Ways With Words at Dartington Hall July 5-15 2019

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Ways With Words Festival of Words and Ideas Dartington Hall

5–15 July 2019

wayswithwords.co.uk


Words of Welcome F

or more than two decades it has been my privilege, as the Festival President, to welcome you to Dartington. This year, as I do so for the last time, I can do no better than repeat what has always been the message of my greeting. Dartington is unique among literary festivals. It becomes – during those precious summer weeks – a community in which speakers and their audiences share the pleasure of exchanging ideas. The 2019 programme, as always, illustrates that the most distinguished authors in Britain are attracted to Dartington. I know that you will enjoy the time spent in their company as much as I have enjoyed my good fortune in being associated with the Festival.

Roy Hattersley Festival President

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I

t’s all change at Ways With Words.

After more than 20 years Lord Hattersley is no longer to be president of the Ways With Words Festival at Dartington Hall. He has served the festival with the same devotion as he previously served Birmingham Sparkbrook where he was MP for 33 years (9 years, of which, he was also Deputy Leader of the Labour Party).

W

elcome to Ways With Words 2019. We have put together a packed programme of the events, talks, comedy and workshops from politicians, novelists, comedians, poets, academics and journalists. There should be something for everyone. Some familiar faces will be about including al fresco artist Paula Cloonan, Southwest Sculptures with the Ways Without Words exhibition, local art collective Ephemera as well as a treasure trove of books and art in the Ship Studio and the ever popular Amnestea. As a team this is our sixth festival at Dartington and we are delighted to offer some new ideas including a

We are so grateful to him for his dedication and enthusiasm and hope he has many years to sit back and enjoy the festival without responsibility. Which brings me to the programme, in your hands now which this year this has been organised by Leah Varnell and Jane Fitzgerald with help from Phil John. What a good job they have done. I hope you will enjoy everything the festival has to offer. I know I shall. Kay Dunbar Festival Director

murder-mystery event, a live streamed performance from the Gaza Strip, a large group meditation in the Great Hall, Speakers’ Corner, an exhibition of hand made books in the yurt and a host of family events in our Word Circus located in various venues around the festival. It is such a delight to be back in Dartington Hall which not only offers wonderful venues for the talks but is also set in a stunning location. Do try to find time between events to stroll along the River Dart or around the wonderful gardens or simply sit in a deckchair with a cup of tea. The next ten days promise to entertain, amuse, educate and stimulate. It is always a pleasure to be amongst the WWW community. We’re looking forward to discussing and debating – we hope you are too. Leah Varnell Managing Director

² wayswithwords ³ @Ways_With_Words µ wayswithwordsfestival Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

#www2019 page 3


Dan Dietch

FRIDAY 5th JULY

Joseph Stiglitz

Great Hall

Matt Harvey

John Crace

Joseph Stiglitz Wealth Creation

1

2.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Nobel Prize-winning economist and bestselling author, Joseph Stiglitz, explores how many have made their wealth by increasing inequality and that the assault on the judiciary, universities, and the media undermines the very institutions that are the foundations of economic prosperity and democracy.

People, Power, and Profits: Progressive

Capitalism for an Age of Discontent (Allen Lane)

Stephen Moss

Family isn’t just Important. It’s Everything.

2

3.30pm

| Great Hall

Dom Joly

Laden before moving to the UK. To mark his fiftieth birthday, he and two friends return to the region and learn about the Middle East, religion, friendship and growing old disgracefully.

The Hezbollah Hiking Club: A Short Walk across the Lebanon (Constable)

John Crace

May You Live in Interesting Times

4

6.30pm

| Great Hall

John Crace, author and political sketch writer for The Guardian observes the workings of the coalface in Westminster. Many things may yet have changed since the time of writing and John will provide insight on the current state of affairs in the political landscape.

£11.00

I, Maybot (Faber)

Having worked on series alongside David Attenborough, Alan Titchmarsh and Chris Packham, BAFTA award-winning BBC producer, Stephen Moss explores the shifting hierarchies of animal families and reveals the intricate social lives of our planet’s most fascinating animals.

Matt Harvey

Dynasties: The Rise and Fall of Animal Families

(BBC Books)

Dom Joly

Three Men on a Camel ... Without the Camel

3

5.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Dogs and an Angry Man

5

8.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Poet Matt Harvey continues his collaboration with artist Claudia Schmid and her strange, funny, sad drawings as they launch their new expanded version of SIT! Alongside dogs there’ll be alchemical elephants, ineffectual snake charmers, birds’ nest hats and an angry man eating a chair.

SIT! (Unicorn)

Born in Beirut comedian Dom Joly lived through the civil war and went to school with Osama Bin

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £27 (not including events 4 and 5) page 4

£11.00


FRIDAY 5th JULY

Barn

Word Circus

Martin Brown

Sam Willis, James Daybell

Martin Brown

Gelong Thubten

Horrible Histories, Doodles and Drawings

6

2.00pm

| Barn £10.00 / £5.00 children

Sharpen your pencils and celebrate ‘Horrible Histories’ and ‘Lesser Spotted Animals’ with illustrator and cartoonist Martin Brown. His passion for ‘drawing his doodles and little figures’ is infectious and in a talk peppered with jovial jokes, awesome anecdotes and live drawing, he brings the worlds of wildlife and history to life.

Terrible Trenches Field Book (Scholastic);

Gelong Thubten

A Monk’s Guide for Young People

8

5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00 / £5.00 children

Buddhist monk and author Gelong Thubten offers advice for young people on retaining an independent mind when faced with the pressures of social media and daily life. He is a pioneer in mindfulness teaching, working with many schools and colleges and developed an app for children to help combat rising mental health issues. Age 8 plus.

A Monk’s Guide to Happiness (Yellow Kite)

Martin Brown’s Lesser Spotted Animals (David Fickling Books)

Sam Willis and James Daybell Histories of the Unexpected LIVE

7

3.30pm

| Barn

£10.00 / £5.00 children

Sam Willis, presenter of the BBC’s The Silk Road and James Daybell’s new history show will change the way you think about the past and the present. They demonstrate how the most unexpected of subjects has a history and how they link together in unexpected ways. What links the Titanic, Pompeii, Neolithic cave painting, Victorian perfumes, electrical experiments on the human face and Glaswegian gangs?

Histories of the Unexpected (Atlantic) Day Ticket for Barn: £24 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

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THE

D R WO

S U C IR

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al v i t s e f e o th Roll up t iscover: and d ing, ook Mak B , g n i ll yte nd ion, Stor heatre a T e e Meditat r F , one g Artists for every Roamin s e c n a perform Pop-Up

FRIDAY 5TH JULY Shiphay Academy and their brilliant young performers present a free abridged performance of Macbeth

SATURDAY 6TH JULY

Horrible Histories illustrator Martin Brown shares his passion for doodling in a live drawing event (2.00pm Barn)

South Devon College performance students present adaptations of much loved children’s books in free pop-up theatre events around the festival grounds

Delve into the drama and delight of the kingdom of animals with Blue Planet producer Stephen Moss (3.30pm Great Hall)

Storyteller Chris Brooks will weave a web of enchantment as he spins yarns for folk of all ages

BBC presenter Sam Willis and James Daybell reveal unexpected histories of just about anything (3.30pm Barn)

Artists in Residence, Ephemera will be visually capturing events and speakers throughout the festival alongside illustration and drawing workshops for adults and children

Unclutter your mind and take part in a guided meditation with Buddhist monk Gelong Thubten (5.00pm Barn)

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SATURDAY 6th JULY

Great Hall

Frank Field

Kamal Ahmed

Gelong Thubten

Caroline Slocock

Meditation in the 21st Century

9

10.00am

| Great Hall

The Truth About the Iron Lady £11.00

11

1.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Gelong Thubten will speak on mindfulness and finding a deeper approach to happiness. He will offer methods for training the mind to choose lasting happiness and to develop more compassion. Thubten became a monk in 1993 and is a pioneer in mindfulness teaching, working with groups from Silicon Valley tech giants to schoolchildren, doctors and prisoners.

Left-wing feminist and former private secretary to Margaret Thatcher, Caroline Slocock suggests it’s time to rewrite how we portray powerful women and accept that Margaret Thatcher was ‘one of us’. Caroline takes a political and personal look at life inside Thatcher’s No.10 during its dying days and reflects on women and power, then and now.

A Monk’s Guide to Happiness (Yellow Kite)

People like us: Margaret Thatcher and Me (Biteback Publishing)

Frank Field

Securing the Future of the Cradle to the Grave Welfare State

10

11.45am

| Great Hall

£11.00

Kamal Ahmed

Grounds for Optimism

12

3.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Sponsored by

For many, the crowning glory of the welfare state was the birth of the National Health Service in 1948. Currently more than £171 billion is spent every year on welfare – and yet, since Atlee there has been no strategic review of the system. Former Minister of Welfare Reform, Frank Field, argues that serious questions must be asked about how the welfare state can remain sustainable as the twenty-first century progresses.

Kamal Ahmed, editorial director of BBC News, had a very ‘British’ childhood in every way – except for the fact that he was half English and half Sudanese. Raised in 1970s London at a time when being mixed-race meant being told to go home, he now makes the case for a new conversation about race in Britain.

Not for Patching: A Strategic Welfare Review (Haus Publishing)

The Life and Times of a Very British Man (Bloomsbury)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 14) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

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SATURDAY 6th JULY

Simon Weller

Great Hall

Caroline Slocock

John Simpson

Robin Ince

John Simpson Friend or Foe

13

5.00pm

| Great Hall

Robin Ince

Laugh at Your Punch Line £11.00

BBC World Affairs Editor for more than half his 52year career, John Simpson has reported on major events all over the world. As a man who has seen many a real-life intrigue unfold in the halls of power, he explores the realm of murky Russian plots, conspiracies and assassinations in his latest work.

