Hay Festival 2023

Join our family group and experience what Theraplay is like! The session will be playful, physical and fun. Everyone joins in, so come prepared for activity. Theraplay is a way of playing with your child which builds and enhances attachment, self-esteem, trust in each other and joyful engagement. It’s based on the natural patterns of healthy interaction between parent and child. You can use the ideas in everyday parenting and in any setting where relationship connection is important, for example in schools, older adult care settings, or for family reconnection following life events.

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. Accompanying adults: please stay in attendance at all times, but you do not require a ticket.

Enjoy this half-hour open air performance between events. Formed from a group of community choirs spanning the Midlands, Got 2 Sing Choir perform contemporary, uplifting songs from top of the charts to golden oldies, with plenty of fun and laughter. The choir want to share their passion of singing with everyone – if you’re interested in joining, visit got2sing.co.uk.

A panel of world-class business leaders provide insight into how they’re putting sustainability at the core of all strategies, removing uncertainties driven by global challenges, and forming a foundation of security, growth and resilience. The experts will discuss the UK and EMEA findings from the United Nations Global Compact-Accenture CEO Study on Sustainability. Joining will be Anna Marrs, president of global commercial services at AMEX, and Jitesh Gadhia, chair of the British Asian Trust, a member of the House of Lords and former senior managing director at the Blackstone Group.

Rukmini Iyer’s Roasting Tin series has sold over 1.5 million copies globally in five years. She’s a recipe writer, food stylist and former lawyer who loves creating easy recipes and believes that making time to eat well – for yourself or for family dinners – is an integral part of the day. Her approach to cooking Indian food, shown in her new book India Express, is inspired by seeing the ease with which her mother switched between Indian meals to recipes from Delia, Linda McCartney, and Jamie – keeping traditional flavourings, but looking at ways to put easy week-night dinners on the table. As well as writing cookbooks, Iyer styles and writes recipes for the Guardian, BBC Good Food, Waitrose, and Fortnum & Mason.

There will be a BSL interpreter at this event

Dolan and Heisey delve into the complicated world of relationships – with yourself, friends and romantic partners – as they discuss their novels. Dolan’s The Happy Couple follows a cast of characters in the run-up to a wedding, as they all try and find their happily ever after. Heisey’s Really Good, Actually follows Maggie, getting divorced as she approaches her 30th birthday, and having to rediscover who she really is. Heisey, an author and TV writer, and Dolan, a novelist, discuss writing love and friendship with humour, relatability and vulnerability.

Dolan and Heisey talk to publisher, curator and writer Nia Thomas.

Dr Michael Mosley reveals his favourite dietary top tips from his hit podcast Just One Thing, with a special guest, the UK’s leading scientist researching how food can boost your health, Professor Tim Spector. If you were going to change what you eat in one way, what should you do to improve your health and your life?

Have some fun with Michael Rosen, former Children’s Laureate and much loved author and poet, creator of We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, A Great Big Cuddle and Michael Rosen’s Sad Book. Michael is a hugely popular performer – come along and join him for stories, poetry, humour and entertainment for all ages.

Open talking from gender equality activist and Everyday Sexism founder Laura Bates and author of I Heard What You Said Jeffrey Boakye, who has a particular interest in issues surrounding race, masculinity, education and popular culture. Together they’ll discuss important issues for young people today including consent, women online and toxic masculinity. Laura Bates is a Hay Festival 2023 Thinker in Residence, questioning norms, finding new perspectives and challenging us to action.

Come and join Rooted Forest School for outdoor family sessions inspired by the Forest School approach. We’ll use foraged materials to craft natural items that you can take away with you, taking part in some simple tool use and finishing off with a hot apple juice around the fire. These sessions are aimed at families and will run whatever the weather, so make sure you’re wrapped up for the conditions.

The anthologist Allie Esiri returns to Hay to celebrate Shakespeare for Every day of the Year, marking the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s First Folio, with an all-star cast including Helena Bonham Carter (Harry Potter, The Crown), Tom Goodman-Hill (The Imitation Game, Rebecca), Jessica Raine (Call the Midwife, The Devil's Hour), Tony Robinson (Blackadder, Tony Robinson’s History of Britain), Simon Schama (A History of Britain, Foreign Bodies), Jordan Stephens (Rogue One, Catastrophe), Samuel West (All Creatures Great and Small) and Olivia Williams (The Sixth Sense, The Crown).

Please note that the final line-up may be subject to change.

The consultation industry, argue authors Mariana Mazzucato and Rosie Collington, has made its way to the heart of our economies and governments, resulting in everything from getting in the way of our attempts to halt climate change to muddying political accountability. In The Big Con: How the Consulting Industry Weakens our Businesses, Infantilizes our Governments and Warps our Economies, they debunk the myth that consultancies always add value to the economy with original research and recommendations for how to make sure the role of consultants works for economies and governments that are fit for purpose.

The International Booker Prize is awarded annually for a single book and celebrates the vital work of translators, with the £50,000 prize money divided equally between author and translator. Winner, Georgi Gospodinov (Bulgarian) for the book Time Shelter and his translator Angela Rodel will be in conversation with Gaby Wood, Director of the Booker Prize Foundation, and judge Tan Twan Eng, the Booker-shortlisted Malaysian novelist.

Classicist and reformed stand-up comedian Natalie Haynes explores the wider resonance of a life from the ancient world: funny, irreverent, erudite and full of fire.

Alice Winn’s debut novel is the story of a forbidden romance set against the backdrop of the First World War. In Memoriam tells the tale of Henry Gaunt, infatuated with his best friend Sidney Ellwood but unaware that Ellwood feels the same. Trying to escape his feelings by enlisting in the British Army, Gaunt is soon joined by Ellwood, and the pair find solace in fleeting moments, knowing that death could come for them as it has their friends and fellow soldiers. Winn, who lives in Brooklyn and writes screenplays, is in conversation with Costa Novel Award-winner Claire Fuller.

Come and join Rooted Forest School for outdoor family sessions inspired by the Forest School approach. We’ll use foraged materials to craft natural items that you can take away with you, taking part in some simple tool use and finishing off with a hot apple juice around the fire. These sessions are aimed at families and will run whatever the weather, so make sure you’re wrapped up for the conditions.

Aged 43, now mayor of London Khan was unexpectedly diagnosed with adult-onset asthma, and so began his journey to becoming more educated about the dangers posed by air pollution and climate change. In Breathe: Tackling the Climate Emergency, he shares how he underwent a political transformation that would see him become one of the most prominent global politicians fighting elections on green issues, talks about some of the ways in which he believes the environmental discussion can be put back on track, and shares how anyone can win the argument on climate. Khan was first elected mayor in 2016, and re-elected in 2021. In conversation with science writer, broadcaster and author of Nomad Century, Gaia Vince.

The Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna and Hay Festival present the first of a series of debates about the future of Europe. Journalist and IWM Rector Misha Glenny discusses the rise of autocracy with: Zsuzsanna Szelényi, an Hungarian politician and foreign policy specialist, author of Tainted Democracy: Viktor Orbán and the Subversion of Hungary; Ece Temelkuran, Turkish novelist and political thinker; and Fintan O’Toole, Irish Times columnist and writer.