Hay Festival 2024

Graham Webb helps run 4Wood TV & Film Constructions who build sets for some of the best-known TV shows. Graham shares the details of how set building, including constructing the new Tardis for Doctor Who, helps tell stories.

There’s a place where all the strangest stories began… Prepare to be swept away to a land beyond your wildest imagination by master storyteller Katherine Rundell (The Explorer) as she unveils her epic new fantasy series Impossible Creatures.

Follow Christopher, Mal and a baby griffin on their urgent quest across the wild splendour of the Archipelago, a secret place in our world where all the creatures of myth still live and thrive. Discover dragons small enough to perch on your thumb, winged horses, gold-horned hares that salute the brave, and chaotic green talking squirrels. Imagine pitting your wits against sphinxes, swooping out over the sea in a flying coat – and uncover the secret at the heart of the islands that threatens the creatures’ survival, and the world itself.

In a world filled with vibrant colours, a young child feels a different shade – grey. Despite the joyous orange balloon, the huge yellow sun and the bright green trees, the child still feels grey. But when a reassuring hand reaches out and shares words of kindness, the child begins to see the warmth of colour again, and knows that they will always be loved, whether they feel grey or sunshine yellow. Delve into a heart-warming and powerful story of emotions with these two cherished creators.

Discover how to make amazing art with materials found in nature, in this inspiring session with experienced artist and educator Pippa Pixley. Pippa’s creative and exciting workshop draws on her wonderful new book Make Art With Nature. You’ll learn to sketch woodland creatures using burnt wood, twigs and coloured rocks and stones, and come away with a fresh enthusiasm for nature craft.

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

Humankind may be rapidly approaching the commercial exploitation and perhaps colonisation of the moon and Mars. Does history give us confidence that it will be peaceful and constructive, instead of a further reason for conflict, trouble and wars? Given the precedents – humanity’s ‘common inheritance’ of such places as the Antarctic and the world’s oceans – we must ask: how well have we succeeded in avoiding international competition and conflicts? How well do international agreements work? The philosopher and Principal of Northeastern University, London, asks what should be done to avoid competition in space becoming conflict on Earth?

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.

This fermentation-filled tasting session explores fermentation in different cultures and how to get started on your fermenting journey. Fermentation may be all the rage today, but fermented food has been an essential feature of diets around the world for millennia. Pao-Yu Liu grew up in Taipei City, Taiwan and moved to the UK at 21. A self-taught fermenter, she started practising these ancient techniques when diagnosed with diabetes at 37. She founded Pao Pop ‘N’ Pickles in 2017 to produce unpasteurised, lacto-fermented pickles and sauces in London. Author and fermentation producer James Read explains how to get started in his book Of Cabbages and Kimchi: A Practical Guide to the World of Fermented Food. Polly Russell is a food historian and curator at the British Library.

Television writer, producer and director, Rem Conway, has worked on Sex Education, Riches and Father Ted amongst many more. He now leads on development for Kudos Knight with celebrated writer Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders, This Town). Join Rem as he shares what he looks for in writers and writing, as he seeks projects for the screen.

Find out everything you ever wanted to know about life on a farm with the Countryfile farmer. How do you know when your animals are happy or sad? How does milk get from a cow to my cereal bowl? Can children drive tractors too? From noisy machines to hungry cows, blooming flowers and crowing cockerels, the farm is a very busy place – and there’s so much to discover. From the fascinating to the funny, the author of A Year on Adam’s Farm has all the answers. Adam runs Cotswold Farm Park in Gloucestershire, which pioneers rare breed conservation.

Please bring your own notebook and pen or pencil to this event.

This lively poetry performance introduces you to dragons, large and small, high and low, and invites you to join them as they take flight! And I Hear Dragons, edited by Wales Poet Laureate Hanan Issa, is a joyous collection of children’s poetry from across Wales, with poems from Alex Wharton, Nia Morais and Casi Wyn, among others. Come and celebrate the diversity and energy of poetry from Wales for children and young people.

Discover how to make amazing art with materials found in nature, in this inspiring session with experienced artist and educator Pippa Pixley. Pippa’s creative and exciting workshop draws on her wonderful new book Make Art With Nature. You’ll learn to sketch woodland creatures using burnt wood, twigs and coloured rocks and stones, and come away with a fresh enthusiasm for nature craft.

Enjoy a half-hour open air performance by the Decis - an a cappella women’s group from Hay and surrounding villages. Singing together since 2014, the Decis perform a variety of songs including blues, folk, early music, and anything else they fancy.

Military historian Max Hastings (Operation Pedestal, Abyss) tells an almost-forgotten story with his signature blend of top-down and bottom-up action detail. Operation Biting was a daring assault on the coast of Nazi-occupied Europe to capture key components of a newly-identified radar network. Amid heavy snow 120 men landed, some of whom were mis-dropped almost two miles from their objective. They nonetheless launched the assault, dismantled the German radar, and after three nail-biting hours in France and a fierce battle with Wehrmacht defenders, escaped in the nick of time. Meet the fascinating personalities and hear the wealth of previously unchronicled detail in this almost literally cliffhanging tale.

Ever wonder how award-winning books make their way from the author’s mind into your hands? In this new salon series, the British Book Awards (aka the Nibbies) bring you shortlisted authors from the 2024 awards in conversation with members of their publishing teams, shedding a light on all that goes into the creation of your favourite titles. Join The Bookseller’s programme director Miriam Robinson as she explores the publishing process with Katherine Rundell and her creative collaborators.

Rundell’s bestselling novels for children include Rooftoppers, The Explorer and The Good Thieves. She has won the Costa Children’s Book Award, the Blue Peter Book Award and the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize, among many others. Her The Golden Mole and Other Living Treasure was shortlisted for 2022 Waterstones Book of the Year.

Hari Kunzru (The Impressionist, Transmission) shares his gripping and brilliantly orchestrated new novel. Blue Ruin moves back and forth through time to deliver an extraordinary portrait of an artist as he reunites with his past and confronts the world he once loved and left behind. Once, Jay was a promising artist, but now, undocumented in the US, he lives out of his car, delivering groceries at the height of the pandemic. A delivery leads him to a chance encounter with a former lover from his art school days – setting a reckoning decades in the making into motion. Kunzru talks to the TLS Fiction and Politics Editor.

“I wish I had better parents!” Barry said, a third time. And then suddenly the entire room started to shake… Indulge in some epic wish-fulfilment with acclaimed author, comedian and screenwriter David Baddiel as he celebrates the ten-year anniversary of his debut children’s book The Parent Agency. Imagine the perks of a world where children can choose their parents, and get a sneak peek into some new bonus chapters from The Parent Agency musical stage adaptation, which is currently in the making. David talks to actress and comedian Carrie Quinlan.

If you are thinking I’m too small to make a difference then remember the plankton – they are one of the tiniest creatures on the planet but without them where would we be? The award-winning author and former Children’s Laureate Lauren Child talks about Smile, the final novel in utterly the best series ever. Clarice Bean knows it’s not just the planet that needs help – there’s her whole family too… And if you want things to change for the better, it’s not just up to everyone else, it’s also up to you.

Please bring your own notebook and pen or pencil to this event.

You are enough. You are interesting. Tell your story. Everybody can write. In this creative writing workshop Laura Dockrill, celebrated author of You Are a Story, shows how creativity can be your most valuable tool in living life your way. She opens the way to self-care, imagination and finding the stories that only you can tell. Whether you want to write for yourself or put your work out into the world, writing is for everyone.

Please bring your own notebook and pen or pencil to this event.