Moscow, Midnight (John Murray)

Printmakers’ Books An exhibition of handmade artists’ books in the Yurt on the Great Lawn OPEN 10am–6pm every day. Free entrance. Dartington Print Workshop presents a selection of personal, tactile and idiosyncratic books which can be physically handled and examined. DPW is a part of Dartington’s programme of education in art and craft, open to all and producing work of the highest quality. The show will be stewarded by printmakers willing to inform and explain. During the Festival there will be the opportunity to ‘make a book in a morning’ at the print Workshop in Shippon Yard, exploring simple printmaking techniques.

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 14) page 8

14

8.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Comedian, Robin Ince, uses his lifetime of standup as a way of exploring some of the biggest questions we all face. Offering personal insights and interviews with the world’s top comedians, neuroscientists and psychologists, he makes a hilarious and powerful call to embrace our inner experience – no matter how odd that may prove to be.

I’m a Joke and So Are You (Atlantic)

Amnestea The ever popular Amnestea will be served all day in the East Wing lounge. Enjoy a piping hot cup of tea and delicious cake. All proceeds go to Amnesty International.


SATURDAY 6th JULY

Barn

Politics and Change

Rachel Reeves

Jack Brown

John Rees

Rachel Reeves

John Rees

Westminster Women

15

10.00am

| Barn

Revolutionaries £10.00

Rachel Reeves, MP for Leeds West, explores the significant role of women in British politics. She brings forgotten MPs out of the shadows and looks at the many battles fought by the Women of Westminster from 1919 to 2019. Assessing significant achievements, from the earliest suffrage campaigns to Barbara Castle’s fight for equal pay, Rachel Reeves brings to light the political work of women too often overlooked.

Women of Westminster (IB Tauris)

| Barn

£10.00

The Levellers, who were formed out of the explosive and tumultuous 1640s and the battlefields of the Civil War, became central figures in the history of democracy. Author, broadcaster and activist John Rees will reassert the revolutionary nature of the 1642–51 wars and the role of ordinary people in this pivotal moment in history.

The Leveller Revolution (Verso)

Women of the 60s

Behind the Door at No.10 11.45am

1.30pm

Virginia Nicholson

Jack Brown

16

17

| Barn

£10.00

18

3.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

With perhaps the world’s most iconic front door, 10 Downing Street is the home and office of the British Prime Minister and the heart of British politics. As No.10’s first-ever Researcher in Residence, Jack Brown had unprecedented access to people and papers. He sheds new light on unexplored corners of Prime Ministers’ lives and delivers an intimate account of the building at the core of British political power.

It was known as a decade of revolution, peace, love, psychedelia and sexual abandonment, but did the world really change for women in the 1960s? Was the availability of ‘the pill’ on the NHS a liberation or a trap? Social historian, Virginia Nicholson, reveals how women who lived through those times look back on a decade supposedly devoted to sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll.

No.10: The Geography of Power at Downing Street (Haus Publishing)

How was it for you? Women, Sex, Love and Power in the 1960s (Viking)

Day Ticket for Barn: £40 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

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SATURDAY 6th JULY

Barn / Dukes Room

Oversteps Day Jenny Hockey, Antony Mair, Pat Leighton, Carol DeVaughn Rachel Louise Brown

Brand New

Caroline Criado-Perez

Caroline Criado-Perez 5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

In a world largely built by, and for, men, campaigner and writer, Caroline Criado-Perez, exposes the data bias and gender politics that have a profound effect on the health and wellbeing of women’s lives. She reveals the range of ways in which women are excluded from the very building blocks of the world we live in, from government policy and medical research to technology, workplaces and urban planning.

Invisible Women (Chatto & Windus)

| Dukes Room

10.00am

£7.00

We are pleased to introduce four new Oversteps poets who have been published in the past year.

Michael Thomas, James Turner, Joan McGavin, Andrew Nightingale Welcome Back

A Case for Change

19

20

21

11.30am

| Dukes Room

£7.00

All four poets have published with Oversteps Books in recent years, and we are delighted to welcome them back to read today.

Jenny Hockey, Antony Mair, Pat Leighton, Carol DeVaughn The Precious Planet

22

2.00pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

This morning’s readers will be joined by Christopher North, Hilary Elfick and Alwyn Marriage for a wide variety of readings of the love of our world.

Jenny Hockey, Antony Mair, Pat Leighton, Carol DeVaughn Love is in the Air

23

3.30pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

Christopher North, Hilary Elfick and Alwyn Marriage join the readers from the morning to continue on the themes of love for those with whom we share our lives.

Day Ticket for Barn: £40 page 10

Day Ticket for Dukes Room: £14


SUNDAY 7th JULY

Katie Hickman

Peter Stanford

Richard J. Evans

Katie Hickman

Richard J. Evans

British Women in India

24

11.00am

| Great Hall

Torsten Silz

Mykel Nicolaou

Great Hall

A Study of an Era £11.00

The first British women to set foot in India did so two and a half centuries before the Raj. As wives, courtesans and she-merchants, their voyages to India were daring leaps into the unknown. For some it was painful exile, but for many it was exhilarating. Through diaries, letters and memoirs, celebrated chronicler Katie Hickman uncovers their stories, until now hidden from history.

She-Merchants, Buccaneers and Gentlewomen: British Women in India 1600 – 1900 (Virago)

26

2.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

At the time of his death at the age of 95, Eric Hobsbawm was the most famous historian in the world and his writings had a huge and lasting effect on the practice of history. Richard J. Evans tells the story of Hobsbawm as an academic, but also as witness to history itself, and of the twentieth century’s major political and intellectual currents including the emergence of New Labour.

Eric Hobsbawm: A Life in History (Little Brown)

Peter Stanford Angelology

25

12.45pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

In a 2016 poll, one in ten Britons claimed to have experienced the presence of an angel. Author and journalist Peter Stanford explores our fascination with angels and examines their history and role in the great faiths. Could angels be a manifestation of divinity? Or part of the poetry of religion? What is the cultural significance of a religious idea in a secular, sceptical post-Christian world?

Angels ( Hodder & Stoughton)

Michael Honnor

Book Making Workshop 10.00am–1.00pm

| Shippon Yard

£50.00

These intriguing and energetic workshops offer the chance to explore fascinating printmaking techniques, make images, add a word or two and sew the result into your own small handmade book - all in the space of three hours. Simple concluding lunch provided. Call to book 07779 731824

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £36 (not including event 28) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

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SUNDAY 7th JULY

Great Hall

Simon Winder

Satish Kumar

Simon Winder

Satish Kumar

In-Between Europe

27

4.15pm

| Great Hall

Consume Less and Celebrate More £11.00

Continuing his hilarious informative and personal exploration of European history, author of ‘Germania’ Simon Winder turns his attention to the history of in-between Europe and tells the story of Lotharingia – a place between places. He retraces the various powers that have tried to overtake the land that stretches from the mouth of the Rhine to the Alps and the might of the peoples who have lived there for centuries.

Lotharingia - A Personal History of Europe’s

Lost Country (Picador)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £36 (not including event 28) page 12

28

7.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Consumerism drives the pursuit of happiness in much of the world, yet as wealth grows unhappiness abounds. Environmental thought leader and former monk, Satish Kumar, distills five decades of reflection and wisdom into a guide for everyone seeking a life that prioritises the ecological integrity of the Earth, social equity, and personal tranquility and happiness.

Elegant Simplicity: The Art of Living Well (New Sociey Publishers)


SUNDAY 7th JULY

Barn

Charlie Burrell

Environmental

Isabella Tree

Mary Colwell

Mike Berners-Lee

Isabella Tree

Mike Berners-Lee

Rewilding Knepp

29

11.00am

| Barn

£10.00

Isabella Tree tells the story of a pioneering rewilding project at Knepp in West Sussex. Forced to accept that intensive farming on the heavy clay of their land was economically unsustainable, Isabella Tree and her husband Charlie Burrell decided to step back and let nature take over. The introduction of free-roaming cattle, ponies, pigs and deer – proxies of the large animals that once roamed Britain – saw extraordinary increases in wildlife numbers and diversity in little over a decade.

Wilding (Picador)

| Barn

31

2.30pm

| Barn

£10.00

Expert in sustainability and climate change Mike Berners-Lee discusses our biggest environmental and economic challenges including energy, climate change, food, plastic pollution, antibiotics and biodiversity. He offers a realistic alternative to the destructive path the world is on at the moment.

There is no Planet B (Cambridge University Press)

Wonders of Rock Pools

The Cry of the Curlew 12.45pm

What Can we do to Combat Climate Change?

Heather Buttivant

Mary Colwell

30

Heather Buttivant

£10.00

Curlew numbers have declined by 50% over the last 22 years. Natural history producer Mary Colwell undertook a 500-mile journey following the bird from nesting in Ireland, to incubating eggs in Wales and fledging chicks in Norfolk, to find out what was happening to our largest wading bird. She believes there is still time to avoid extinction, provided we act now.

Curlew Moon (William Collins)

32

4.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

The British beach is full of creatures that we think we know - from crabs to clams, starfish to anemones. But, in fact, we barely understand how many survive or thrive. Environmentalist and rockpooling addict Heather Buttivant, gives an eyeopening account of the curious creatures inhabiting this alien underwater world between the tides.

Rock Pool: Extraordinary Encounters Between the Tides (September Publishing)

Day Ticket for Barn: £32 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 13


SUNDAY 7th JULY

Virginia Baily

Nahla Summers

Stephen Matthews

Stephen Matthews

Carol Ballenger and John Powls

The Church that Sarah Built

33

11.00am

| Dukes Room

Dukes Room

£7.00

Lakeland publisher and writer, Stephen Matthews, tells the story of Sarah Losh who in 1842 built the church at Wreay in Cumbria. She was the architect, works manager and sculptor. The building is an intellectual and poetic fantasy, a unique creation that defies all the conventions of the age. In its philosophy her work anticipates the Arts and Crafts movement by half a century.

Collaborations

35

2.30pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

Sarah Losh and Wreay Church (Bookcase)

Photographer Carol Ballenger and poet John Powls discuss their methods of working collaboratively for over twenty years, with examples from five published books. Poets Susan Taylor and Simon Williams, writing in response to Carol’s photographs, join Carol and John in presenting examples from ‘Sea Songs’ and ‘Defining Treescapes’ against a backdrop of projected images.

