GLADcast

In researching novels based on real life historical events, author Sarah Day has followed eighteenth-century explorers to Russia and a group of persecuted gay men to the Tremiti Islands. She has explored a hidden church beneath a swimming pool in St Petersburg, a derelict prison on San Domino, and viewed countless photographs and archives of extraordinary individuals. Sarah offers fascinating tales of her travels, as well as tips for your own travels – and your own travel writing.

Amber Massie-Blomfield travelled from the tip of Cornwall to the Isle of Mull to discover Britain’s most astonishing theatres. In rural communities and the inner-city, Amber found haunted halls, stages hewn from granite cliffs, and squeezed into a former public loo. During her residency at Gladstone's Library as Political Writer in Residence, Amber reads an excerpt from her book, Twenty Theatres to See Before You Die.

Poet Suzannah Evans reads from her 2018 poetry collection Near Future and discusses her writing experiences. Set in an all-too-imaginable Earth where resources are insufficient for human existence and asteroid storms threaten the solar system, Suzannah’s poems ask us to think about what we would do if we were there: if we had to go to work meetings as the world ends; where we might most stylishly store our iodine tablets; how efficient carbon harvesting would really be if it were administered by middle management.

We’re delighted to welcome Damian back to Gladfest – he was the very first event of our very first festival! You Will Be Safe Here is Damian’s first novel. Set in South Africa in 1901, at the height of the Boer War, Sarah van der Watt and her son are taken from their farm by force to Bloaemfontein Concentration Camp – where the English promise they will be safe. A deeply moving novel of connected parts, inspired by the true contemporary story of Raymond Buys, You Will Be Safe Here explores our capacity for cruelty and kindness. Damian talks to novelist Sarah Perry about writing this extraordinary novel.

Mountaineering literature is a traditionally male-dominated genre. Stephen Harper’s best-selling Ladykiller Peak (1965) claimed that mountaineering by ‘the weaker sex’ was a form of ‘women’s rebellion against man’s natural assumption of command’. Nevertheless, women have succeeded in summitting, climbing, and exploring some of the most remote, extreme landscapes in the world. Rachel's talk focuses on the spectacular life and writings of the fin-de-siècle mountaineer Lizzie Le Blond (1860-1934), responsible for establishing the Ladies’ Alpine Club in 1907. An avid nature-photographer, tobogganist, ice-skater, long-distance cyclist, and racing driver, Le Blond also became one of the pioneers of so-called ‘manless’ climbing, and undertook the first women-only traverse of Piz Palü in 1900. Victorian and Edwardian female climbers like Le Blond contended with voluminous gowns, ill-fitting equipment, constraining social mores, but nevertheless achieved global mountaineering success and fame, publishing extensively before being written out of literary history in the twentieth century. Le Blond is a key figure in Rachel's forthcoming book on women, nature and nature-writing, In Her Nature (Chatto & Windus). This book will marry the focus on landscape evident in Rachel's first book, Map of a Nation: A Biography of the Ordnance Survey (Granta, 2010), with the feminist history of her second book, A Revolution of Feeling: The Decade that Forged the Modern Mind (Granta, 2017). This talk will explore how women’s experiences of the natural world relate to a male-dominated history of exploration and landscape representation; to restore lost and unsung women’s voices; and to reveal to readers an unfamiliar, hitherto hidden natural world: her nature, seen through women’s eyes in the past and present.

The tale of how the hero Theseus killed the Minotaur, finding his way out of the labyrinth using Ariadne’s ball of red thread, is one of the most intriguing, suggestive and persistent of all myths, and the labyrinth – the beautiful, confounding and terrifying building created for the half-man, half-bull monster – is one of the foundational symbols of human ingenuity and artistry. Charlotte Higgins tracks the origins of the story of the labyrinth in the poems of Homer, Catullus, Virgil and Ovid, and with them builds an ingenious edifice of her own. A BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week.

Emily Brontë: misanthropic, enigmatic, awkward. But was she? Is Heathcliff’s creator really what we think we know of her? In this biography with a twist, Claire O’Callaghan conjures up a new portrait of one of the English canon’s most well-known figures. Claire discusses Emily’s feminism, her passion for the natural world – and the ‘fake news’ stories she inspired…

In a time of upheaval and division – political, cultural, religious – what can be done to find a common ground? Join Pádraig Ó Tuama (leader of Corrymeela, Ireland’s oldest peace and reconciliation organisation), and Zia Chaudhry (Director of Liverpool John Moore’s Foundation for Citizenship) in conversation with Peter Francis.

