen Miles is founder of the Nature is a Human Right campaign and a guerrilla gardener; Louisa Adjoa Parker writes on rural racism; and Daniel Raven-Ellison founded the National Park City initiative.

In 2022, S4C – the Welsh language television channel – is 40. A discussion on the past, present and future of the channel, from the dramatic campaigns that led to its establishment to its present-day form as a multiplatform broadcaster with an international reach. In the company of S4C Chief Executive Siân Doyle, prominent figures from the worlds of broadcasting and politics trace the challenges and successes of four decades, while interrogating the role and function of a minority language broadcaster in a globalised world. Cenwyn Edwards is Former Head of Factual Programmes at HTV and Former Head of Factual and Co-Productions at S4C; Siân Gwenllian AS/MS is a Member of the Senedd and Journalist; Angharad Mair is Chair of Tinopolis Cymru. ​Chaired by Sioned Wiliam, Comedy Commissioner for Radio 4 (2015 - 2022).

Actor and award-winning writer Manjeet grew up in a house where there were no books. She was put on the ‘slow readers’ table in junior school and in secondary school was told ‘not to get her hopes up’ for her English GCSE. In this interactive workshop, Manjeet uses her own story to help liberate you from your fears around writing and open up a space for creativity, while supporting you to find your unique storytelling voice.

Award-winning poet Alex Wharton leads an event full of rhythm, rhyme and free verse as he reads from his poetry collection Daydreams and Jellybeans. Escape into beautiful daydreams but watch out for any hairy jellybeans... or mischievous hedgehogs. Follow Alex’s hints and tips to make poetry of your own.

Come and join the CLD Trust and Strong Young Minds champions and wellbeing ambassadors to hear how everyone can improve their mental health and emotional wellbeing.

Roula Khalaf is editor of the Financial Times. She was previously deputy editor from 2016 to 2020, overseeing a range of newsroom initiatives and award-winning editorial projects and leading a global network of more than 100 foreign correspondents. She gives this year's lecture honouring the great contrarian​focusing on how to restore trust in journalism followed by a Q&A session chaired by Alan Rusbridger, Editor of Prospect magazine.

Adam Gabriel has always been a child of nature. Raised on his parents’ remote Yorkshire farm, where life is measured by the rhythms of the seasons, and the yearly arrival of an itinerant local monk, he seems destined for a quietly contented life. When tragedy turns the family’s life upside down, Adam faces a stark choice. When he needs it most, can he find the strength to save the people he loves? The author is known to millions as presenter of Love Your Garden, Ground Force, and ITV’s Spring Into Summer. He has written more than 40 gardening books, 11 novels and three volumes of memoirs. He talks to journalist and editor Alex Clark.

Dylan Huw works bilingually across criticism, fiction and collaborative projects, and is one of the Arts Council of Wales' Future Wales Fellows. Crystal Jeans, short story writer and novelist, won the Wales Book of the Year for her novel Light Switches Are My Kryptonite. David Llewellyn, novelist and scriptwriter, was shortlisted for the Polari Prize with A Simple Scale. Kirsti Bohata, Professor of English Literature and the Co-Director of the Centre for Research into the English Language and Literature at Swansea University, maps the importance of the short story form in the development and portrayal of queer culture to mark the publication of a groundbreaking anthology of queer writing from Wales.

In the third of four BBC Radio 3 lunchtime recitals broadcast at Hay Festival this week, presented by BBC Radio 3 presenter Sarah Walker, the Mithras Piano Trio play Dvořák's Piano Trio No 3 in F minor, Op 65 and Shulamit Ran's Soliloquy.

Authors and award-winning young climate activists Amy and Ella Meek discuss their latest book Be Climate Clever. These two passionate changemakers answer all your burning questions about climate change. This is a ‘don’t miss’ event for all children interested in the environment.