Virginia Baily

Nahla Summers Acts of Kindness

Secrets of the Lost Territory

34

12.45pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

36

4.15pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

Author Virginia Baily’s new novel takes us to the Tripoli coast of 1929; an engrossing and intensely poignant story of a woman’s journey through a world of persecution and corruption. What awaits her is not an idyll of cocktail parties and dashing adventures, instead violence and repression in the ‘lost’ territory Mussolini promised to reclaim for Italy.

Last year Nahla Summers cycled 3,000 miles across the USA, but instead of being sponsored in cash for a cause, her supporters donated acts of kindness to strangers. Nahla, who describes herself as a social change maker, a transformative coach, a podcaster and accidental adventurer, tells the story of what led her to this epic journey, and explains how spreading acts of kindness can change the world one person at a time.

The Fourth Shore (Fleet)

44 Rays of Sunshine

Day Ticket for Dukes Room: £20 page 14


MONDAY 8th JULY

Great Hall

Sabrina Cohen-Hatton

Phil Lancaster

Sabrina Cohen-Hatton

The Most Difficult Decisions Imaginable - Who Lives and Who Dies?

37

10.00am

|

Great Hall

£11.00

Dr Sabrina Cohen-Hatton, who has been a firefighter for eighteen years, decides which of her colleagues rush into a burning building or makes the call to evacuate if the situation has escalated beyond hope. She reveals the decision-making skills that are essential to surviving – and even thriving – in such a fast-paced and emotionally-charged environment.

The Heat of the Moment: Life and Death

Decision-Making From a Firefighter (Doubleday)

38

11.45am

| Great Hall

Steve Jones

The Sun - Our Nearest Star

39

1.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Our sun drives the weather, forms the landscape, feeds and fuels - but sometimes destroys - the creatures that live upon it and controls their patterns of activity. Geneticist Professor Steve Jones shows how life on Earth is ruled by our nearest star and the genetic and evolutionary effects of sunlight on snails, fruit-flies and people.

Here Comes the Sun (Little, Brown)

Phil Lancaster

David Bowie and Me

Deborah Moggach Growing Old

Steve Jones

Deborah Moggach

40 £11.00

Deborah Moggach, bestselling author of ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’ and ‘Tulip Fever’, discusses her latest novel ‘The Carer’, which explores the idea that life most definitely does not stop for the elderly – it just moves onto a very different plane, full of surprising twists and turns.

The Carer (Tinder Press)

3.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Throughout iconic musician David Bowie’s transition from pop group member to solo performer, Phil Lancaster was by his side. As the drummer in Bowie’s band Phil was there as the singer’s musical stripes began to show, and was witness to his early recording techniques, his first experimental forays into drug-taking, and the band’s discovery of his bisexuality.

At the Birth of Bowie: Life with the Man Who Became a Legend (John Blake)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 42) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 15


MONDAY 8th JULY

Great Hall

David Owen

Daisy Hay

David Owen

Daisy Hay

Making Sense of Donald Trump

41

5.00pm

| Great Hall

Frankenstein - Brilliant Chaos £11.00

Recent leaders have been depressives, alcoholics, narcissists, populists and those affected by hubris syndrome and driven by their religious beliefs, such as Bush and Blair. But Donald Trump presents a completely different set of issues. Former Foreign Secretary David Owen analyses the mental and physical condition of political leaders, past and present, and explores how they paved the way for President Trump.

Hubris - The Road to Donald Trump (Methuen

Publishing Ltd)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 42) page 16

42

8.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

In the 200 years since its first publication, Mary Shelley’s story of Frankenstein’s creation during stormy days and nights at Byron’s Villa Diodati on Lake Geneva has become literary legend. Professor of English Literature at Exeter University, Daisy Hay, returns to the objects, portraits, illustrations and artefacts of the novel’s genesis in order to assemble its story anew.

The Making of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (The Bodleian Library)


MONDAY 8th JULY

Barn

Stories of Life

Dave Goulson

Unappreciated Heroes of the Natural World

Howard Sooley

45

Dave Goulson

Madeleine Bunting

Peter Moore

The Extraordinary Life of Endeavour

43

10.00am

|

Barn

£10.00

The voyage of HM Bark Endeavour is perhaps the most significant in the history of British exploration. Commanded by James Cook, the vessel brought Europeans astonishing new insights into the geography, natural history and people of Oceania. But what of the ship herself? Peter Moore tells the story of the extraordinary life of Endeavour.

Endeavour: The Ship and Attitude that Saved the World (Chatto & Windus)

Wartime Secrets and Hidden Histories 11.45am

| Barn

| Barn

£10.00

Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Sussex, Dave Goulson investigates the intriguing, sometimes weird habits of the creatures that live right under our noses. He looks at how our lives are intertwined with that of earwigs, bees, lacewings and hoverflies and explores the environmental damage inadvertently done by gardeners, and how with a few small changes our gardens can become a network of tiny nature reserves.

The Garden Jungle (Jonathan Cape)

Laura Cumming

My Mother and Other Missing Persons

46

3.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

Uncovering the mystery of her mother’s disappearance as a child: art critic and author Laura Cumming takes a penetrating look at her family story. Humble objects light up her narrative: a pie dish, a carved box, tickets, recipe books and pictures of all kinds, from paintings to photographs, open up doors to the truth.

On Chapel Sands (Chatto & Windus)

Madeleine Bunting

44

1.30pm

£10.00

Lorna Gibb

Stories of Longing, Loss and Resistance

47

5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

Best-selling author of non-fiction titles including ‘The Plot’ and ‘Love of Country’, Madeleine Bunting talks about the challenges of researching and writing her first novel. Set on Guernsey, ‘Island Song’ brings to life a largely untold experience of WWII. She discusses the psychological toll of living under German occupation and the messy reality of human relationships in a tightly knit island community.

Childlessness touches everyone – from the playgrounds of Glasgow to the villages of Bangladesh; from religious rites to ancient superstitions; from the world’s richest people to its powerless and enslaved. Lorna Gibb paints a global portrait of people without children – those who long, those who were denied, and those who choose.

Island Song (Granta)

Childless Voices (Granta)

Day Ticket for Barn: £40 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 17


TUESDAY 9th JULY

Angela Levin

Elizabeth Jane Burnett

Angela Levin

Prince Harry - From Reckless Rebel to Respected Role Model

48

10.00am

| Great Hall

£11.00

Prince Harry is one of the world’s most popular royals. Journalist Angela Levin, had exclusive access to him. She delves into his troubled childhood and the lasting effect of losing his adored mother, Diana, Princess of Wales. She unpicks the defining moments that have enabled him to face his demons and use his experience to help others who struggle with mental, emotional and physical pain.

Harry: Conversations with the Prince

Roots and Belonging

| Great Hall

A Life in Comedy

50

1.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

After a 30-year career in the comedy industry, the multi award winning producer behind Absolutely Fabulous, The Office, Little Britain, The League of Gentlemen, French and Saunders and Fry and Laurie Jon Plowman tells the uncensored story of how TV comedy works, from the first germ of an idea to the after-party at the Emmys. Comedy Bronze (Bonnier Books)

Louis de Berniéres 3.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

The Grassling (Allen Lane) Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 53)

£11.00

Prize winning author and poet, Louis de Berniéres, returns to themes that have characterised his work for many years. The latest novel ‘So Much Life Left Over’ and collection of poetry ‘The Cat in the Treble Clef’ explore profound personal stories and human connections. He discusses his creative life and the different challenges of writing a novel and a poem. See also ‘Captain Corelli’s Mandarin’ on page 20 Sponsored by

Spurred on by her father’s declining health and inspired by the history he once wrote of his small Devon village Ide, Elizabeth-Jane Burnett delves through layers of memory, language and natural history to tell a powerful story of how the land shapes us and speaks to us.

page 18

Louis de Berniéres

Jon Plowman

51

Elizabeth Jane Burnett 11.45am

Jon Plowman

Captain Corelli and Beyond

(John Blake)

49

Ivon Bartholomew

Graham Shackleton

Great Hall

So Much Life Left Over (Harvill Secker); The Cat in the Treble Clef (Harvill Secker)


TUESDAY 9th JULY

Urszula Soltys

Great Hall / Dukes Room

Joseph O’Connor

Billy ‘Scratch’ Hitchen

Joseph O’Connor 5.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

International best-selling author of ‘Star of the Sea’, Joseph O’Connor, discusses his latest novel ‘Shadowplay’ which explores the complexities of love that stand dangerously outside social convention, the restlessness of creativity, and the experiences that led Bram Stoker to write Dracula, the most iconic supernatural tale of all time.

Shadowplay (Harvill Secker)

Adventures at Sea 8.00pm

| Great Hall

(Workshop) A Journey into the Travel Journal

FE1

11am–1pm

| Dukes Room

£16.00

A workshop exploring techniques and ideas to enrich your writing and the experiences of travel Part 1 Loosening the pen and the imagination and Part 2 Capturing experiences on the wing. We will look at examples, discuss techniques and try some experiments - bring notebook/journal and a pen.

Linda Blair

Billy ‘Scratch’ Hitchen

53

Linda Blair

Christopher North

The Inspiration of Bram Stoker

52

Christopher North

£11.00

Easter, 1963 - the end of the school holidays approaching, but instead of returning to school, Billy Hitchen ran away to sea aged 14. Before the age of 19 he had sailed round the world five times. In 1973, he returned home to Salcombe in South Devon and went on to spend the next three decades fishing in every sea area, from Devon to Rockall.

Scratch, a Salcombe Boy (Troubador Publishing)

(Workshop) Beyond Mindfulness

FE2

2.00-4.30pm

| Dukes Room

£16.00

Mindfulness, although a valuable way to help you feel calm and balanced, is really only the starting point if you want to enjoy a truly fulfilling life. Psychologist Linda Blair will help you understand your personality traits, creative passions and intelligence profile and learn how to declutter and simplify your life.

