Hay Festival 2025 Full Programme

Spend a stylish afternoon in the company of two of Britain’s most dynamic lovers of art. Journalist Lynn Barber, whose memoir An Education inspired a Nick Hornby film starring Carey Mulligan, and whose new book is A Little Art Education, shares stories of how she went from a curious outsider to finding her place among some of the most admired artists of the last 100 years.

Fashion designer Zandra Rhodes shares her life story for the first time in her memoir Iconic: My Life in Fashion in 50 Objects. She talks about the stories behind some of the mementos she’s collected over the years. Rhodes has been a leading figure of the fashion industry for over five decades, celebrating her 50th year in fashion in September 2019 with a retrospective exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum in London, which she founded.

Writer Michael Malay tells the story of making a home for himself in England as an Indonesian Australian, and finding strange parallels between his life and the lives of the animals he examines.

In his new book Late Light, through four ‘unloved’ animals – eels, moths, crickets and mussels – Malay looks at the economic, political and cultural events that have shaped the modern landscape of Britain. Late Light is a rich blend of memoir, natural history, nature writing and a meditation on being and belonging.

The latest film from iconic writer-director Sofia Coppola (Lost in Translation, Marie Antoinette), Priscilla is a moving, nuanced and visually ravishing exploration of the dark side of celebrity, delicately retelling and re-examining one of history’s most complicated love stories.

West Germany, late 1950s. Teenage Priscilla Beaulieu (Golden Globe nominee Cailee Spaeny) receives an invitation to a party with Elvis Presley (Jacob Elordi, Saltburn). Already a meteoric rock-and-roll superstar at this time, Elvis becomes someone entirely unexpected in their private moments together: a thrilling crush, an ally in loneliness, a gentle best friend. Through Priscilla’s eyes, Coppola presents the unseen story of their long courtship and turbulent marriage: a great American myth spanning decades and oceans, from the army base where they met to his dream-world estate at Graceland.

Faithfully adapting Priscilla’s own memoir, and anchored by Spaeny’s Venice Best Actress winning performance, this is a mature and masterful cinematic feast for the senses that sees Coppola at the very top of her game.

“A transportive, heartbreaking journey into the dark heart of celebrity… Sofia Coppola at her best” – Rolling Stone

Rachel Eliza Griffiths is an American multimedia artist and poet, whose work has been published in The New Yorker and The New York Times. Her most recent poetry collection is Seeing the Body. Her first novel, Promise, tells the story of two Black sisters growing up in small-town New England at the end of the 1950s, during the Civil Rights Movement. She discusses this book, and the global role of literature, with Colombian writer and political essayist Juan Gabriel Vásquez (The Sound of Things Falling), a former winner of the IMPAC International Dublin Literary Award and Man Booker International Prize finalist.

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven.

Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven.

Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Michael Heseltine (Member of Parliament from 1966 to 2001) left the political arena once, only to be called back by David Cameron to advise the government. Here he shares a potpourri of reminiscences of his youth, early adulthood and previously unexplored aspects of his political career with the BBC’s Europe editor. He recounts finding his home, creating his garden and renowned arboretum, and regenerating his village. He looks back on the fundamental changes he was able to mastermind while in power and sets out the policies that he believes are still urgently needed to unite the country.

Lord Heseltine privatised more parts of the public sector than any other minister and strongly supports the concept of an industrial strategy and a competitiveness agenda. Above all, he is determined not to give up trying to restore Britain’s position at the heart of Europe after the self-inflicted harm of Brexit. He talks to Matt Frei, Europe Editor and Presenter at Channel 4 News.

This is the story of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, the two geniuses behind The Beatles, as you’ve never heard it before. Ian Leslie discusses John & Paul, his biography of the pair, which begins in 1957 when the two teenagers met in suburban Liverpool and ends 23 years later, when Lennon was murdered.

Leslie, author of two acclaimed books on human behaviour, looks at how Lennon and McCartney were not just friends, rivals or collaborators, but intimates who both had the fabric of their world ruptured at a young age, and who longed to make emotional connections. His refreshing take on two of the greatest icons in music history draws on recently released footage and recordings.

