Our recommendations for Hay Festival
Hay Festival of Literature is now over, life feels very flat in Hay on Wye
As usual we had a stand on the shop as well as running our shop in Hay over the ten day festival
These are a few of our highlights from the Festival
FRIDAY 24th MAY
Event No 16. Sting in the Tale
Once commonly found in the marshes of Kent, the short-haired bumblebee now only exists in the wilds of New Zealand, the descendants of a few queen bees shipped over in the C19th. The conservationist describes his drive to reintroduce it to its native land, the effects of intensive farming on the bee population, and the consequences of extinction
Athene English talking at the Country Living Magazine Women in Business Forum
SATURDAY 25th MAY
Event 41. Susy Smith & Guests
What does it take to start a small rural business? Discover how to turn talent into turnover with advice from three successful entrepreneurs: Business Manager at Women in Rural Enterprise (WiRE) Fiona Davies, home textile designer Jan Constantine and Hay’s own Athene English of The Great English Outdoors
TUESDAY 28th MAY
Event 203. Jenny Uglow
The story of Sarah Losh – forgotten Romantic heroine, antiquarian, architect and visionary. In the church in Wreay, her masterpiece, there are carvings of ammonites, scarabs and poppies; an arrow pierces the wall as if shot from a bow; a tortoise-gargoyle launches itself into the air. And everywhere there are pinecones, her signature in stone. The church is a dramatic rendering of the power of myth and the great natural cycles of life and death and rebirth. Chaired by Simon Mundy
FRIDAY 31st MAY
Event 327. Birds in a Cage by Derek Niemann
The remarkable untold story of a group of POWs who, through a shared love of birds, overcame hunger, hardship and boredom to bring purpose and dignity to their lives behind barbed wire. Under the gaze of Nazi guards, they founded a secret bird-watching society, and their legacy lives on in institutions such as the RSPB and the British Wildlife Trust
SUNDAY 2nd JUNE
Event 428. The Robber of Memories: A River Journey Through Columbia.
Running through the heart of Colombia is a river emblematic of the fascination and tragedy of South America, the Magdalena, considered by some the most dangerous place in the world. Jacobs is captured by the FARC, has a chance encounter with Gabriel García Márquez and is brought to reflect on memory and identity, and the nature of mystery
Other memorable events of the Festival include John Bulmer, the photographer talking about his seminal work in 1960s photographing in the North of England; the event we sponsored, Warhorses of Letters with Robert Hudson, Marie Phillips and John Finnemore and Robert Macfarlane, taling about his new book
In 2005 Macfarlane and Roger Deakin travelled to explore the holloways of South Dorset’s sandstone. They found their way into a landscape of shadows, spectres and great strangeness. Six years later, after Deakin’s early death, Macfarlane returned to the holloway with the artist Stanley Donwood and writer Dan Richards