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 53) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 19


TUESDAY 9th JULY

Great Hall

Science of the Mind & Body David Nott

Surgery on the Front Line

Simon Weller

Annabel Moeller

56

Hannah Critchlow

David Nott

1.30pm

| Barn

£10.00

War Doctor David Nott has spent the last 25 years taking unpaid leave from the NHS to volunteer in some of the world’s most dangerous war zones. Driven by compassion and the thrill of extreme personal danger, he is now widely acknowledged to be the most experienced trauma surgeon in the world.

War Doctor (Picador)

Robert Plomin

The Genomic Revolution

57

Hannah Critchlow Does Free Will Exist?

54

10.00am

|

Barn

£10.00

Many of us believe that we are free to shape our own destiny. But what if free will doesn’t exist, our lives are largely predetermined, hardwired in our brains, and our choices over what we eat, who we fall in love with, even what we believe are not real choices at all? Such questions are tackled by Science Outreach Fellow at Magdalene College, Cambridge, Hannah Critchlow.

Making Sense of Childhood

55

11.45am

| Barn

£10.00

For more than 40 years child psychiatrist, Mike Shooter, has listened to children and adolescents in crisis, helping them to find their stories and begin to make sense of their lives. He sheds light on the painful issues and universal experience of growing up.

Growing Pains (Hodder & Stoughton)

£10.00

Blueprint: How DNA makes us who we are (Allen Lane)

58

Captain Corelli’s Mandolin 5.00pm

| Barn

£7.00

(Cert 15, running time: 124 mins) Hollywood adaptation of Louis de Bernières’ novel set on the Italian-occupied Greek island of Cephalonia during the 1940s. Opera-loving mandolin player Captain Corelli (Nicolas Cage) finds the population resentful when he first arrives on the island. But soon his involvement with local beauty Pelagia (Penelope Cruz) helps him form a bond with the local community and he starts to question his own involvement in the war. EVENT 59 Book events 51 & 58 together for £16.00

Day Ticket for Barn: £32 (not including events 58 and 59) page 20

| Barn

A pioneer in the field of genetics and world expert on twin studies, Robert Plomin, makes the controversial case that DNA is the most important factor in shaping who we are. Our families, schools and immediate environment are important he maintains but not as influential as our genes.

The Science of Fate (Hodder & Stoughton)

Mike Shooter

3.15pm


Booking Your Tickets

It’s easy to book your tickets for Ways with Words Dartington Festival 2019 – book online, by phone, by post or in person.

Ticket Sales ONLINE

YOUR DETAILS Name Address

www.wayswithwords.co.uk (from 3rd June)

BY PHONE

Postcode

Telephone: 01803 867373

Tel.

Telephone lines are open 10am– 5pm, Monday–Friday.

E-mail

Please have your event numbers and your payment card ready before phoning. We accept Visa and Mastercard.

BOOKING FOR FRIENDS STARTS TUESDAY 28TH MAY

BY POST

GENERAL BOOKING STARTS MONDAY 3RD JUNE

Please complete this form and send with cheque and stamped s.a.e. to: Ways With Words Festival Box Office, Droridge Farm, Dartington, Totnes, Devon TQ9 6JG Please make cheques payable to ‘Ways With Words’.

IN PERSON During the festival the box office, on-site at Dartington Hall, will open 30 minutes before the first event of the day and will close after the start of the last event of the day. Please note: Before the festival starts the box office operates off-site and is open for telephone, postal and online sales only (see above).

• Maximum 4 tickets per event • For phone and postal bookings only

CONCESSIONS People aged 24 or under and people on benefits can buy tickets normally priced at £11 or less for just £5 if purchased in person during the festival. We operate a ‘carers go free’ policy for people in receipt of Carer’s Allowance. Proof of entitlement for the above will be required.

DATA PROTECTION Ways With Words will not pass on your details to any other organisation.

TERMS & CONDITIONS The right is reserved to substitute speakers and vary the advertised programme if necessary. All information is correct at the time of going to press. Please refer to our website (wayswithwords.co.uk) for full details of our policy on cancellations, ticket refunds and exchanges, and on lost tickets.

Cancellations, refunds, exchanges and lost tickets policy – see p40 or wayswithwords.co.uk

page 21


EVENT

eg

A. N. Author

|

PRICE No. £ 11

|

£11

| | | | | | | | | |

FRIDAY 5th JULY 1 2 3 4 5 ▲

6 7 8 ▲

| Stephen Moss | Dom Joly | John Crace | Matt Harvey | Great Hall Day Ticket (1–3) | Martin Brown | Sam Willis and James Daybell | Gelong Thubten | Barn Day Ticket (6–8) | Joseph Stigliz

£11 £11 £11 £11 £27 £10 £10 £10 £24

SATURDAY 6th JULY 9 10 11 12 13 14 ▲

15 16 17 18 19 ▲

20 21 22 23 ▲

| Frank Field | Caroline Slocock | Kamal Ahmed | John Simpson | Robin Ince | Great Hall Day Ticket (9–13) | Rachel Reeves | Jack Brown | John Rees | Virginia Nicholson | Caroline Criado-Perez | Barn Day Ticket (15–19) | Hockey, Mair, Leighton, DeVaughn | Thomas, Turner, McGavin, Nightingale | Hockey, Mair, Leighton, DeVaughn | Hockey, Mair, Leighton, DeVaughn | Dukes Day Ticket (20–23) | Gelong Thubten

SUNDAY 7th JULY 24 25 26 27 28

Richard J. Evans

Great Hall Day Ticket (24–27)

Katie Hickman Peter Stanford Simon Winder Satish Kumar

29 30 31 32

Heather Buttivant

Barn Day Ticket (29–32)

Isabella Tree Mary Colwell Mike Berners-Lee

33 Stephen Matthews 34 Virginia Baily 35 Carol Ballenger & John Powls 36 Nahla Summers ▲

Dukes Day Ticket (33–36)

page 22

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £45 £10 £10 £10 £10 £10 £40 £7 £7 £7 £7 £14

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £36 £10 £10 £10 £10 £32 £7 £7 £7 £7 £20

3

TOTAL

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

33

EVENT

TOTAL

|

£11

| | | | | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

£32

| | | | | | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

WEDNESDAY 10th JULY 60 Mark Leigh | £11 61 Rachel Trethewey | £11 62 Maggie Oliver | £11 63 Chris Mullin | £11 64 Alison Weir | £11 65 Melissa Benn | £11 ▲ Great Hall Day Ticket (60–64) | £45 66 Marion Turner | £10 67 Naoko Abe | £10 68 Henry Eliot | £10 69 Anne de Courcy | £10 70 Victoria Bateman | £10 ▲ Barn Day Ticket (66–70) | £40

| | | | | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

A. N. Author

MONDAY 8th JULY 37 38 39 40 41 42

Sabrina Cohen-Hatton

Great Hall Day Ticket (37–41)

43 44 45 46 47 ▲

Deborah Moggach Steve Jones Phil Lancaster David Owen Daisy Hay Peter Moore Madeleine Bunting Dave Goulson Laura Cumming Lorna Gibb Barn Day Ticket (42–46)

|

PRICE No. £ 11

eg

| | | | | | | | | | | | |

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £45 £10 £10 £10 £10 £10 £40

TUESDAY 9th JULY 48 49 50 51 52 53 ▲

54 55 56 57 58 59 ▲

| | Jon Plowman | Louis de Berniéres | Joseph O’Connor | Billy ‘Scratch’ Hitchen | Great Hall Day Ticket (48–52) | Hannah Critchlow | Mike Shooter | David Nott | Robert Plomin | FILM: Captain Corelli’s Mandolin | Talk and Film (events 51 & 58) | Barn Day Ticket (54–57) | Angela Levin

£11

Elizabeth Jane Burnett

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £45 £10 £10 £10 £10 £7 £16

3

33

Book online, by phone or by post – see page 21 for full details


EVENT

eg

|

A. N. Author

THURSDAY 11th JULY 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 ▲

Jonathan Bate Wilfred Emmanuel Jones Sonia Purnell Jane Jelley Gina Rippon Lindsey Hilsum Chris Bonington Great Hall Day Ticket (71–75)

78 79 80 81 82

Matthew L. Tompkins

Barn Day Ticket (78–82)

83 84 85 86

Jacqueline Sarsby

Called to the Edge Poets

Dukes Day Ticket (83–86)

Hugh St. Clair Alex Woodcock Jill Burke Naomi Wood

Joe Richards Andy Christian

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

PRICE No. £ 11

|

£11

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £45 £10 £10 £10 £10 £10 £40 £7 £7 £7 £7 £20

FRIDAY 12th JULY 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 ▲

94 95 96 97 98 ▲

| | Nicholas Crane | Viv Groskop | Patrick Gale | Robert Hardman | Natalie Haynes | Great Hall Day Ticket (87–91) | Johnny Mains | Anna Turns & Geetie Singh-Watson | Eleanor Anstruther | Kate Clanchy | Hallie Rubenhold | Barn Day Ticket (94–98) | Annabel Abbs

£11

Ollie Ollerton

£11

Ticket Total

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £45 £10 £10 £10 £10 £10 £40

| | | | | | | | | | | | | |

3

TOTAL

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

£

Add Annual Friends’ Membership (£20)*

33

EVENT

eg

|

A. N. Author

PRICE No.

|

£11

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

| | | | | | | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£ |£

| | | | |

|£ |£ |£ |£ |£

SATURDAY 13th JULY

| | | | | | | ▲ Great Hall Day Ticket (99–103) | 107 Paul Conroy | 108 Clare Rewcastle Brown | 109 Zeba Talkhani | 110 Sara Wheeler | 111 Lalage Snow | ▲ Barn Day Ticket (107–111) | 106 Andrew Wilson |

99 Anna Pasternak 100 Marcus du Sautoy 101 Diarmaid MacCulloch 102 Christopher Somerville 103 Kurt Jackson 104 Ben Okri 105 Patten, Harvey, Williams & Taylor

£11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £11 £45 £10 £10 £10 £10 £10 £40 £7

SUNDAY 14th JULY

| | | | ▲ Great Hall Day Ticket (112–114) | 116 Oliver Morton | 117 Steven Connor | 118 Mark Miodownik | 119 Rob Hopkins | ▲ Barn Day Ticket (116–119) |

112 Polly Toynbee & David Walker 113 Nick Bilbrough 114 Julian Baggini 115 David Nicholls (inc book)

FESTIVAL EXTRAS FE1 FE2 FE3 FE4 FE5

Christopher North Tue 9 Linda Blair Tue 9 Christopher North Wed 10

Total

Linda Blair Wed 10 Murder Mystery Sat 13

| | | | |

TOTAL

£ 11

£11 £11 £11 £25 £27 £10 £10 £10 £10 £32

£16 £16 £16 £16 £30

3

33

£

* Friends receive, by post, a printed copy of each programme for Ways With Words in Dartington, Cumbria and Southwold, newsletters and an invitation to the launch parties at Dartington and Cumbria as well as exclusive Friends’ only events.