Take a trip along the A1 (no traffic, guaranteed) and learn about the history and mystery of the Great North Road, a 400-mile route that has run through Britain for the last 2,000 years. Writer and author Rob Cowen follows this road – throughout history an ancient trackway, Roman road, pilgrim path, coach route and motorway – and takes a journey through history, place, people and time in his new book The North Road.

In conversation with Phoebe Smith, journalist and author of Wayfarer, he describes journeying along the Great North Road, and weaving his own histories and memories with the landscapes he moved through. Cowen writes on nature, place and people. His first book, Skimming Stones, won the Roger Deakin Award from the Society of Authors.

Celebrate the beauty, strength and joy of being a woman with Donna Ashworth.

The author and poet introduces her collection To the Women, which has been updated with over 70 new poems since its first publication.

Ashworth offers words of wisdom and comfort in this uplifting and empowering event, celebrating the beauty, strength and joy of being a woman. She reminds us that we are stronger when we come together and unstoppable when we accept ourselves.

Ashworth’s daily poetry has nearly 1.8 million followers on social media. Her books include Wild Hope, Love, Loss, Life and I Wish I Knew. She talks to style advisor, television presenter and author, Susannah Constantine.

Steve Crawshaw has written and worked on human rights and justice for more than thirty years, from reporting on Eastern Europe for The Independent to directing Human Rights Watch, becoming advocacy director for the UN and Amnesty International and then Director of the Office of the Secretary General. With human rights lawyer Baroness Helena Kennedy, he discusses the process of bringing war criminals to justice.

Putting a country’s leader on trial once seemed unimaginable. But as Crawshaw describes in his book Prosecuting the Powerful, the possibilities of justice have been transformed. He recounts his encounters with retributive justice from Slobodan Milošević and Bashar al-Assad to the front lines in Ukraine, Israel/Palestine and at The Hague.

Do the stories we tell ourselves shape our destiny? And what do stories say about us? Lyse Doucet, the BBC’s Chief International Correspondent and senior presenter, considers Joan Didion’s famous quote: “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.”

Doucet explores the global shift in finding ourselves through stories, borrowing narratives from many sources, escaping from the daily bombardment of negative news and shifting to podcasts, long form narratives, to frame our own sense of self.

Doing nothing is seen as one of the ultimate wastes of time. But what if doing nothing can actually help us be happier, healthier and more successful? Dr Joseph Jebelli blends science and personal stories to reveal how neuroscience is solving the mystery of the brain at rest, with profound implications for intelligence, creativity and even life expectancy.

Advocating breaking the taboo around rest, Jebelli looks at how things like long baths, walks in nature, meditation and simple daydreaming are key to a more productive life. Jebelli holds a PhD in neuroscience from University College London. His books include In Pursuit of Memory, which was shortlisted for the Royal Society Trivedi Science Book Prize.

A highly anticipated return to fiction feature filmmaking from Wim Wenders (Paris, Texas, Wings of Desire), Perfect Days takes the writer-director to Tokyo to tell a story celebrating the hidden joys and minutiae of Japanese culture.

Winner of the Best Actor award at Cannes 2023, Koji Yakusho (Babel, 13 Assassins) stars as Hirayama, a contemplative middle-aged man who lives a life of modesty and serenity, spending his days balancing his job as a dutiful caretaker of Tokyo’s numerous public toilets with his passion for music, literature and photography. As we join him on his structured daily routine, a series of unexpected encounters gradually begin to reveal a hidden past that lies behind his otherwise content and harmonious life.

Combining a refreshingly unstereotypical depiction of the Japanese capital with a soundtrack comprised of iconic hits from the ’60s and ’80s, this is a subtle, shimmering and ultimately life-affirming reflection on finding beauty in the everyday world around us. The film was nominated for the Best International Film award at the 96th Academy Awards.

“A humane, hopeful embrace of everyday blessings” – Variety

Internationally renowned lyricist Sir Tim Rice steps out from the wings and takes to the stage to reflect on his illustrious career at the heart of musical theatre.

This evening of music and anecdotes sees Rice sharing the stories behind some of the most-loved and best-known musicals of our time, from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and Jesus Christ Superstar to Evita and the Disney productions The Lion King, Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast.

A must for fans of musical theatre, there will be performances by some of the UK’s leading West End singers, including ‘Don’t Cry For Me Argentina’, ‘Any Dream Will Do’ and ‘I Know Him So Well’.