Kells 2014

Meet Gab Torr, who discusses their debut novel with acclaimed poet Joelle Taylor. Hard Place is the story of Billy, whose new flatmates Sid and Rhoda are the kind of people who talk very seriously about taking accountability, adhering to the flat’s community guidelines and holding space for one another. Slowly Billy becomes enmeshed in their radical, vulnerable world, but as her past catches up with her, all must reckon with what they truly stand for.

Torr discusses writing about activism and queer experiences, and their writing journey so far. They are a 2021 London Writers Awardee, and their writing was longlisted for the 2023 Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize.

The story of one man’s alcoholism and his daughter’s struggle to make sense of it. Journalist Sophie Calon watched as her father went from high-flying lawyer to homelessness in just four years. After pinballing between tents, homeless shelters and prison cells, he was found dead in Cardiff city centre aged just 55.

In her moving memoir Long Going, Calon tries to come to terms with her and her family’s grief, combining her narrative with letters and messages from her father, mother and siblings. Calon, who lives near Hay-on-Wye, speaks with searing honesty to poet and author Gwyneth Lewis.

Begin your evening at Hay Festival with some tasty artisan nibbles and drinks in this session showcasing two fantastic businesses local to Hay-on-Wye. Wild by Nature will guide you through a choice charcuterie board, while Lucky Seven Brewery samples some of their different styles of beer, explaining how these delicious products are made with sustainable farming techniques.

Wild by Nature practises regenerative farming in the Black Mountains. The idea for the business was born when Jake Townley and his brother-in-law Ed Dickson moved back to where they had grown up in the Welsh borders, with a shared desire to be closer to nature and to grow, cook and share the food from their farm.

Lucky Seven Brewery is an independent family brewery based in Hay-on-Wye, started in 2014 by Luke and Kelly Manifold. Brewing the beers that they love to drink, and exploring the flavours of different styles, they produce beers that highlight the quality of the ingredients.

Experience a powerful 20-minute one-woman play in the open air. Don’t Harm the Animals tells the story of a woman isolated at the top of a mountain, and deals with issues of PTSD in the aftermath of sexual assault. It shines a light on the lack of understanding given to victims and addresses the impact of secondary revictimisation. The play premiered at the Chain Theatre, New York, and has been described as “Scorching writing” and “A powerhouse of a performance”.

Joanna Pickering is a multi-award-winning British actress and playwright whose work focuses on strong female narrative and advocacy for women’s rights. Her play Lara’s Journey recently live-streamed from New York City to over one million viewers to raise awareness for Ukrainian refugees. Pickering recently secured a three-play deal for 2026, to be produced by a Broadway award-winning team. These initmate shows at Hay Festival will be directed by the award-winning Welsh writer and director, Philip John.

Three brilliant speakers, all with something completely different to say. Enjoy the range and variety of Hay Festival packaged into one entertaining session. This evening, space scientist Maggie Aderin-Pocock says her destiny was always written in the stars, journalist Simon Jenkins asks whether America can survive Trump, and best-selling author Elif Shafak talks about the power of fiction to connect us all. Chaired by the BBC’s international editor, Jeremy Bowen.

How did a globally-celebrated novel become a multi-award-winning film? An extraordinary opportunity to go behind the scenes of Hamnet with author/screenwriter Maggie O’Farrell and producer and founder of Hera Pictures Liza Marshall to hear the secrets of creating one of the most acclaimed literary adaptations of recent times. O’Farrell takes you inside the process of translating her story to the screen, sharing the choices, challenges and discoveries that shaped the film. Marshall uncovers the collaborative magic that turned vision into reality. They’ll also talk tantalisingly about their next project together – based on O’Farrell’s new novel Land.

Discover Cantopop in this story of pop music, identity crisis and Hong Kong with singer-songwriter Emma-Lee Moss, aka Emmy the Great. She talks to the author of My Family and Other Rock Stars, Tiffany Murray, about how, as an 11-year-old in Hong Kong in the summer of 1995, she discovered Cantopop (Cantonese pop music) and fell in love with it. But when her family moved to England and she suppressed her Hong Kong heritage, she suppressed her love for Cantopop too. Moss shares how rediscovering the music helped her rediscover her Hong Kong identity, and sings some of her favourite songs. Moss is a British-Chinese writer and musician who sings in English, Cantonese and Mandarin.