Full details on our cancellations, refunds, exchanges and lost tickets policy at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 23


Rover Tickets and Accommodation Packages Rover Tickets

Accommodation Packages

Rover tickets give admission to the numbered events in the programme over a particular period. They can be bought separately or as part of an inclusive accommodation package.

Ways With Words offers 10-night accommodation packages (ranging from £1123–1750pp) and two 5-night packages (from £562–£945) in Higher Close or in the Courtyard at Dartington Hall. We also offer two 3-night weekend packages (from £361pp) and a 4-night midweek package (from £504pp) in Higher Close.

Note: Festival Extras’, marked ‘FE’ must be purchased separately. A Rover ticket guarantees a seat for every event in the Great Hall. We hold a set number of seats for Rover ticket holders in the Barn and other, smaller venues. These are on a first come, first served basis. To purchase Rover tickets please write the number you require in the box and then make payment as indicated on the front of the booking form.

10-day Rover ticket (Price: £385) Admission to all numbered events (see above)

All packages include a Rover ticket in the price. If you are interested in an accommodation package please phone 01803 867373 and we can advise on availability and give more details.

Bed & Breakfast

5-day Rover ticket (Price: £260) 1st 5-day Rovers begin with event 1 on Friday 5th July and end at 12.45pm on Wednesday 10th July. 2nd 5-day Rovers begin with 1.30pm event on Wednesday 10th July until the end of Sunday 14th July Midweek 5-day Rovers run from Monday 8th July to Friday 12th July

Weekend Rover tickets (Price: £160) 1st weekend Rovers begin with event 1 on Friday 5th July and end with the last event on Sunday 7th July 2nd weekend Rovers begin on Friday 12th July at 1.30pm until the end of Sunday 14th July

page 24

Accommodation varies from comfortable, en suite bedrooms right in the heart of the festival site to single, student bedrooms (which share bathroom facilities) about 2 minutes walk from the site. Along with your room and breakfast, packages include dinner or lunch and dinner.

Bed & Breakfast accommodation is available in Higher Close (single rooms sharing bathroom facilities) at £36 pp/pn. There is a 2-night and 2 tickets per night’s stay minimum purchase.

TO MAKE A RESERVATION for an accommodation/Rover package or B&B please phone 01803 867373 Payment in full is required at the time of booking. Cancellations cannot be refunded. Customers are strongly advised to take out holiday insurance.

Book online, by phone or by post – see page 21 for full details


WEDNESDAY 10th JULY

Great Hall

Maggie Oliver

Mark Leigh

Rachel Trethewey

Mark Leigh

Maggie Oliver

A Guide to the Modern World for the Easily Perplexed

60

10.00am

|

Great Hall

£11.00

Mark Leigh offers definitions for the elderly and not-soelderly who are bamboozled by the technology of the contemporary world that the more youthful take for granted. He demystifies a host of modern concepts, conceits and technologies that have entered everyday use and parlance but which are alien.

The Older Person’s Guide to New Stuff (Robinson)

Rachel Trethewey

Edward VIII - The Women he Loved and Lost

61

11.45am

| Great Hall

£11.00

Wallis Simpson is known as the woman who stole the King’s heart and rocked the monarchy – but she was not Edward VIII’s first or only love. Rachel Trethewey explores three love affairs that could have changed the course of history and how the heir to the throne behaved like a child craving affection, resorting to emotional blackmail to keep his lovers with him.

Before Wallis: Edward VIII’s Other Women (The History Press)

One-Woman’s Campaign to Fight for Justice

62

1.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

When detective Maggie Oliver first discovered that children as young as 10 were being groomed, abused and trafficked for sex by gangs of men in the Rochdale area, she felt like a lonely voice calling for people to act. She explains how she couldn’t just sit back while young lives were being destroyed. Instead, she blew the whistle, losing her job and - at times - her mind, in a bid to stop others from experiencing the same.

Survivors: One Brave Detective’s Battle to Expose the Rochdale Child Abuse Scandal (John Blake)

Chris Mullin

A Vision of Post-Brexit Britain

63

3.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Thirty-five years after the publication of ‘A Very British Coup’, former Labour MP, Chris Mullin, has written a timely sequel ‘The Friends of Harry Perkins’. In this novel the fault lines forged in the white heat of the referendum have become entrenched features of British political life, power does not come without a personal price and shadowy forces are at work behind the scenes.

The Friends of Harry Perkins (Scribner UK)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 65) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 25


WEDNESDAY 10th JULY Great Hall / Dukes Room

Chris Mullin

Alison Weir

Anna of Kleve - Passion and Courage

64

5.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

In her latest novel, acclaimed historian and author, Alison Weir, draws on new evidence to conjure a startling image of Anna of Kleve, Henry VIII’s much-maligned fourth wife, as a charming, spirited woman, loved by all who knew her - and even, ultimately, by the King who rejected her.

Anna of Kleve, Queen of Secrets (Headline)

Melissa Benn

A Radical Agenda

65

8.00pm

|

Great Hall

Christopher North

(Workshop) A Journey into the Travel Journal

FE3

11am–1pm

| Dukes Room

£16.00

A workshop exploring techniques and ideas to enrich your writing and the experiences of travel - Part 1 Loosening the pen and the imagination and Part 2 capturing experiences on the wing. We will look at examples, discuss techniques and try some experiments - bring notebook/ journal and a pen.

Linda Blair £11.00

Journalist and writer, Melissa Benn, makes a timely and provocative plea for a National Education Service. She argues that our education system has been damaged by politicians who have arrogantly imposed a regime of market-driven reforms and that we need a more equitable education system to prevent stagnation and decline in our school system.

Life Lessons (Verso)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including event 65) page 26

Melissa Benn

Alison Weir

(Workshop) Beyond Mindfulness

FE4

2pm–4.30pm

| Dukes Room £16.00

Mindfulness, although a valuable way to help you feel calm and balanced, is really only the starting point if you want to enjoy a truly fulfilling life. Psychologist Linda Blair will help you understand your personality traits, creative passions and intelligence profile and learn how to declutter and simplify your life.


WEDNESDAY 10th JULY

Barn

Historical Perspectives Henry Eliot

Romantic Literature – A Global History, from Sappho to Sontag

68

Victoria Bateman

Henry Eliot

| Barn

£10.00

The Penguin Classics Book (Particular Books)

Anne de Courcy

Peace and War on the Cote d’Azur

Chaucer – A Cosmopolitan Life 10.00am

| Barn

Literature has revolved around love since the first named poet, the Mesopotamian princess Enheduanna, wrote a hymn praising her love goddess Inanna. Love has been the subject of Greek lyrics, Roman epics, medieval romances, Renaissance sonnets, Enlightenment philosophy, nineteenthcentury novels and 21st-century fan fiction. Henry Eliot traces the changing forms of love, with lots of romantic book recommendations along the way.

Marion Turner

66

1.30pm

£10.00

69

3.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

Chaucer was captured by the French in the Hundred Years War, saw slave markets in Genoa, lived through the Black Death and was influenced by paintings of Giotto in Florence. Through focussing on the art he saw, the streets he travelled and buildings he lived in, Marion Turner – the first female biographer of Chaucer – casts a new light on the celebrated poet.

Transport yourself to the golden, glamorous world of the French Riviera in the Spring of 1938, where at its heart was the enigmatic Coco Chanel. Social historian, Anne de Courcy, explores the lives of the Cote d’Azur elite in the 1930s and 40s – a period that saw some of the deepest extremes of luxury and terror in the twentieth century.

Chaucer: A European Life (Princeton University Press)

Chanel’s Riviera (Weidenfeld & Nicholson)

Naoko Abe

Victoria Bateman

Cherry

67

11.45am

How Women Made the West Rich

| Barn

£10.00

Cherry Blossom, or sakura, the national flower of Japan represents the fragility and beauty of life. Naoko Abe examines the political and cultural heritage of the flowers and tells the story of Collingwood ‘Cherry’ Ingam, an English botanist whose passion for Japanese cherry blossom saved the tai haku cherry (among others) from extinction.

Cherry Ingram: The Englishman who Saved the Blossoms for Japan (Chatto & Windus)

70

5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

Prominent feminist Victoria Bateman leads calls for a sexual revolution in economics and has conducted high profile ‘naked protests’ to highlight the marginalization of women’s bodies in public life. The fellow in economics at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge says to understand the burning economic issues of our time we need to put sex and gender at the heart of the picture.

The Sex Factor (Polity Books)

Day Ticket for Barn: £40 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 27


THURSDAY 11th JULY

Wilfred Emmanuel Jones

Jonathan Bate

Jonathan Bate 10.00am

| Great Hall

£11.00

How the Classics Made Shakespeare (Princeton University Press)

Wilfred Emmanuel Jones

72

|

73

£11.00

Award-winning entrepreneur, Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, remortgaged his house in 2005 to launch his brand ‘The Black Farmer’ from nothing and now enjoys an annual turnover of several million. From a deprived childhood in inner-city Birmingham to becoming one of the nation’s most famous farmers, he argues that only by embracing jeopardy, and liberating ourselves from uncertainty and self-doubt, can we realise our full potential.