In Victorian Britain rags were recycled into paper. Many of the urban poor made their living from collecting rags which were processed in paper mills before eventually being transformed into paper for books and newspapers. The personnel involved in recycling – beggars, orphaned children, rag-and-bone collectors and dealers in waste – featured in the fiction of the period, particularly in the work of Charles Dickens. He was fascinated by the ability of cloth to be transformed into different things, reflecting on how clothing of the very poor was converted into the paper on which his novels were printed. The child in rags appears repeatedly in his novels, whether Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, or Florence Dombey, and Dickens showed that ragged children could be ‘recycled’ into educated citizens, just as the filthy rags they wore could be recycled into books. Deborah Wynne explorest Dickens’s fascination with the link between rags, children and paper and hear some of the strange stories associated with Victorian textile recycling.

Two key figures in the cultural renaissance of our local area, Artistic Director of Theatr Clwyd, Tamara Harvey, and founder of Pedlars and The Good Life Experience, Charlie Gladstone, talk to the Library’s Warden, Peter Francis, about their cultural plans for the year and hopes for the future. Illustration: David Setter

There ARE still wild places out there on our crowded planet – and Dan Richards has spent the last few years visiting some of them. From Cairngorm bothies to fire-watch lookouts in Washington State, Roald Dahl’s writing hut to a lighthouse in the North Atlantic, haunted Icelandic ‘houses of joy’ to frozen Russian ghost towns now only home to bears, Dan asks: why are we drawn to wilderness? What can we do to protect them? And what does the future hold for outposts on the edge?

We were delighted to welcome Patrick back to Gladfest with his latest book, Take Nothing With You. A Sunday Times bestseller within a week of its launch at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, Patrick’s 16th novel tells the story of fifty-something Eustace, a gay Londoner of leisure. In the same week that he falls hopelessly in love with a man he has yet to physically meet, he find out he has cancer of the thyroid. During radioactive iodine therapy – alone in a lead-lined suite with only disposable clothes for company – his memories come circling back…Patrick talks to Damian Barr.

Neil has appeared in the film adaptions of Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch and Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary, as well as producing The Missing Hancocks for BBC Radio 4. But he is also an antiquarian book dealer, and has recently spent much of his time curating the archive of the late Alan Rickman. Neil gives a fascinating hour as he discusses his life in books.

Damian Le Bas grew up surrounded by Gypsy history. His great-grandmother would tell him stories of her childhood in the ancient Romani language; the places her family stopped and worked, the ways they lived, the superstitions and lores of their people. But his own experience of life on the road was limited to Ford Transit journeys from West Sussex to Hampshire to sell flowers. In a bid to better understand his Gypsy heritage, the history of the Britain's Romanies and the rhythms of their life today, Damian set out on a journey to discover the atchin tans, or stopping places – the old encampment sites known only to Travellers. Through winter frosts and summer dawns, from horse fairs to Gypsy churches, neon-lit lay-bys to fern-covered banks, The Stopping Places lives on the road, somewhere between the romanticised Gypsies of old, and their much-maligned descendants of today.

In 1958, Sylvia Blackwell, fresh from one of the new post-war Library Schools, takes up a job as children's librarian in a run-down library in the market town of East Mole. Her mission is to fire the enthusiasm of the children of East Mole for reading. But her love affair with the local married GP, and her befriending of his precious daughter, her neighbour's son and her landlady's neglected grandchild, ignite the prejudices of the town, threatening her job and the very existence of the library with dramatic consequences for them all. The Librarian is a moving testament to the joy of reading and the power of books to change and inspire us all.

Herbert Powyss longs to make his mark in the field of science - something consequential enough to present to the Royal Society in London. He hits on a radical experiment in isolation: for seven years a subject will inhabit three rooms in the cellar of a manor house, fitted out with books, paintings and even a chamber organ. The solitude will be totally unrelieved by any social contact; the subject will keep a diary of his daily thoughts and actions. Only one man is desperate enough to apply for the job: John Warlow, a semi-literate labourer with a wife and six children to provide for. The experiment, a classic Enlightenment exercise gone more than a little mad, will have unforeseen consequences for all included.