Two daring, record-holding adventurers celebrate the human spirit and discuss staying resilient in the face of physical and mental crises.

Mark Agnew was part of the first team to ever kayak the north-west passage, spending 103 days in the Arctic, after two previous failed expeditions. Strained to the limit, he experienced a mental health crisis and almost abandoned the water forever. In his book There Will Be Headwinds, Agnew charts an inspirational journey from failure to world record breaker.

Mollie Hughes has explored some of the wildest environments on earth. Aged 29, she skied more than 700 miles across Antarctica, through storm-force winds and temperatures as low as minus 45 degrees Celsius. Drawing from her book Breathe, she uses her extreme experiences and psychological research to share lessons that can be applied to more everyday challenges.

YouTube sensation Fred Mills takes us on a journey through the most important industry in the world: construction. From the homes we wake up in to the transport infrastructure we use and the hospitals we rely on, construction has an impact on us all.

Mills, who founded the largest and most subscribed-to construction channel in the world with over 3.9 million subscribers on YouTube, charts the story of 10 mega projects reshaping our modern world in his book Mega Builds. This is an entertaining and fascinating front row seat to amazing feats of engineering, showing what will inform the future of the man-made world.

Begin your evening at Hay Festival with some tasty artisan nibbles and drinks in this session showcasing two fantastic businesses local to Hay-on-Wye. Wild by Nature will guide you through a choice charcuterie board, while Lucky Seven Brewery samples some of their different styles of beer, explaining how these delicious products are made with sustainable farming techniques.

Wild by Nature practises regenerative farming in the Black Mountains. The idea for the business was born when Jake Townley and his brother-in-law Ed Dickson moved back to where they had grown up in the Welsh borders, with a shared desire to be closer to nature and to grow, cook and share the food from their farm.

Lucky Seven Brewery is an independent family brewery based in Hay-on-Wye, started in 2014 by Luke and Kelly Manifold. Brewing the beers that they love to drink, and exploring the flavours of different styles, they produce beers that highlight the quality of the ingredients.

A screening of Sally Potter’s fearless adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s supposedly unfilmable book – Orlando was nine years in the making. This restlessly rule-bending, gender fluid, time-travelling epic – starring a dazzling Tilda Swinton on typically shape-shifting form – remains an unmatched feat of queer filmmaking.

Young aristocrat Orlando begins a quest for love and freedom in the court of Elizabeth I as a man. He is granted favours and property by the queen who commands the nobleman to never change. Orlando completes the search 400 years later as a woman, shaking off their biological and cultural destiny.

Directed by Sally Potter (1992). Film duration: 1 hour 33 minutes. Certificate PG.

Sign up here for a masterclass in the art of burgers, BBQ and backyard culture with Anthony Murphy, Burger Chef of the Year 2023 and co-founder of the ultimate meat boutique, The Beefy Boys. While ‘Murf’ shares his barbecue skill and inducts you into the knack of the grill, you’ll devour a two-course tasting menu starting with an exclusive version of The Beefy Boys’ famous BBQ sharing platter.

This meaty medley will include the chef’s beef cheek, burnt ends, 12-hour smoked pork belly, 12-hour smoked brisket, hot link sausage and a slider version of the Butty Bach Burger, topped up with portions of BBQ beans, mac & cheese and creamy coleslaw. To round off the feast, sample a decadent, homemade brownie. A must for all griddled food fans and cookout converts!

Fresh from his tour, Macnificent, where he sold over 800,000 tickets worldwide, Michael McIntyre plays Hay Festival, performing some greatest hits and new bits. An exceptional opportunity to see McIntyre in an intimate venue in one of only a few shows he’ll perform in 2026.

