Hay Festival 2020 is cancelled

Wake up and re-energise with our morning yoga class. Iyengar yoga is characterised by precision, alignment and attention to detail and is an inclusive and accessible yoga practice. Mats are provided; wear comfortable clothing; all abilities welcome.  Wye Valley Yoga

This workshop allows you to bring together your hand and heart of awareness in creating an ensō; a disciplined, creative practice of traditional Japanese Zen ink painting, a circle that is hand-drawn in one uninhibited brushstroke to express a moment when the mind is free to let the body create.
The Table is in the centre of the town about ten minutes steady walk from the festival site: 43 Lion St, Hay-on-Wye, Hereford HR3 5AA.

The literary critic, famed for his wit and acute interpretations, explores the themes of his two spring publications. Radical Sacrifice revaluates the idea of sacrifice as purposed in theology and philosophy, reclaiming the act as radical politics. The re-publication of Why Marx Was Right examines the philosopher’s core ideas in the context of capitalism’s crises and communism’s collapse. Chaired by Dai Smith.

Clark honours the life and work of the pioneer of the hospice movement. His biography shows how Cicely Saunders and the hospice she created, St Christopher’s, played a crucial role in shaping a new discourse of care at the end of life.  From the pessimism of ‘there is nothing more we can do’, medicine and healthcare gradually adopted a more purposeful approach to care at the end of life, which came to be known as ‘palliative care’.  

An exploration of Muslim women’s involvement in violent religious politics, specifically Islam. Brown examines the ways in which gendered jihadi narratives motivate and enfranchise, and how they combine with everyday experiences of living and politics. She also examines how counter-terrorism and counter-radicalisation programmes impact on religious women’s rights and Muslim communities in the UK. Brown is Lecturer in Islamic Studies.
See also event [371].

The story of our culture over 1,000 years can be told as the story of changing ideas about the weather. While leading a walk from the spectacular ruins of Llantony Priory up into the hills, Alexandra Harris looks at writers and artists across the centuries who, when looking up at the same skies and walking in the same brisk air, have felt very different things. Weatherland allows us to witness cultural climates on the move. The weather is vast and yet we experience it intimately, which is why Harris builds her remarkable story from small evocative details: from the Anglo-Saxons through the Norman Conquest, the Middle Ages to the Romantics there have been times for meteoric marvels and times for gentle breeze. Weatherland is a celebration of British weather and a life-story of those who have lived in it. As we enter what may be the last decades of British weather as we know it, this is a history for our times. A member of the Brecon Beacons National Park will join the walk.

Four books inspired by desperate stories from around the world: A Jigsaw of Fire and Stars is Ghanaian-British filmmaker Yaba Badoe’s story of the horrors of people-trafficking and the magic of African folklore. In Child 1 Steve Tasane captures the survival spirit of a group of undocumented children in a refugee camp. Inspired by the plight of child refugees in Ethiopia, Ele Fountain’s Boy 87 is one 14-year-old’s search for a better life. In Mitch Johnson’s Kick, a boy called Budi is working in a sweatshop in Jakarta making football boots but dreams of being a football star. Chaired by Sian Cain.

When Billy and Fatcat discover a Terrible Beast making a Terrible Soup out of all of their friends, they are quick to react. Luckily Billy has a clever trick – hidden in her hair. BookTrust’s illustrator-in-residence introduces her new story as she champions the causes of more humour and inclusivity in picture-books.

Dr Ben Garrod’s new books are great fun and informative. Looking at Tyrannosaurus Rex, Diplodocus and Triceratops, he uses the most modern and interesting science to reveal amazing discoveries about the best known dinosaur species. Garrod is an evolutionary biologist, a teaching fellow at Anglia Ruskin University, and broadcasts regularly on TV and radio. He is patron of NatSCA, a trustee of the Jane Goodall Institute and an ambassador for the Wildlife Trusts, the Marine Conservation Society and Bristol Museum.

 If you were creating a world of your own, what would it look like? Would you build your house out of brick – or out of jelly? Would it be on the ground or in a tree? Would your shops sell envelopes and sweets – or shoes for superheroes? Would you ride a train to town, or a dinosaur? Come and work with this illustrator to create your very own extraordinary world.

(parents must attend but do not require a ticket)

Come to this family and children's nature adventure session run by Rooted Forest School in the Hay Festival Wild Garden. Join in a range of outdoor, Forest School-inspired activities including nature games, natural crafts and making, fire skills, foraging and cooking.

(parents must attend but do not require a ticket)

The Destino Dance Company, who have performed at Sadlers Wells, aim to promote Ethiopian traditional dance and culture by merging it with contemporary and West African dance. This unique blend allows us to share the richness of African dance and culture. These sessions are recommended for anyone who loves dancing regardless of age, gender or ability.

Hay Primary School, Oxford Rd, Hay-on-Wye, HR3 5BT

To recreate the past as a living, breathing place, the historical novelist has visited churches, archives, museums and art galleries all over Italy.  In this lecture, she tells the story of her discoveries; how the decoding of old paintings alongside the work of the most modern historians helped her to penetrate hidden worlds inside the Renaissance, finding wonder and drama in ordinary lives and exploring the complexities of politics and religion along with emotion, the senses and the heady appetites of body and soul. Dunant’s novels include the acclaimed trilogy The Birth of Venus, In the Company of the Courtesan and Sacred Hearts, her two novels about the Borgias, Blood and Beauty and her latest In the Name of the Family. 

With a death toll of 50-100 million people and a global reach, the Spanish 'flu of 1918-1920 was the greatest human disaster, not only of the 20th century, but possibly in all of recorded history. And yet, in our popular conception it exists largely as a footnote to World War One. Spinney recounts the story of an overlooked pandemic, tracing it from Alaska to Brazil, from Persia to Spain, and from South Africa to Odessa. Telling the story from the point of view of those who lived through it, she shows how the pandemic was shaped by the interaction of a virus and the humans it encountered; and how this devastating natural experiment put both the ingenuity and the vulnerability of humans to the test. Chaired by Stephanie Boland of Prospect magazine.

The hugely ambitious Parthian press project to gather in one imprint the greatest Welsh writing in English of the past 100 years has now reached 50 titles – from Raymond Williams and Margiad Evans to Rachel Trezise and Leonora Brito. Phil George leads a conversation about the scope and scale, impact and treasures of Welsh literature. What do we learn from these modern classics? What might the next 50 books be? And how might they be selected? 

The lecturer in modern Indian history and global political thought explores the origins of modern anti-terror legislation in India’s struggle for independence and the reverberations today.

Find out what goes into the making of the world’s longest-running drama serial. Alison Hindell, currently Acting Editor, and members of the writing team, share some backstage secrets about living in the UK’s best-known fictional village.