'It is in the shelter of each other that the people live.' Drawing on this Irish saying, poet, storyteller and theologian Pádraig Ó Tuama relates ideas of shelter and welcome to journeys of life, using poetry, story, biblical reflection and prose to open up gentle ways of living well in a troubled world. Interweaving everyday stories with narrative theology, gospel reflections with mindfulness, and Celtic spirituality with poetry, In the Shelter reveals the transformational power of welcome. He talks to the Library’s Warden, Peter Francis.

After a wonderful Hearth session in November 2018, we’re bringing poetry and what it can mean for mental health to Hearth’s older sibling. Three of the North-West’s best poets, Angela Topping, Angi Holden and Deborah Alma, discuss the written word’s power to express, articulate, and respond to mental health.

Along with Sally Tomlinson, Danny Dorling has written one of the most interesting books on a subject that has threatened to overwhelm us all: Brexit. Called ‘the must-read book about Brexit’ and ‘a much-needed mirror’, Rule Britannia suggests that whatever the outcome, Britain must consider its past if it is ever to make sense of its future. Positioning the EU referendum as the last gasp of Empire, Dorling and Tomlinson argue that in reconciling itself to a new beginning, Britain has a chance to carve out a new national identity...

We ran out of time in Kit’s 2018 festival interview, so we brought her back for another hour! Kit doesn’t only write bestselling fiction: as editor, fundraiser, and promoter she has been the energy behind a 2018 anthology of contemporary working-class writing. A collection of essays, poems and memoir, Common People celebrates working-class stories. Kit talks to the Library's Director of Collections and Research, Louisa Yates.

Join one of Gladfest’s most notable, energetic speakers for another trip into the surprising side of the Victorian age. In 2017 Simon found an illustrated novel, published in 1877, on the shelves at Chetham’s Library, Manchester. The Story of a Honeymoon was written and illustrated by Charles H. Ross and Ambrose Clarke – but Simon knew better. Having spent some years immersed in Victorian cartooning Simon was well-placed to identify that Ambrose Clarke was in fact, the cross-dressing, comic-strip-writing, Ally-Sloper-drawing, very-much-female Marie Duval (1845-1890). Simon tells more of his extraordinary discovery.

Our first ever 'Gladfest discusses...' session! A panel of Gladfest speakers, Damian Barr, Kit de Waal and Sarah Perry, take on the relationship between writing and power, exploring some of the most significant historic and contemporary examples.

Do you know the Rosy Gilchrist novels? If you don’t, you should! They are some of the wittiest crime fiction there is. Rosy Gilchrist works at the British Museum and lives a quiet, blameless life – until in 1952 her aunt is murdered. Rosy goes on to solve crimes in four more novels, including the most recent, The Cambridge Plot. Suzette introduces her pitch-perfect tribute to crime writing’s golden age.

Joe Moran has an eye for the small, everyday things that quite a lot of us might miss – or at least not notice to the same extent. His writing examines mundane phenomena from motorways to watching television, and (in Queuing for Beginners) he investigates everything from phones to train carriages to yes, queuing. His recent work on shyness traces the histories of some notably shy British figures, from Agatha Christie to – surprisingly – George Best. His latest book, First You Write a Sentence, is a ‘style guide by stealth’, a celebration of how good writing can help us to notice the world and live more meaningful lives. Joe ponders the link between shyness, creativity and observing the everyday.

A special preview of the black comedy from one of Wales’ most exciting new playwrights. Hear writer Emily White, director Tamara Harvey and the stars of the show talk about this bold and brilliant play. Set in a run-down spa town in Wales, Pavilion tells the story of a community on the closing night of the much-loved local night spot, as young and old drink, dance, fight and snog their way into the early hours.

On Good Friday, 2010, Times journalist Melanie Reid fell from her horse, breaking her neck and fracturing her lower back. She was 52. Paralysed from the top of her chest down, she was to spend almost a full year in hospital, determinedly working towards gaining as much movement in her limbs as possible and learning to navigate her way through a world that had previously been invisible to her. As a journalist Melanie had always turned to words and now, on a spinal ward peopled by an extraordinary array of individuals similarly at sea, she found writing was her life-line. The World I Fell Out Of is an account of that year, and of those that followed. It is the untold ‘back story’ behind Melanie’s award-winning ‘Spinal Column’ in The Times Magazine and a testament to ‘the art of getting on with it’.