Jeopardy: The Danger of Playing It Safe on the Path to Success (Piatkus)

| Great Hall

£11.00

In 1942, the Gestapo would stop at nothing to track down a mysterious ‘limping lady’. The target was Virginia Hall. Biographer and journalist, Sonia Purnell, shares this inspiring story of a glamorous American with a wooden leg who broke through the barriers against her gender and disability to be the first woman to infiltrate Vichy France and helped turn the course of the intelligence war.

A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of WWII’s Most Dangerous Spy, Virginia Hall (Virago)

Vermeer - A Detective Story

74

3.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Johannes Vermeer’s luminous paintings are loved and admired around the world, yet we do not understand how they were made. The few traces Vermeer has left behind tell us little: there are no letters or diaries; and no reports of him at work. Painter and art historian, Jane Jelley, unlocks the studio door, and offers a glimpse of Vermeer at work.

Traces of Vermeer (Oxford University Press)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including events 76 and 77) page 28

1.30pm

Jane Jelley

Embracing Jeopardy

Great Hall

Jane Jelley

Heroism and Spycraft

Ben Jonson famously accused Shakespeare of having small Latin and less Greek. However, acclaimed literary critic and biographer Jonathan Bate argues that the Greek and Roman classics forged Shakespeare. Mapping the influence of Cicero and Horace on Shakespeare’s work, he finds new links between the Bard’s work and classical traditions, ranging from myths and magic to monuments and politics.

11.45am

Sonia Purnell

Sonia Purnell

Shakespeare and the Classics

71

Great Hall


THURSDAY 11th JULY

Robert Wilson

ITN Channel 4 News

Great Hall

Lindsey Hilsum

Chris Bonington

Gina Rippon

Chris Bonington

Mind the Gender Gap

75

5.00pm

| Great Hall

The Top of the Mountain £11.00

Reading maps or reading emotions? Do you have a female brain or a male brain? Drawing on her life’s work as a Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging, Gina Rippon unpacks the stereotypes that bombard us from our earliest moments and explores how centuries of sexism has led to science asking the wrong questions.

The Gendered Brain (Bodley Head)

77

8.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Having undertaken 19 Himalayan expeditions, including four to Mount Everest, mountaineer and explorer Chris Bonington talks about what it takes to conquer fear, how to survive in the most inhospitable places on earth and overcome physical and emotional obstacles.

Ascent (Simon and Schuster)

Lindsey Hilsum

Reporting From the Front Line

76

6.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Glamorous and hard-drinking war reporter Marie Colvin sought to bear witness to the horrifying truths of war from the most dangerous places in the world, going in further and staying longer than anyone else. Fellow foreign correspondent Lindsey Hilsum shares the extraordinary life and tragic death of the most daring war reporter of her time.

In Extremis: The Life of War Correspondent Marie Colvin (Chatto & Windus)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including events 76 and 77) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 29


THURSDAY 11th JULY

Barn

Art, Imagination & Illusion Jill Burke

The Artistic Nude in Renaissance Italy

Rachel Hippolyte

80

Matthew L. Tompkins

Naomi Wood

| Barn

£10.00

British Surrealist Arthur Lett-Haines and painter Cedric Morris founded the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing where Lucien Freud and Maggi Hambling found their ambition and focus. Hugh St Clair illuminates the lives of two men who were at the centre of the art world in Paris and London in the 1920s and 1930s and later were hugely influential in the field of gardening and cookery.

A Lesson in Art and Life (Pimpernel Press)

Adventures in Forgotten Sculpture 11.45am

| Barn

£10.00

As a stonemason who worked on the west front of Exeter Cathedral for six years, Alex Woodcock’s life has been shaped by a love of Romanesque sculpture. It was in his 30s as a medieval scholar when he first carved stone. Alex Woodcock discusses the potency of ancient stone carvings and how stone connects us through time.

King of Dust (Little Toller) Day Ticket for Barn: £40 page 30

Why is western art full of naked people? Looking at artworks by Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and others, Jill Burke discusses the inception of the artistic nude in Renaissance Italy and asks how people understood real-life nakedness and considers how the nude reflected assumptions about sexuality, gender, race and power.

The Renaissance Nude (Yale University Press)

81

3.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

It was a photograph of students dressed as the Moon, robots and skyscrapers at the Metal Ball in 1929 that prompted Naomi Wood’s obsession with the Bauhaus. She discusses her powerful new novel set in turbulent pre-war Europe which treads a dangerously fine line between love and obsession.

The Hiding Game (Picador)

Matthew L. Tompkins Smoke and Mirrors

Alex Woodcock

79

£10.00

Danger: School

Lives in Glorious Colour 10.00am

| Barn

Naomi Wood

Hugh St. Clair

78

1.30pm

82

5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

Magician turned experimental psychologist, Matthew L Tompkins, investigates the arts of deception as practised by mesmerists, magicians and psychics. With stories of ghost rapping, mind reading, lethal autopsies and death (or not) defying stunts, Tompkins discusses the human mind’s susceptibility to illusion. Expect a ‘selectively honest account of lies about the truth about lies’.

The Spectacle of Illusion (Thames & Hudson with Wellcome)


THURSDAY 11th JULY

Dukes Room

Jacqueline Sarsby

Joe Richards

Andy Christian

Jacqueline Sarsby

Andy Christian

Dartmoor Voices

83

11.45am

| Dukes Room

Naked Works £7.00

What was it like for a Dartmoor farmer and his daughters working the land before, during and after the First World War? How much could they explore their county when cars and buses came to the moor? And how did middle class visitors bring modernity to the ancient farmhouses? Oral historian and photographer, Jacqueline Sarsby, who has documented the lives of farming families on Dartmoor over a number of years, answers these questions and more.

A Dartmoor Farmer, his Daughters and his

Diary (The Rotherfold Press)

84

1.30pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

Joe Richards’ new play concerns a long marriage, with its ordinary triumphs and failures, now drawing towards a close. It is portrayed with emotional precision, humour and compassion. His previous play, ‘North Wood’ was premiered at last year’s festival. Performed by Sarah Thomson and Patrick Cooper.

3.15pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

In conversation with psychiatrist Morian Roberts, writer and artist Andy Christian explores the way life models can confront the artist and viewer by looking at us directly, thus empowering them from compliant nudes to forceful, naked personalities. He discusses this process with some of the original collages illustrated in his book, ‘Naked Works’.

Naked Works (The Private Press)

Called to the Edge Poets Six Diverse Voices

86

Joe Richards Times Table

85

5.00pm

| Dukes Room

£7.00

Poetry from Jane Slavin, Rosie Barrett, Melisande Fitzsimons, Rachel Gippetti, Jo Ball and (the late) Abigail Robinson explores lived experiences in a variety of form and subject matter. Six diverse voices share heartfelt and celebratory work from the anthology ‘Called to the Edge’.

Called to the Edge (Crafty Little Press)

Day Ticket for Dukes Room: £20 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 31


FRIDAY 12th JULY

Annabel Abbs

Michael Sissons

Aaron Hargreaves

Great Hall

Ollie Ollerton

Annabel Abbs

A Sensual and Intellectual Awakening

87

10.00am

| Great Hall

Viv Groskop

Nicholas Crane

£11.00

Nicholas Crane Where are We?

89

1.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

In her latest novel award-winning author, Annabel Abbs, draws the curtain back on Frieda - the real Lady Chatterley. Trapped in a marriage to English professor Ernest Weekly, Frieda meets the penniless but ambitious younger writer, D. H. Lawrence. Their scandalous affair unleashes a creative outpouring that influences the course of literature forever.

We are all geographers: human beings who care about the places we think of as ‘home’ – our habitat. With our contemporary narrative of climate change, geopolitics, population growth, migration and dwindling resources, author and presenter of Coast, Nicholas Crane, makes the compelling case that never has geography been so important.

Frieda: The Original Lady Chatterley (Two Roads)

You Are Here: A Brief Guide to the World (W&N)

Ollie Ollerton

Viv Groskop

Beyond the Breaking Point

88

11.45am

| Great Hall

£11.00

Ex-Special Forces’ soldier and star of Channel 4’s hit show SAS: Who Dares Wins, Matthew ‘Ollie’ Ollerton, has overcome alcohol, drug addiction, struggles with anxiety and depression to become an entrepreneur and mental health charity ambassador. He relates vital life lessons he has learnt as a soldier and survivor.

Break Point (Blink Publishing)

Women and the Art of Brilliant Speaking

90

| Great Hall

£11.00

What happens if you open your mouth and nothing comes out? Public speaking can be a nerve-wracking experience. However, stand-up comedian and author, Viv Groskop, is here to help you overcome anxiety as she examines the art of oratory through recent history’s great women speakers.

How to Own The Room (Bantam Press)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including events 92 and 93) page 32

3.15pm


FRIDAY 12th JULY

Markus Bidaux

Great Hall

Patrick Gale

Robert Hardman

Natalie Haynes

Patrick Gale

Natalie Haynes

No Possessions

91

5.00pm

| Great Hall

A Women’s War £11.00

Patrick Gale, Sunday Times bestselling author of ‘The Man in the Orange Shirt’ discusses his latest novel. A sad-funny comedy of resilience and survival that intertwines illness, love and memories as the protagonist Eustace faces cancer treatment and looks back on an eccentric childhood and adolescence in his parents’ old people’s home in Weston Super-Mare.

93

8.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Broadcaster and classicist Natalie Haynes, with her trademark passion and wit, retells the story of the Trojan War from an all-female perspective, giving voices to women, girls and goddesses who, for so long, have been silent.

A Thousand Ships (Mantle)

Take Nothing With You (Tinder Press)

Robert Hardman The Real Crown

92

6.30pm

|

Great Hall

£11.00

On today’s world stage, one leader stands apart. Queen Elizabeth II has seen more of the planet and its people that any other head of state. Renowned royal biographer Robert Hardman tells the true story of drama, intrigue, exotic and even dangerous situations involving the Monarch, the woman at the centre of it all.

Queen of the World (Century)

Michael Honnor

Book Making Workshop 10.00am–1.00pm

| Shippon Yard

£50.00

These intriguing and energetic workshops offer the chance to explore fascinating printmaking techniques, make images, add a word or two and sew the result into your own small handmade book - all in the space of three hours. Simple concluding lunch provided. Call to book 07779 731824.

