Tickets have gone on sale for the 2022 Chiswick Book Festival in west London (September 7-14), with more top names added to the star-studded lineup.
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Dame Sheila Hancock, Pam Ayres and Phyllis Logan (above) and Ciaran Hinds will join speakers already announced – Dame Eileen Atkins, Revd Richard Coles, Chris Patten, Ronnie Archer-Morgan, Adele Parks, Sadie Jones, Justin Webb, Sir Vince Cable, Mihir Bose and Jeremy Bowen. Children’s authors include Cressida Cowell, Rob Biddulph, David Wood, Greg James and Chris Smith.
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Dame Sheila will explore issues of ageing, grief and anger in her new book Old Rage, interviewed by Jane Garvey, former presenter of Woman’s Hour. Writer and entertainer Pam Ayres will discuss life in the countryside in her book Who Are You Calling Vermin?
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Oscar nominee Ciaran Hinds, Sinead Cusack and other actors will read poems by WB Yeats to mark the unveiling of a sculpture by Conrad Shawcross RA, celebrating the Nobel Prize winning poet. Yeats spent formative years in Bedford Park, Chiswick, where he wrote his celebrated poem The Lake Isle of Innisfree, which has inspired the publicly-funded sculpture. The ‘Poetry Hour’ readings are organised by the Josephine Hart Poetry Foundation, and will follow the sculpture’s unveiling by the Rt Rev Dr Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury.
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Later in the Festival, Phyllis Logan will read from the works of Dame Iris Murdoch, who grew up in Chiswick and is celebrated, like Yeats, on the Chiswick Writers Trail. Two Festival walks led by accredited guides will explore the areas where Murdoch, EM Forster, Anthony Burgess, JG Ballard, Nancy Mitford, Dylan Thomas, Robert Bolt and other writers lived.
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Chiswick residents Peter Oborne (The Fate of Abraham) and Deborah Cadbury (The School That Escaped The Nazis) are among the many authors speaking at this year’s Festival. Twenty other writers will take part in the Local Authors Party at the George IV pub.
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Jo James, the Festival’s programme director, said: “I am so excited to be presenting a programme that brings to Chiswick some of the top names in publishing for autumn 2022, and also reflects the abundance of talent in and around this wonderful area.”
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The Chiswick Book Festival is a non-profit-making community event that raises money for charities: St Michael & All Angels Church, which hosts the Festival, and three reading charities – Doorstep Library, InterAct Stroke Support and Read for Good.
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The 2022 event’s speakers include:
Memoirs: Dame Eileen Atkins, Chris Patten, Ronnie Archer-Morgan, Dame Sheila Hancock, Philip Beale, Lucy Easthope, Justin Webb, Antony Thomas, Philip Beale, Benedict Allen.
History: Jessie Childs, Lucy Jago, Miranda Malins, Deborah Cadbury, Peter Bradley, Nick Higham, CJ Shuler, Iain MacGregor, Robert Seatter, Will Wyatt, David Jacques.
Fiction: Bonnie Garmus, Revd Richard Coles, Peter Popham, Adele Parks, Lucy Foley, Fiona Cummins, Sadie Jones, Clare Clark, Alex Gerlis, Helen Sedgwick, Ellen Alpsten, Annabelle Abbs, Freya Berry, Liz Hyder, Emma Curtis, Nicola Rayner, Susie Lynes.
Politics and current affairs: Michael Cockerell, Michael Crick, Sir Vince Cable, Jeremy Bowen, Tharik Hussein, Peter Oborne, Mihir Bose.
Arts, literature and entertainment: Ciaran Hinds, Sinead Cusack, Annemarie Bilclough, Franny Moyle, Jacqueline Riding, Philip Hook, Miles Leeson, Anne Rowe, Rachael Wiseman, Phyllis Logan, Caroline Frost, Robert Rees, Pam Ayres, Ralph Brookfield, Robert Hokum.
Business and economics: Stewart Langley, Geraldine Gallacher, Kathryn Jacob, Dharshini David.
Children’s authors: Cressida Cowell, Rob Biddulph, Greg James & Chris Smith, Anna Christina, Ben Bailey-Smith & Sav Akyuz , Zoe Antoniades, Mark Evans, Diane Hofmeyr, Ken Wilson-Max, Sophy Henn.
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Catch up with earlier programme announcements on our News pages:
Actor Kevin McNally heads local authors lineup – 25 July 2022
Celebrate Auntie’s centenary with these BBC authors – 19 July 2022
Cressida Cowell, Rob Biddulph and Greg James to head children’s Festival – 9 July 2022
Don’t miss Ronnie Archer-Morgan of Antiques Roadshow – 21 June 2022