Due to overwhelming demand, tickets for Michael McIntyre’s live show have completely sold out. But we’ve created one more way to be part of the moment. Join us for a live screening of the event, streamed directly from the main stage to an additional Festival venue. You’ll enjoy the show in real time, surrounded by fellow Festival-goers, sharing the laughter as it unfolds.

Fresh from his tour, Macnificent, where he sold over 800,000 tickets worldwide, Michael McIntyre plays Hay Festival, performing some greatest hits and new bits.

An immersive and jaw-dropping look at a network of radical extremists who terrorised the West in the 1970s with intricately-planned plane hijackings and hostage-takings. Jason Burke, the Guardian’s international security correspondent, talks to investigative journalist Oliver Bullough about figures including Leila Khaled, with her jewellery made from grenade rings, the hard-drinking Carlos the Jackal, in shades and designer suits, and the radical leftists of the Baader-Meinhof Gang.

Burke has been a foreign correspondent for almost 30 years. His book The Revolutionists draws on decades of research and previously classified documents, as well as original interviews with hijackers, spies and more. He takes us into the world of the book, and the people he met while writing it, and assesses a seismic decade that transformed the modern world.

Comedian and actor Nigel Planer offers a wildly entertaining and gloriously sideways glimpse into a remarkable life and work. Planer’s varied career includes creating characters such as Neil the Hippy from the iconic 1980s programme The Young Ones, appearing in shows including Blackadder, voicing Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books, and writing over 100 episodes of The Magic Roundabout.

Drawing on his memoir Young Once, Planer shares stories from his life in conversation with Toby Lichtig, fiction and politics editor at The TLS. From receiving éclair related injuries to being bullied into BandAid by Bob Geldof, and gatecrashing a rave with Robin Williams, he explains why you should never give up on looking for your Happy Ever After.

Sip a glass of wine as you listen while Tom Gilbey lays out the joy, hilarity and humanity of the drink. Gilbey’s family were the first Brits to buy a Bordeaux Chateau in 1875, while Gilbey himself ran the London marathon while blind tasting 25 wines.

He talks to author Tiffany Murray about the wine minefield – the rules, the swirling, sniffing, old-world-new-world debate. Let the internet’s most charismatic wine expert show you how to choose and talk about wine, without sounding pretentious.

Join this year’s four Royal Society of Literature Jerwood Poets for a première of new collaborations co-conceived with musician Kathryn Williams. The four poets – Karen McCarthy Woolf (England), Scott McKendry (Ireland), clare e potter (Wales) and Roseanne Watt (Scotland) – have produced works which recover myths from each corner of the British Isles.

McCarthy Woolf’s verse novel Top Doll was a Guardian Book of the Year and shortlisted for the TS Eliot and Jhalak Prizes. McKendry’s poems have appeared in the Poetry Review, Stinging Fly and more. In 2024 he was chosen by Paul Muldoon as Ireland Chair of Poetry’s Poet of Promise. Potter is a poetry therapy practice trainee, has translated for the National Poet of Wales, and was a Hay Festival Writer at Work. Watt is a writer and filmmaker from Shetland. Kathryn Williams is a singer-songwriter with 17 albums under her belt, and has been nominated for the Mercury music prize, among others.

Round off your evening with a fresh and lively dollop of funky brass music, invoking eclectic styles from New Orleans marching bands through to Bronx-inspired Hip Hop and closer-to-home Welsh language pop music.

Paying their debt to the age-old tradition of brass bands from the slate mining villages of North Wales, Llareggub Brass Band rise from the ashes of the past to deliver an energetic performance and enough hwyl to get you dancing!

Formed by band leader Owain Roberts in 2015, the band has released several studio albums and EPs. They have toured internationally, and won a BAFTA Cymru award for their documentary Cyrn ar y Mississippi (‘Horns on the Mississippi’).

Begin the day with a guided tour of Hay Castle led by its director, art historian Tom True. Explore the castle’s layered history, meet some of the characters who once shaped it and hear how it is being reimagined today as a place for ideas, art and thoughtful encounters. The tour includes time to experience the castle’s new interactive interpretation on the second floor, followed by coffee and pastries.

Coffee and pastry included in the ticket price. Meet in the Great Hall.

