BIOGRAPHIES

AISLE 16
Are the UK’s only poetry boyband.
‘What if you could learn everything
you need to know about poetry in one hour,
then never have to hear about it ever again?
Man,that would be sweet!’
Starring Luke Wright, who has performed
with Eddie Izzard, Pete Townsend and
Jerry Hall in BBC Radio 2’s Late Night
Cabaret and was Adam’s ‘poetry bitch’ on
the Adam & Joe Show, Ross Sutherland,
Joel Stickley and Chris Hicks, the partners
in rhyme use the flashiest costumes,
choreography and most up-to-date
techniques to bring verse to the unversed.

TOM BAXTER
Is one of the brightest
new names on the UK music scene and his
first release, Feather and Stone, received
rave reviews in the press: ‘Gorgeous’ (The
Times), ‘Charismatic and engaging’ (Time
Out) and ‘Tom Baxter’s star is rising fast’
(The Guardian). He will perform on
Saturday night on the Bowling Green.

ALEX BELLOS
Studied mathematics and
philosophy at Oxford, going on to become
the Guardian’s unofficial ‘rave
correspondent’ and earning a welldeserved
cult following. He lived in Rio de
Janeiro for five years and is the author of
the modern classic, Futebol: The Brazilian
Way of Life. He will be talking about
chorinho, a Brazilian musical style that was
the precursor to samba, accompanied by a
chorinho band.

RICHARD BENSON
Is a former editor
of the Face, who has written for many
newspapers and magazines, and is ‘...one
of Britain’s most important cultural
commentators’ (The Guardian). His first
book, The Farm: The Story of One Family
and the English Countryside, a memoir of
growing up in the Yorkshire countryside on
a 50-acre smallholding, has just been
published by Hamish Hamilton. ‘A brazzock
by any other name’ will see him talking
about wildflowers, especially those at Port
Eliot.

ST JOHN BOWMAN
Is an editor and
film-maker of documentaries and dramas.
In the Film Tent he will be showing the
pilot for The Importance of Being Elegant,
directed by George Amponsah and Cosima
Spender, focusing on a cult called
The Sapeurs and the politics of music and
fashion from Kinshasa to Paris. He will
also introduce Gravity, a multi-awardwinning
film which was shortlisted for the
best short film at the recent London Film
Festival, and deals with the detached
nature of gun violence. This film was
played outside the G8 summit in
Edinburgh. St John will also present
The Oculas, a film he has made about a
strange machine and its appearance in the
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

SUSIE BOYT
Is the author of four novels
including The Normal Man, which was read
on Radio 4, The Last Hope of Girls, which
was shortlisted for the John
Llewellyn Rhys prize, and Only Human,
which was shortlisted for the Mind book of
the Year. Susie also writes about fashion
for the Financial Times and lives in London
with her family. On Sunday she will be
putting on her show, Only Human-Married
Alive, playing Marjorie Hemming, a
marriage counsellor who claws back
couples from the bleakest brinks. Private
scenes from her lamp-lit consulting room
will be re-enacted by Susie and her
company.

FAMOS BRAMWELLS
Was created to
entertain without resorting to juggling or
escapology. And to do it without using a
lot of props, which lets face it just get in
the way and are heavy to carry. Since then
he has performed and compered at
festivals all over the world – England,
Scotland, Wales, Ireland, America,
Australia, Austria, Belgium, Holland,
Germany and Cornwall... As no one has
asked him to stop he will carry on.

Stone Soup Storytelling
Is based in Plymouth but calls on a network of Storytellers from all around the world. It is represented at this year's festival by David Doyle (Dublin) and Nik Brooks (London), who have both been associated with the festival since its inception. Stone Soup has been working its particular brand of Oral Imagery at events, gatherings, and festivals for the past three years, with its biggest audience, to date, being around two thousand on a beach on Dorset's Jurassic coastline, with a backdrop of a forty-foot long Sea-God, and an eighteen-foot Mermaid. Stone Soup currently organises a regular series of open Storytelling events, including two in Plymouth, one family-oriented, and the other for Adults Only. Please visit the website at www.stonesoupstorytelling.org.uk for further details.

MICK BROWN
Is the author of the
highly acclaimed The Dance of 17 Lives: The
Incredible True Story of Tibet’s 17th
Karmapa, published by Bloomsbury. Mick
is a journalist and broadcaster and the
author of four previous books: Richard
Branson: The Inside Story; American
Heartbeat: Travels from Woodstock to San
Jose by Song Title; The Spiritual Tourist;
and Performance. Mick is currently writing
a biography of the legendarily eccentric
and reclusive Phil Spector, who had not
given a major interview for 20 years when
Mick Brown went to meet him in Los
Angeles in December 2002. Five weeks
later a 40-year-old actress was found shot
dead in the hall of Spector’s home. He is
now awaiting trial for murder. Through
Juke Box Martyr, Mick will be taking us on
a journey in words and music through the
strange life and times of rock’n’roll’s
greatest producer.

LOUISE CARPENTER
The author of
An Unlikely Countess: Lily Budge and the
13th Earl of Galloway, will lend her unique
and eccentric insight into life in a big
house as experienced by a troubled child,
to be played by the actor Murrough
O’Brien. Drawing on the memoirs of
Randolph Galloway, lobotomised by his
parents in 1952, Louise will lead a tour
below and above stairs in Port Eliot. There
will be five tours over the weekend, with
places limited to strictly 20 on a first
come, first served basis. NB People
interested in joining a tour should sign up
in the Site Office in the Walled Garden
beforehand.