‘Failure is a success if we learn from it’ wrote a certain William Gladstone. But how can a pen, paper or even a laptop liberate us? In this evening event, Writer in Residence Emily Morris discusses how writing the true story of experience of unexpectedly becoming a single parent helped free her from feelings of pain, shame and failure. What’s more, her writing has helped others, an experience she never anticipated. Emily reads from her memoir, My Shitty Twenties, and talks about the pitfalls and peaks of writing real life.

Our Alibis in the Archive 2019 speakers join us for a panel session to discuss crime writing, their favourite authors, and some tips for budding writers out there! Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend.

The two talk crime writing from the past to the present day. Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend.

The 30s, the Golden Age of crime writing, saw the emergence of a number of leading female crime writers who can be held responsible for the development of the crime novel. Janet looks at the importance of the female of the species. Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend.

Julian Symonds and Michael Gilbert were two of Britain’s leading male crime writers and commentators of the post-war era. Martin discusses their work, their influence on the genre – and on his own writing. Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend.

From the beginning, setting has been an intrinsic part of most crime novels. The Hound of the Baskervilles, for example, would have been a very different story - and probably a different dog - if it was set in St Mary Mead. But as the detective novel developed, settings became both more diverse and more specific. Michael Ridpath looks at how crime novelists have made use of setting over the years. Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend.

Why is it that so many great Scottish crime writers over the years have been drawn to the darkest side of the genre? A forensic look at the genetic origins of Tartan Noir. Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend.

Frances Fyfield gives a personal memoir of P.D. James. Part of our 2019 Alibis in the Archive weekend,

Join one of the world’s best-known crime writers as he reflects on a life in writing. A novelist and short-story writer, Peter Robinson is the creator of Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks, a character featured in over 20 novels, many of which have been critically rewarded as well as being popular best-sellers. Part of our Alibis in the Archive 2019 weekend.

Everyone thinks they know Agatha Christie. This may be because she is the most successful crime writer in the history of the world. But it is also because she writes such pared-down, pure examples of the genre. In researching her for her own 'Agatha Christie' mysteries, Alison was struck by how she uses Poirot, Marple and co as her 'voice', so that the detective becomes someone behind whom she can hide, maintaining a kind of authorial privacy. But it all gets a lot more interesting when one turns to Christie's Mary Westmacott novels, six non-crime novels, although still with her characteristic page-turning drive. Something about the pseudonym seems to liberate her to be more herself, less hidden, exploring failed marriages and flawed motherhood. With a detective at the heart of the story, there can be a unique dialogue between reader and writer, and in all her work Agatha Christie instinctively responds to this. Part of our Alibis in the Archive 2019 weekend.

Edmund Crispin is perhaps unique amongst crime writers in that he was also, under his real name of Bruce Montgomery, a professional composer. David talks about Montgomery’s life, gives a few examples of his musical style, and examines how he makes use of music and his experience of the music industry in some of his novels. Part of our Alibis in the Archive 2019 weekend.

Director of Collections and Research Louisa Yates and Marketing Manager Amy Sumner chat to Paul Jeorrett on his Calon FM show, Calon Talks Books, about the exciting plans in place for #Gladfest19. Some of the festival's speakers choose their favourite 'literary tracks'.

Pastor and Theologian Mitri Raheb gives this year’s Robinson-Spong lecture exploring the Bible and contemporary Christianity from a Palestinian perspective.

At least 50% of theatre is visual but playwrights are seldom considered to write the visuals so much as the words actors speak. In Oliver Emanuel's career he has written a play without words. He has written for puppets. When he writes radio drama, he is always thinking about what the audience will see. Using his own work and practice as a starting point, Oliver discusses what it is to write for the stage and radio, about how story can be carried visually, and about what it is like to see a 10-foot dragon come to life.

The role of animals in human society is a topic of increasing significance. Susanna Forrest – author of The Age of the Horse (2016) – explores the challenges of doing animals justice in contemporary non-fiction. In a unique hour, Susanna shows how her own particular field – equine culture and history – has much to teach us about history, literature, anthropology, philosophy, and even food. Not just for horse-lovers!

We love speculative fiction: books exploring prospective future worlds in realistic styles have enduring popularity in bestseller lists and critics’ hearts. But why are we so drawn to it? What does speculative fiction help us come to terms with? What can it tell us about ourselves – and do we really want to know? Sophie Mackintosh suggests answers to these questions, complete with a reading of her Booker-longlisted novel The Water Cure.

