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Archive for June, 2011

It was a controversial swap; the Torygraph replacing the Grauniad.  The January post on this blog asking “Will the Telegraph change the Hay Festival” was tweeted more and attracted more comments than any other post this blog has published.  Now the curtain has closed on the 2011 festival we can take a view ‘ex post’.  My view [...]

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Melvyn Bragg was the highlight of my last trip to Hay (though he also had the dubious honour of being the sweatiest speaker I saw, bringing new meaning to the phrase ‘dripping with enthusiasm’. Fortunately for Melvyn, though not for the rest of the festival goers, the temperature has dropped fifteen degrees in the past [...]

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Professional poker player and writer Victoria Coren was in Hay to talk about her love affair with the game, as described in her memoir ‘For Richer, For Poorer’. The soundtrack to her book wouldn’t be the upbeat and dancey ‘Poker Face’ but the much more ominous ‘Hotel California’. Poker sucks you in, and not in [...]

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Goodnight Mr Tom must be one of the few books which hasn’t had all the joy sucked out of it by being on the school curriculum. And Michelle Magorian must be one of the few authors at Hay who stood up and sang to her audience. She talked about how Goodnight Mr Tom has really [...]

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Chris Evans on stage

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Andrew Davies is not a man ashamed of his public persona. His attitude was very much, well, if people think I revel in the rude bits, I’m damn well going to revel in the rude bits. Davies was here to talk about his latest adaptation, of the Winifred Holtby novel, South Riding. A significant proportion [...]

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Hay at Night

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I can only hope to be as sparky and sparkling as Mavis Nicholson when I’m an octogenarian. Her book, What Did You Do In The War, Mummy? is a collection of interviews with women about their wartime experiences – from WI stalwarts to spies to the little known but awesomely named ‘landjills’. The audience for [...]

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