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (not including events 92 and 93) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 33


FRIDAY 12th JULY

New Voices

Barn Eleanor Anstruther

Chaos of Misunderstanding

96

1.30pm

| Barn

£10.00

Exploring themes of ownership and abandonment, Eleanor Anstruther’s debut is a fictionalised account of the true story of Enid Campbell (1891-1964), granddaughter of the 8th Duke of Argyll, who sold her son to her sister for £500. She maintains that in a world of privilege, truth remains the same; there are no heroes and villains, only people misunderstood.

A Perfect Explanation (Salt Publishing) Geetie Singh-Watson

Kate Clanchy

Hallie Rubenhold

School Life

97

Johnny Mains

Ghost Stories – Women’s Voices

94

10.00am

| Barn

£10.00

Editor and literary historian, Johnny Mains, offers a new perspective on the ancestry of the supernatural, uncovering long-silenced voices of female authors. The work of these trailblazing Victorian women; long suppressed by men is unveiled and their hidden history revealed.

An Obscurity of Ghosts (Black Shuck Books)

Geetie Singh-Watson in discussion with Anna Turns

Is Youth Climate Activism Working?

95

11.45am

| Barn

£10.00

Organic publican and ethical entrepreneur Geetie Singh-Watson discusses the current wave of youth climate activism with environmental writer and founder of Plastic Clever Salcombe, Anna Turns. They consider the power of these young voices, how and why they are becoming increasingly engaged and proactive, how their own children are taking action, and their hopes and fears with respect to this.

Day Ticket for Barn: £40 page 34

3.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

Fearless wit, an ear for poetry and a flair for writing about difficult situations combine to make poet and teacher Kate Clanchy’s stories so moving. She discusses her experiences in the ‘Inclusion Unit’ and the vital role poetry plays in her school.

❝❝ Kate Clanchy is doing the most important job in Britain, and doing it magnificently” Philip Pullman Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me (Picador)

Hallie Rubenhold

The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper

98

5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

Drawing upon formerly unseen archival material social historian Hallie Rubenhold turns the narrative of the Ripper murders upside down as she unearths the stories of his victims Polly Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Kate Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly. Rubenhold reveals a world not just of Dickens and Queen Victoria, but of poverty, homelessness and rampant misogyny.

The Five (Doubleday)


SATURDAY 13th JULY

Seth Jackson

Great Hall

Anna Pasternak

Marcus du Sautoy

Diarmaid MacCullough

Anna Pasternak

Wallis Simpson: England’s Scapegoat

99

10.00am

| Great Hall

£11.00

Wallis Simpson is known as the woman at the centre of the most scandalous love affair of the 20th century. Bestselling biographer, Anna Pasternak, seeks to redeem a women wronged by history offering illuminating new information from those who were close to the couple.

Untitled: The Real Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor (William Collins)

Marcus du Sautoy

The Art of Intelligence

100

11.45am

| Great Hall

£11.00

Technology has always allowed us to extend our understanding of being human. Exploring the limits and potential of the new tools of Artificial Intelligence, scientist, broadcaster and author, Marcus du Sautoy, asks could recent developments in artificial intelligence mean that it is no longer just human beings that create art?

The Creativity Code (Fourth Estate)

Diarmaid MacCulloch

That Ruffian Thomas Cromwell

101

1.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Thomas Cromwell is one of the most notorious

Kurt Jackson

figures in English history. For a time, the self-made ‘ruffian’ was ruthless and a master manipulator. Diarmaid MacCulloch sets out Cromwell’s true place in the making of modern England and Ireland, for good and ill.

Thomas Cromwell: A Life (Allen Lane)

Christopher Somerville The Private Life of Britain’s Cathedrals

102

3.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

When travel writer, Christopher Somerville, set out to explore Britain’s cathedrals, he found his fixed ideas of cathedrals as great unmoving bastions of tradition shaken to the roots though conversation with believers and non-believers, architects and archaeologists and the cleaners.

Ships of Heaven (DoubleDay)

Kurt Jackson

Flora and Fauna

103

5.00pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

From day-to-day plants to the more unusual, twisted forms and strange fruit of the undergrowth, artist Kurt Jackson’s new collection of poems, paintings, drawings, sculptures and printmaking celebrate the diversity of the plant kingdom.

Kurt Jackson’s Botanical Landscape (Lund Humphries)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (Not including events 104 and 105) Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 35


SATURDAY 13th JULY

Great Hall / Dukes Room

Murder Most Horrid Andrew Wilson

Ben Okri

APEX

Mat Bray

Outwitting a Killer

Brian Patten

Ben Okri

Who is the Prisoner?

104

6.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

Man Booker prize-winner, Ben Okri, makes an impassioned plea for freedom and justice in his latest work. Set in a world uncomfortably like our own his latest novel offers a penetrating examination of how freedom is threatened in a posttruth society in a world of lies, oppression and fear.

The Freedom Artist (Head of Zeus)

Brian Patten, Matt Harvey, Simon Williams (ed) & Susan Taylor (ed) PLAY fundraising event

105

8.15pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

‘Play’ features 150 poems from 100 poets on the theme of play. Matt Harvey and the editors read their favourites. The evening culminates with a reading by Brian Patten from his new collection ‘The Book of Upside Down Thinking’. ‘PLAY’ anthology is raising funds for a play space in Totnes, in memory of Reuben Williams, the editors’ three-year old grandson.

PLAY Anthology Celebration

106

| Dukes Room

£7.00

Novelist and biographer, Andrew Wilson, unpacks his latest murder mystery. Set in Baghdad in1928 crime writer Agatha Christie leaves the UK determined to investigate the unresolved mystery of the death of explorer and writer Gertrude Bell from an apparent drugs overdose. But all is not as it seems.

Death in a Desert Land (Simon & Schuster)

Murder Mystery – Interactive Theatre

Holmes and Watson – A Teaparty Mystery

FE5

4.00-6.00pm

| Dukes Room

£30.00

Having solved the case of the Hound of the Baskervilles, Holmes and Watson return to Devonshire where foul deeds are once again afoot. A tea party hosted in Holmes’ honour results in a murder that the famous sleuths will be unable to solve alone. Ticket includes afternoon tea, a glass of fizz and lashings of intrigue. Limited spaces; Friends’ booking until 19th June.

Michael Honnor

Young Persons Book Making Workshop

10.00am–1.00pm

| Shippon Yard

£25.00

These intriguing and energetic workshops offer the chance to explore fascinating printmaking techniques, make images, add a word or two and sew the result into your own small handmade book - all in the space of three hours. Simple concluding lunch provided. Call to book 07779 731824.

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £45 (Not including events 104 and 105) page 36

1.30pm


SATURDAY 13th JULY

Barn

Global Issues Zeba Talkhani

A Muslim Feminist Finds Herself

(c) Chris Boland

109

Paul Conroy

Zeba Talkhani

| Barn

£10.00

While covering the war in Syria in 2012, veteran photographer Paul Conroy and Sunday Times war correspondent Marie Colvin decided to smuggle themselves across enemy lines into the city of Homs, when a rocket killed Marie Colvin and Rémi Ochlik and seriously injured Conroy. Seven years on, Paul Conroy gives an account of survival and friendships forged amid the horrors of war.

Under the Wire (Quercus)

| Barn

Travels in Russia – With Geniuses of the Golden Age

110

3.15pm

| Barn

£10.00

With the writers of the Golden Age as her guides – Pushkin, Tolstoy, Gogol and Turgenev, among others – travel writer Sara Wheeler sets out to explore the literal Russian landscape and its emotional literary counterpart. She travels across eight time zones, from rinsed north-western beetroot fields and far-eastern Arctic tundra to the ethnic soup that is the Caucasus.

Lalage Snow

Information is Light 11.45am

Zeba Talkhani charts her experiences growing up in Saudi Arabia amid extreme patriarchal customs and her journey to finding individuality. Talkhani offers a fresh perspective on living as an outsider, the mother-daughter relationship and body positivity. She describes how she came to claim her own narrative and construct her own identity as a feminist Muslim in the UK.

Mud and Stars (Jonathan Cape)

Clare Rewcastle Brown

108

£10.00

Sara Wheeler

Marie Colvin’s Final Assignment 10.00am

| Barn

My Past is a Foreign Country (Sceptre)

Paul Conroy

107

1.30pm

In Search of Calm £10.00

111

5.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

When Clare Rewcastle Brown began reporting on the destruction of Borneo’s rainforest, no one could have predicted it would bring down the Malaysian government. She recounts how she exposed a web of corruption involving international banks, companies and politicians – and argues that the dark side of globalisation must be fought.

Working in the world’s most dangerous war zones, correspondent and photographer Lalage Snow has documented gardens created in the midst of conflict. From soldiers’ gardens in Camp Bastion to families tending plots in the middle of a surreal frozen war in Ukraine, she tells the sometimes shocking, sometimes uplifting stories of gardens and the gardeners.

The Sarawak Report (Lost World Press)

War Gardens (Quercus)

Day Ticket for Barn: £40 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 37


SUNDAY 14th JULY

Polly Toynbee, David Walker

Nick Bilbrough

Julian Baggini

Polly Toynbee and David Walker Where are We Now?

112

11.00am

| Great Hall

£11.00

To say that we live in uncertain times is something of an understatement with the political landscape changing and reforming at a breath-taking pace. Polly Toynbee and David Walker have been political commentators and journalists for The Guardian for many years and aim to unpick some of the recent changes to our country, our society and our political environment.

Dismembered: How the Conservative Attack on

the State Harms Us All (Guardian Faber Publishing)

| Great Hall

Julian Baggini

The Philosopher’s Map

114

2.30pm

| Great Hall

£11.00

One of the great mysteries of human history is that written philosophy flowered entirely separately in China, India and Ancient Greece at more or less the same time. Philosopher and author, Julian Baggini, explores some of the philosophies of the world offering insights into commonalities and differences in how we think.