Alys Conran is one of Britain’s most exciting new writers. Her first novel, Pigeon, was praised for its humanity and skill: ‘might have been authored by Faulkner’, one critic wrote. Appropriately enough for a festival called Hearth, Alys’s second novel Dignity (forthcoming in 2019) is all about the places we call home. It tells the story of three women: sharp-tonged Magda, her carer Shusheela, and the memories of Magda’s mother Evelyn, a former teacher. Magda spent her childhood in the British Raj, a place that ground down her mother and left a lasting legacy on all three women. Dignity considers what the Raj means to Britain today.

Tania Hershman might be a poet. She might be a short story writer, or an editor, a critic, a blogger, a journalist and a short fiction activist (via her website ShortStops). She has been Writer in Residence at Gladstone’s Library and at a university biochemistry department, and is currently writer in residence in a cemetery. Her writing is eclectic, funny, thought-provoking and rare. It is inspired by science and by the poems of Louis MacNeice. In this hour Tania reads a specially-chosen selection of her past and current work while talking to Louisa Yates about how her writing life has shaped her, what she’s writing now, what hybrid writing means, and all that she might be next. PLEASE NOTE: THIS RECORDING CONTAINS EXPLICIT LANGUAGE.

It’s 2nd March 1975 and two babies are born: Yonas Kelati in Eritrea, and Jude Munro in Britain. 30 years later, Yonas’s asylum case ends up on Jude’s desk – their lives couldn’t be more different, and yet one hinges on the other. A multi-voice novel, The Invisible Crowd is a compelling exploration of the British asylum system, the lottery of birth and the kindness of strangers. The Chief Executive of the Refugee Council called it ‘a wonderful book’ and it was one of the Guardian Readers’ Books of the Year in 2017. Ellen introduces us to the ragbag of people who encounter Yonas on his journey, and explores how Jude will argue his case…

Jacqueline Saphra’s A Bargain with the Light: Poems After Lee Miller was published by Hercules Editions in 2017. In this hour Jacqueline takes a closer look at the life and work of Lee Miller, extraordinary and courageous photographer and trailblazer for women. Jacqueline offers some background about Miller’s place in twentieth-century history and shares her experience of writing poems that explore the intersection of life, art and world events. Followed by a reading of the full sequence with projected images and an open mic session where the audience is invited to perform image-inspired poems.

Alan Cadwallader delivers this year’s Robinson-Spong public lecture, considering the challenge of material culture to metaphysical readings of the Bible.

Keggie Carew’s memoir, Dadland (2016), won the Costa Biography Award 2017 for its spellbinding account of her unorthodox, engaging, complicated father. Appropriately, the book’s subtitle is ‘a journey into uncharted territory’, and this is the subject of Keggie’s evening event. Writing about a close family member brings with it difficult decisions about what to share. Keggie shares a tale of biography, history, and personal anecdote.

Tara Guha is an expert at writing in the snatches of time that others might think are impossible. Her first novel, 2015’s bestselling Untouchable Things, was written as her daughter napped; this summer her Twitter feed detailed her new novel being written and edited in tents, during swimming breaks, amid swarms of bees and on trains. The adrenaline of the writing process clearly influenced Untouchable Things: it’s a taut, tense thriller praised for its ‘outstanding ensemble cast’. Tara shares her experiences of writing her first book, and news of her new project.

Liz Flanagan’s writing is known for its gripping, thrilling tone and powerful friendships. Her first young adult novel, Eden Summer, tells the story of Jess and her friend Eden, and is set in West Yorkshire. The two girls know everything about one another – but when Eden goes missing Jess realises there’s a lot Eden has never shared. Liz’s second novel, the forthcoming Dragon Daughter (October 2018), is a story of adventure, migration and belonging, aimed at children of nine years and upwards. Set on the imaginary island of Arcosi, it is told through the eyes of servant girl Milla, who discovers the last four dragon eggs and is forced to keep them secret amidst growing tensions. In her Hearth event, Liz reads from both her novels, discusses questions of friendship and identity, and talks about the importance of landscape, whether real or imagined.

Mental health has long been intimately linked with poetic expression. Reading and writing poetry can help to articulate struggles and find shared experiences; it can contribute to wellbeing and form part of a strategy of coping. It can be private musing or a public declaration. Angela Topping recently contributed to a new anthology of poetry on the theme of mental health. In this reflective hour she delivers a reading on mental health and wellbeing. We are delighted to welcome back Angela Topping to Gladstone’s Library. Angela was Writer in Residence for one month in 2013.