How writers can give a voice to those who need it. Two authors talk about why they weave themes of gender, violence, identity, social justice and human rights into their work. Lebanese author Rabih Alameddine and British-Turkish novelist Elif Shafak talk to writer and translator Daniel Hahn about the importance of creating stories that give a platform to silenced voices.

Alameddine’s 2025 National Book Award-winning The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) is a darkly comic family saga celebrating love across six decades, through the unbreakable attachment of a son and his mother. Shafak’s latest novel, There Are Rivers in the Sky, connects the lives of three strangers across time and space through the everlasting influence of two rivers, the Tigris and the Thames.

In a single lifetime, Christianity has witnessed one of the most extraordinary about-turns in attitudes to sex and gender in human history, bringing liberation for some and fury and fear for others. Oxford University professor Diarmaid MacCulloch places recent changes into the 2,000-year-long tale of Christians trying to make sense of sexual desire. MacCulloch is author of the award-winning A History of Christianity, adapted into a six-part BBC television series. He talks to broadcaster Francine Stock.

Join writers and editors of the Times Literary Supplement along with special guests for a live recording of their weekly podcast on books and culture.

Come and join three editing and publishing experts for an unmatched opportunity to refine your creative writing ideas. Silk Road Slippers writing courses are for writers of all levels, and have been described by the Financial Times as “a revelation”.

You’ll complete a short writing exercise, then share your work for immediate constructive feedback. The Silk Road Slippers team – publishing legend and former Bloomsbury editor-in-chief Alexandra Pringle, best-selling author and historian Alex von Tunzelmann and editorial consultant Faiza Khan – will address style, substance and storytelling. This intensive yet welcoming environment will help you take your creative skills to the next level.

Watch a selection of short films, curated by MUBI, throughout the morning. The day’s schedule will be listed each morning at the venue – pop along and take a look.

Step into the magical world of Bird & Blend Tea Co., discover the secrets of tea mixology and create your own perfect blend in an immersive and interactive Tea Mixology Experience led by an expert mixologist. This hands-on workshop invites you to taste up to six unique blends and test your tea knowledge with an engaging and fun tea matching game.

With expert guidance, you’ll get to craft two custom tea blends to take home and pair with your next fave book! You’ll also learn about different tea types and brewing tips to enhance your tea-making ritual at home. There’ll be an opportunity to ask questions, plus you’ll get a goody bag with free samples. Visit the Bird & Blend Tea Co. stand afterwards for a free gift with purchase (find a special token in your goody bag). Book now – it’s going to be TEArrific!

Come on a walk through the beautiful surrounds of Hay-on-Wye, led by guides from the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park. You’ll be joined by local experts who will give their insights into this treasured landscape.

Hay-on-Wye is located within 520 square miles of beautiful countryside that makes up the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park. The National Park is driving change to bring about a sustainable future, meeting our needs within planetary boundaries. Their Hay Festival series of walks take you into the town’s local environment while offering the opportunity to learn more about the Park’s work.

Just Visiting is a heartening and humorous piece of theatre, woven from real memories and explored through storytelling and puppetry. A gentle dance through grief to discover joy and meaning.

About Face is a professional learning disability theatre company based in Herefordshire, which has developed a reputation for highly creative, unusual, and thought-provoking work. Created from the actors’ own stories, this show captures grief from many angles; personal yet universal, poignant and funny. Audiences are invited to laugh, cry and connect with the most human experience which unites all of us.

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative in these interactive sessions delivered by artists and discover that your imagination is the only 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.

Step inside Hay Castle – a border stronghold shaped by myth, power and reinvention. Visit the current BorderLands exhibition delivered in partnership with Meadow Arts, and enjoy full access to the castle, from cellar to rooftop. Explore rooms layered with stories, including Matilda’s room, the Richard Booth space, historic costumes and the castle cellar.

Experience the new, interactive exhibit on the second floor, then climb to the viewing platform for wide views across the Wye Valley. Your ticket also includes unlimited return visits for a full year, so you can come back as the seasons – and the castle – change.

