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Michael Rosen talks to Kirsty Lang

Rosen’s Almanac: Weird and Wonderful Words for Every Day of the Year

Hay Festival 2025, 

What are words? They’re the beginning of our stories: portals to treasured memories, to the strange sayings that seem to be unique to our own families and the beloved people that say them to us. So, what was your gran’s favourite word for a time-waster? How did your dad answer the question ‘What’s the time?’ And just how many responses are there to the daily query ‘What’s for dinner?’

Even better, how do these words change as they travel across our regions? Join Rosen for a tour of the British Isles and all its vernacular idiosyncrasies, through his ‘Almanac’ of the weird and wonderful words we use. He reflects on the joys of English, for anyone who loves language – whether following its rules or breaking them.