How The World Thinks (Granta)

David Nicholls

115

Drama out of a Crisis 12.45pm

David Nicholls

The Price of Hope

Nick Bilbrough

113

Hal Shinnie

Richard H. Smith

Great Hall

£11.00

4.15pm

| Great Hall £25.00

(inc. book)

The Hands Up Project enables Palestinian young people to perform their own short plays to international audiences via simple video conferencing tools. Nick Bilbrough explores how this process is empowering Palestinian children to tell their stories to the world, and will include performances of live-linked remote plays directly from Gaza.

Best selling author of ‘One Day’, David Nicholls, presents his highly-anticipated new novel ‘Sweet Sorrow’ in which he explores the rocky path to adulthood and the confusion of family life: a celebration of the reviving power of friendship and that brief, searing explosion of first love. Book and ticket event. Rover ticket holders can attend this event but will need to purchase a copy of the book, should they wish to do so, available at the festival bookshop.

Toothbrush and Other Plays

Sweet Sorrow (Hodder & Stoughton)

Day Ticket for Great Hall: £27 (not including event 115) page 38


SUNDAY 14th JULY

Barn

Big Ideas

Mark Miodownik

Steven Connor

Rob Hopkins

Oliver Morton Moon Light

116

11.00am

| Barn

Mark Miodownik

Secret Lives of Liquids £10.00

Science writer, Oliver Morton, explores the history and future of humankind’s relationship with the Moon. From the earliest astronomers such as Galileo, through the first space flights, Morton anticipates the next phase of our interaction with the Earth’s closest neighbour, as a portal and stepping stone to deeper exploration of space.

The Moon: A History for the Future (Profile Books)

A Psychopathology of Intellectual Life

117

| Barn

2.30pm

| Barn

£10.00

A series of glasses of transparent liquids is in front of you: but which will quench your thirst and which will kill you? And why? Why does one liquid make us drunk, and another power a jumbo jet? Discover the secret lives of liquids, from one of our best-known scientists, Mark Miodownik.

Liquid: The Delightful and Dangerous Substances That Flow Through Our Lives (Viking)

Rob Hopkins

Steven Connor 12.45pm

118

£10.00

Steven Connor explores the emotional inner life of knowledge—the lusts, fantasies, dreams, and fears that the idea of knowing provokes. The Grace 2 Professor of English at the University of Cambridge investigates the links between madness, magical thinking, and the desire for knowledge, along with the erotics of secrets, quizzes, quarrelling and the history of ‘general knowledge’ and stupidity.

The Madness of Knowledge (Reaktion Books)

Making Britain Imaginative Again

119

4.00pm

| Barn

£10.00

In the face of the need for deep and far-reaching change, Rob Hopkins argues, we are failing because we’ve largely allowed our most critical tool to languish: human imagination. Imagination is the ability to look at things as if they could be otherwise. Imagination is central to empathy, to creating better lives, to envisioning and then enacting a positive future. But is our collective imagination in 2019 as vigorous as it needs to be?

From What is to What If : Unleashing the Power of Imagination to Create the Future We Want (Chelsea Green)

Day Ticket for Barn: £32 Book tickets online at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 39


Booking Information Book online at www.wayswithwords.co.uk (from 3rd June 2019)

to a refund of the ticket’s value. (NB this will be a proportion of the value if you bought a day ticket. We do not refund people who hold Festival Passes).

By Phone

Priority Booking

Tel: 01803 867373

Friends of Ways With Words can book tickets from Tuesday 28th May 2019.

Online

Telephone lines are open from 10.00am–5.00pm, Monday-Friday. Please have your event numbers and your payment card ready before phoning.

Maximum 4 tickets per event For phone and postal bookings only. General booking starts on Monday 3rd June 2019.

We accept Visa and Mastercard.

Concessions

By post Please complete the form in the centre of this programme and send with cheque and stamped s.a.e to: Ways With Words Festival Box Office, Droridge Farm, Dartington, Totnes, Devon TQ9 6JG

People aged 24 or under can purchase tickets normally priced at £11 or less for just £6 if purchased in person during the festival. People on benefits can also receive a discount on a £11 ticket or less for £5. We operate a ‘carers go free’ policy for people in receipt of Carer’s Allowance. Proof of entitlement for the above is required.

Please make cheques payable to ‘Ways With Words’

Data Protection

In Person

Ways With Words will not pass on your details to any organisation.

During the festival the box office on-site at Dartington Hall will open 30 minutes before the first event of the day and will close after the start of the last event of the day. Please note: Before the festival starts the box office operates off-site and is open for telephone, postal and online sales only (see above).

Terms & Conditions The right is reserved to substitute speakers and vary the advertised programme if necessary. All information is correct at the time of going to press.

Refund and Exchange Policy If you inform the Box Office at least 48 hours before an event, we will be happy to exchange your tickets for another Ways With Words 2019 event (subject to availability). There is a £1.00 fee per ticket for this service (with a maximum charge of £10 per transaction). If an event is cancelled you can exchange your ticket for another event at the festival – subject to availability – or for a voucher which you can use at any Ways With Words event in the future. There will be no charge for this. If you don’t wish to exchange you are entitled

page 40

Book online, by phone or by post – see page 23 for full details


General Information

Thanks to ... Official Bookselling Partner

Travelling to Dartington Dartington is roughly 25 miles southwest of Exeter and about a four hour drive from London.

Sponsors

By car Take the M5, A38 and A384 from Plymouth, the A385 and then follow signs for Dartington Hall. By train Paddington is the mainline station from London. Totnes is the station nearest to Dartington Hall. Dartington Hall is a five minute taxi ride from the station.

Support in kind

Parking Parking charges apply on the Dartington Estate. Please leave plenty of time to get to your event as you may need to park at a distance from the venues and there may be queues at the ticket machines. (NB Residents will receive a permit on arrival which entitles the holder to free parking in the designated car parks during your stay) Accessible parking is provided in the main car park and in the Barn car park. A drop off point for the Barn is situated in front of the archway approximately 30 metres from the Barn. A drop off point from the Great Hall is situated at the White Hart approximately 50 metres from the Hall.

Mobility Access There is wheelchair access to the Great Hall, Barn and Upper Gatehouse, but please let us know when you buy your tickets as wheelchair spaces are limited and must be reserved in advance. There is no wheelchair access to the Dukes Room. There is access to the White Hart bar and dining rooms and to some bedrooms.

Hearing Impairment There is an induction loop system in place in the Great Hall (please ask the stewards where to sit to take advantage of this) and an Infra Red assisted hearing system in the Barn. The Dukes Room is unamplified.

Ways With Words’ Patrons Jonathan Dimbleby, Nicholas Evans, Sir Michael Holroyd, Dame Penelope Lively, James Long, Blake Morrison, The Rt. Hon. Lord Owen, Lord O’Hagan, Peter Stanford, Salley Vickers

Non-executive Directors Anne Oxborough Hamish Dunbar Chloe Bar-Kar

Good, Close and Best Friends Mr Colin Goldsmith, Brenda & John Wynn, Mrs Elizabeth Piercey, Marlene Eyre

Ways With Words Team Festival Curator: Jane Fitzgerald Festival Producer: Phil John Front of House Managers: Jess Morris, Karen Hearty, Caroline Wilson, Chris Brooks, Florence Fitzgerald Box Office: Phoebe Graham, Georgia Brooks Technical Advice: Chris Evans Technicians: Olly Webb, Ninian Harding, Nick Gornall Thank you to the generous and energetic team of volunteers who support the festival in a variety of ways before, during and after the festival.

Dartington Hall General Manager: Sam Walton Guest Services and Revenue Manager: Sam Whiston Technical Manager: Patrick Collins

Full details on our cancellations, refunds, exchanges and lost tickets policy at wayswithwords.co.uk

page 41


Ĺ? Residential & Commerical Property Ĺ? Wills & Probate Ĺ? Taxation & Trusts Ĺ? Family

Official Festival Bookseller

Ĺ? Dispute Resolution Ĺ? Business Ĺ? Marine

We look forward to seeing you there, for booksignings and a range of titles by the guest authors.

www.bartons.co.uk

DISTINGUISHED LEGAL SERVICE Tel: 01803 847777 Email: info@bartons.co.uk

Once again the Ship Studio is hosting Craft workers and Booksellers Colin Baker / Richard Wells / Alison Biles (antiquarian books) Heldrun Panther-Guest (guest designs and pottery) Julia Finzel (original arts and prints) Chris Foweraker (Dartmoor creative woodturning) Kate Andrew (arts and cards)

page 42

Free Places for Young People Each year at the festival we give away about 25 Bursary Passes to young people between the ages of 17–25 so that they can attend all (10 days) or some of the festival free of charge. This is a fantastic opportunity to become immersed in the festival, be introduced to new ideas, new authors and make new friends. For details and application procedure email philip.john@wayswithwords.co.uk


As well as running the festival at Dartington Ways With Words organises these popular events ... Writing, painting and Italian language and culture holiday courses in Umbria, Italy 21–28 September 2019 28 September–5 October 2019

An autumn festival in Southwold on the Suffolk coast 7–11 November 2019

A spring festival at Theatre by the Lake, Keswick 6–15 March 2020

And back in Dartington for Ways with Words 2020 10–20 July 2020 Full details on ouron cancellations, exchanges and lostvisit tickets policy at wayswithwords.co.uk page 43 For details all ourrefunds, events please www.wayswithwords.co.uk


Ways With Words 2019 Including: Kamal Ahmed Julian Baggini Melissa Benn Mike Berners-Lee Chris Bonington John Crace Nicholas Crane Caroline Criado-Perez Louis De Bernières Marcus Du Sautoy Frank Field Patrick Gale Viv Groskop Matt Harvey Natalie Haynes Lindsey Hilsum Robin Ince Kurt Jackson Dom Joly Steve Jones Satish Kumar Diarmaid MacCulloch Deborah Moggach Chris Mullin David Nicholls Joseph O’Connor Ben Okri David Owen Brian Patten Rachel Reeves John Simpson Geetie Singh-Watson Peter Stanford Joseph Stiglitz Polly Toynbee and David Walker Alison Weir …and many more

wayswithwords.co.uk


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