This ticket allows you to visit the castle at a time of your choice on the day selected, and also gives you entry into the Meadow Arts BorderLands exhibition.

Join professional walking guide Sarah Price and Elizabeth Simpson of Elizabeth Simpson Coaching for a guided circular walk through the stunning surroundings of Hay-on-Wye. Designed for creatives and anyone seeking fresh thinking, this walk will help you step out of the ordinary and into inspiration.

Along the route, Elizabeth will introduce nature-based coaching exercises to enhance creativity and problem-solving. You’ll set an intention for the walk, engage in sensory awareness practices and use simple breathwork techniques to unlock clarity. Through mindful observation and interactive exercises, you’ll explore new perspectives on a creative challenge or personal goal. By the end of the walk, you’ll have shifted your mindset, released limiting thoughts and gained fresh insights – whether you’re working on a book, facing a decision or simply seeking renewed energy.

Step inside Hay Castle during Hay Festival 2026 and explore a place shaped by power, survival and reinvention. Led by an expert volunteer guide, this tour traces 800 years of life inside the castle – from medieval plots and royal whispers to its rescue, restoration and reimagining as a place for ideas today. You’ll move through rooms, stairways and towers, hearing stories of the people who lived, schemed, dreamed and partied here. Along the way, take in sweeping views across the Wye Valley – a reminder that this is a border castle, built to watch and be watched.

Guided tours run daily at 11am and 2pm. Tour price includes entry into the Castle for a year including the current exhibition: BorderLands.

Maggie O’Farrell, the award-winning author of Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait, gives an exclusive preview of her highly-anticipated new novel, Land, ahead of its publication. Inspired by O’Farrell’s own family history and by the Irish landscape to which she has a deep personal attachment, Land is a multi-generational epic exploring love, loss and the ties that bind us to place and time. In this special event, O’Farrell discusses her craft as one of today’s most captivating storytellers, and reflects on the huge success of the film adaptation of Hamnet, starring Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley. This session is unmissable for lovers of literary fiction, fans of historical, character-driven novels and anyone intrigued by the art of beautiful, immersive writing.

Step inside the shadowy world of money-laundering – one of Britain’s top investigative journalists reveals the secrets, the scandals and how it might finally be stopped. Oliver Bullough, best-selling author of Butler to the World and former Reuters’ reporter, introduces his new book Everybody Loves Our Dollars, in which he reveals how organised criminals move dirty money around the world, and how they turn their incomes into legitimately recognised wealth.

Hear about Bullough’s conversations with convicted money launderers and the people who prosecuted them, and learn more about the shadowy financial system that turns dirty money into clean, in this fascinating event that will change the way you look at money.

Rediscover the incredible life and career of the man who saved the world from nuclear war in 1962 when he negotiated an end to the Cuban Missile Crisis. U Thant was the longest-serving Secretary-General of the United Nations (1961–71) and held almost celebrity status during a golden age of diplomacy. Now his grandson Thant Myint-U, an award-winning writer and historian who himself served with the UN, takes a fascinating and hugely entertaining look at U Thant’s life. Talking to the BBC’s chief international correspondent Lyse Doucet about his biography Peacemaker, he traces his grandfather’s rise from schoolteacher in a small Burmese backwater in 1947 to the centre of global politics just two decades later.

Two Welsh writers discuss the erosion of memory and the art of the memoir with writer and translator Daniel Hahn in this luminous conversation about what is being lost and what we can hold on to.

Novelist Francesca Rhydderch recounts her struggle for a neurological diagnosis in It Might Not Be True: A Memoir of Life and Love. In danger of fighting a losing battle – with time, memory, herself – she learns there are ways to live in the present by making peace with the past.

Poet Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch’s fourth collection Milk Wood Memoir explores how the paths of her home town of New Quay – walked by Dylan Thomas and likely an inspiration for Under Milk Wood – are slowly collapsing into the sea due to coastal erosion.

Get ready to be inspired, amazed and totally fascinated by the incredible human body with the nation’s most-loved doctor! Dr Ranj will guide young curiosity seekers on an exciting adventure exploring every nook and cranny of the wondrous world within us: from the powerhouse of the heart to the bustling networks of the brain.

