The Stratford Literary Festival returns for its 12th year

The Stratford Literary Festival will be returning for its 12th year on 28 April with a wide range of speakers and events.

Running for eight days, the Warwickshire event will welcome some of the most acclaimed literary fiction authors writing today.

The festival will include speakers who will be debating ideas ranging from science to mental health and womens’ issues to the news.

It will also feature workshops, special childrens’ events and, for the first time a dedicated Writer’s Day.

Speakers include: Strictly Come Dancing judge and former ballet dancer Dame Darcey Bussell, Great British Bake Off judge Prue Leith, chef and cookery presenter Rosemary Shrager and screenwriter Andrew Davies, who most recently wrote the BBC adaptation of Les Misérables.

The event will welcome back classicist Natalie Haynes and best-selling novelist Patrick Gale as well as feature award-winning writers such as Ali Smith, Tessa Hadley, John Lanchester and Man Booker-Prize winner Ben Okri. Opportunities will also be available for audiences to meet some of the 2019’s debuts.

The University of Warwick’s Professor Shirin Rai from the department of Politics and International Studies will be speaking with author of The Women’s Atlas Joni Seagar to Radio 4 Woman’s Hour’s Jane Garvey about how women today are living across continents and cultures.

The festival will also include speakers who will be debating ideas ranging from science to mental health and women’s issues to the news

Newsnight anchor Emily Maitlis will be talking about the “behind-the-scenes” of headlines while Ed Gorman, a former foreign correspondent at The Times and photo-journalist Paul Conroy will be conversing on their experiences of war reporting.

Neurosurgeon Henry March, forensic pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd and forensic scientist Angela Gallop will be sharing their expertise on their new written works while front-line doctor Dr David Nott will be talking about his experience as a trauma surgeon on the front lines of some of the world’s worst war zones detailed in War Doctor.

Speakers on mental health include crime writer Nicci French, who will be talking about the impact of dementia and writers Ella Risbridger and Laura Freeman who will be talking about the food that saved their lives.

Historians giving talks at the Literary Festival will be Alison Weir, Damien Lewis and Tracy Borman, and crime writers such as Mark Billingham and Elly Griffiths will be featured.

Music speakers will include: Classic FM’s John Suchet on his new book Tchaikovsky: The Man Revealed, pianist Lucy Parham and leading female conductor, Jane Glover.

Our growing audiences have shown that they love a variety of events to choose from and this year we’ve included a very wide buffet of choices

– Annie Ashworth

Children’s events launch on 28 April and run until 5 May. A drop-in session will be run to help build a giant Elmer to celebrate the famous elephant’s 30th anniversary, plus stage shows of children’s books The Rainbow Fish and Aliens Love Underpants.

Writers featured for children include Jacqueline Wilson and Francesca Simon along with illustrators Lydia Monks and Nick Sharratt.

The new Writers’ Day will take place on Saturday 4 May for people wanting to find out more about the route to being published, featuring literary agents, editors and experts from publishing. There will also be the opportunity for attendees to have a short one-to-one session with a literary agent to discuss their work.

Workshops will run throughout the festival. Those running include one on modern calligraphy by Emma Barnes, writing comedy by Maggie Irving and one on life writing by Emma Darwin.

The new ‘Writers’ Day’ will take place on Saturday 4 May for people wanting to find out more about the route to being published

Festival Director Annie Ashworth said: “We are really excited by this year’s line-up. Our growing audiences have shown that they love a variety of events to choose from and this year we’ve included a very wide buffet of choices.

“I’m especially pleased that the programme includes some light-hearted, late-evening events to enjoy with a glass of wine, including our Live Lit evening which showcases emerging local writers.

“It will be fun to be working with the team at the Play House again. There will be a café, pop-up stalls to browse and a story-telling machine to dispense a story just for you. We look forward to welcoming everyone along.”

She concluded: “We’re confident they’ll find something to enjoy and broaden the mind and, whilst we can’t guarantee Brexit won’t be mentioned, we promise a wonderful escape from it!”

Student tickets are available for events, further details of which can be found here, while full details of all speakers and events are here.