The BAFTA-award-winning TV presenter, musical theatre star and best-selling author will share fun facts about what makes us tick from his new book Dr Ranj’s Human Body Encyclopedia, top tips on wellbeing and keeping your body healthy and happy, as well as reminders of everything that makes every single one of us special.

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative in these interactive sessions delivered by artists and discover that your imagination is the only 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.

Colleagues and friends Sophie Raworth and Jeremy Bowen discuss Raworth’s inspiring – and dramatic – journey from the BBC Breakfast sofa to pounding the pavements as a marathon runner.

Raworth, one of the BBC’s main evening news presenters, took up running in her 40s, and her first marathon was almost a disaster when she collapsed and was treated for heatstroke. Since then, she has completed all seven World Marathon Majors, and run ten ultra-marathons, including the 150-mile Marathon des Sables across the Sahara Desert.

Raworth talks to Bowen about discovering her love for running, and how it helped her with challenges from losing loved ones to interviewing the Prime Minister.

What happens when a single photograph unlocks a hidden past? Lea Ypi reveals a life of glamour, espionage and survival across war-torn Europe. Using archive files and spy reports, Ypi uncovers the fascinating and disturbing story of her grandmother’s life from Ottoman-era Salonica to wartime Albania and through the rise of communism. It’s a life embroiled in politics, class, love, exile and surveillance. Ypi grapples with unsettling questions about her own family’s past, what it means to survive in an age of extremes, and whether we have the moral authority to judge the acts of previous generations. She talks to the host of the BBC’s In Our Time, Misha Glenny.

 Blackly funny and razor-sharp, John Lanchester introduces his new novel about two very different women, brought together by a betrayal and a hit television show. In Look What You Made Me Do, Kate’s idyllic life takes a dark turn when she watches young screenwriter Phoebe’s new series, Cheating, and sees what she thinks are details about her life and intimacies that only she and her husband would know. In this story of resentment and entitlement, the two women are drawn towards a battle only one of them can win.

Lanchester discusses the inspiration behind the book, his career and more, with literary journalist Alex Clark. This is an unmissable event with a writer whose best-selling novel Capital was adapted into an International Emmy Award-winning television series.

Eminent philosopher Margaret Heffernan leads an agenda-setting discussion about the importance of creativity, and makes a compelling and urgent case for the integration of art into all aspects of life. Heffernan, whose TED talks have been seen by more than 15 million people, looks at what we can learn from the way artists approach life in her book Embracing Uncertainty.

Heffernan is a frequent broadcaster on BBC Radio 4, and is Professor of Practice at the University of Bath. In this event, she talks to author Irenosen Okojie about why, instead of waiting for the future, we should run towards it like artists do, and how art can help us with the stresses and anxieties of the modern world.

Fandom was once immortalised in posters on bedroom walls, but is now front and centre on the For You Page, with fans shaping what we read, watch and stream. Join some of TikTok’s top film commentators as they discuss how online fandom is turning #BookToScreen adaptations into smash hits.

Embark on an epic animal adventure with the award‑winning historian and television presenter (Digging for Britain) as she introduces the jaw-dropping sequel to her highly acclaimed debut novel Wolf Road. Professor Alice Roberts bases her stories on real archaeological discoveries, and in this event she takes us on a stunning journey through the prehistoric landscape.

In Wolf Mountain, the seasons are changing and Tuuli, along with her faithful wolf cub Lupa, is on the move. Leaving her tribe behind, she sets out across the Tundra to discover a new world and find the family of Andar, the friend she has lost. With danger everywhere, will Tuuli find who she is looking for?

Come on a walk through the beautiful surrounds of Hay-on-Wye, led by guides from the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park. You’ll be joined by local experts who will give their insights into this treasured landscape.

Hay-on-Wye is located within 520 square miles of beautiful countryside that makes up the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park. The National Park is driving change to bring about a sustainable future, meeting our needs within planetary boundaries. Their Hay Festival series of walks take you into the town’s local environment while offering the opportunity to learn more about the Park’s work.