CHEAP DATE GARDEN
Founded by
Kira Joliffe, Cheap Date is an anti-fashion
magazine for thinking thrifters, it’s a
passport to panache and a stairway to
style. Shimmy, as your secret sauciest self,
in its Pin-up Photo-booth while your
children mutate into flower fairies. Also,
dotted throughout the garden are its Great
Cheap Date clothes exchanges - turn up
with pieces you no longer wear and swap
them for clothing that rocks your boat.

SAM & SAM CLARK
Are the husbandand- wife team behind Moro,
the awardwinning southern Mediterranean
restaurant which they founded in 1997
after spending their honeymoon travelling
around Spain, Morocco and the Sahara in a
camper van, gathering inspiration for their
groundbreaking recipes. In 2003 they
published Moro: the Cookbook. Their new
book, Casa Moro, was published last year.
The organisers of the festival did not want
to put on just any old cookery
demonstration, we wanted Sam and Sam,
and we wanted it to be on a camping stove
- to inspire our friends who are spending
the weekend beneath canvas. Don’t miss
them in the Walled Garden on Satuday
afternoon demonstrating one of their
fabulous recipes.

ELIZABETH COOK
Has published
poetry and fiction, is the editor of the
Oxford Keats and has written and
broadcast for TV and radio. Her book,
Achilles, won a Fringe First award at
Edinburgh 2000 and has subsequently
been performed at the National Theatre.
‘What the late Angela Carter did for the
folk-tale or fairy-story, Cook is here doing
for the classical epic’ (Spectator).
(Observer). She will be reading from
Achilles.

SALLY CRABTREE
Is a poet and
singer/songwriter who also writes
children’s books. She has been delighting
audiences at festivals around the country
with her colourful and quirky
performances of the ‘Poetree’ – a magical
copper tree whose fruit are the most
strange and wonderful imaginable.

LOUIS DE BERNIERES
Is the author
of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin and Birds
Without Wings. This year he will be
playing his mandolin and guitar with the
Antonius Players, with whom he has been
working for the past two years. In
collaboration, they have delighted
audiences with their unique blend of
poetry and music.

SARAH DAGGAR-NICKSON
Is British and was raised in London,
Sydney, Hong Kong and Istanbul. She has
worked as a documentary-maker,
film-maker and creative director. As a poet
she has performed at the Whitechapel Art
Gallery, Express Excess, & The Poetry Cafe
(Covent Garden). She has written
creatively and on the subject of poetry for
magazines such as .cent &
GoodForNothing. Sarah is 27 and lives in
Whitechapel, London. Her first play, Viola
Ends, is currently in production with
Nabokov.

PTOLEMY DEAN
Is an architect who
specialises in the repair of historic
buildings and the design of new buildings
in sensitive sites. The co-presenter of the
BBC television series Restoration, he is a
Sir John Soane scholar and has extensively
investigated Soane’s work at Port Eliot
over a number of years. At present
Ptolemy enjoys a mix of projects including
repairs and alterations at Malmesbury
Abbey in Wiltshire. On the secular side he
is working on a number of country houses
in Kent, Sussex, Oxon and Gloucestershire.
He is the design consultant for the First
Citizens Bank in North Carolina. He will
conduct an external tour around the
house. See Elsewhere for timing. The
meeting place will be on the North side of
the church.

GEOFF DYER
Is an essayist and a
novelist, whose most recent book, Yoga for
People Who Can’t be Bothered to Do it,
has received much praise. He will be firespinning
and also reading from his work.


MICHAEL EAVIS
You know, the one
who runs the greatest festival in the world.
The Methodist dairy farmer philanthropist
- and proud owner of the 600-acre Worthy
Farm in Pilton, Somerset - has been
welcoming festival goers to his home since
1970. He will be talking about his life and
Glastonbury.

LOUIS ELIOT
Singer and songwriter, is
the former Kinki Machine and Rialto front
man. He will bring what The Times called
his ‘true pop genius’ back home to
Cornwall, by performing with his band on
Friday night and doing an acoustic set on
Sunday.

EKOW ESHUN
Is a writer and cultural
commentator, seen regularly on the Late
Review, and the new artistic director of
the ICA. He was editor of Arena magazine
and his first book, Black Gold of the Sun,
has just been published by Hamish
Hamilton. He will give us a visual walkthrough
of his novel.

BERNARDINE EVARISTO
Is the
author of Lara, The Emperor’s Babe and
Soul Tourists (out now from Hamish
Hamilton). She is a recent recipient of a
NESTA Fellowship Award and was made a
Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in
2004.

MIKE FIGGIS
Started his career making
pop videos after studying music in London
(he is a member of the R’n’B band, Gas
Board). The director of Leaving Las Vegas
and Internal Affairs, he is currently
working on Guilty Pleasure about a young
couple who set up a ménage-à-trois before
their wedding and Going Down, about a
young woman who becomes a prostitute to
pay her way through college. He is also
editing, the next issue of the influential
magazine, FIVE, out next year. Don’t miss
his latest work in the Film Tent, introduced
by FIVE founder, Kate Jago.

JAMES FLINT
Writer and film-maker, is
the author of three novels (The Book of
Ash, 52 Ways to Magic America and
Habitus). Aware that none of us is getting
any younger, he is currently directing a
short series of mini-dramas set in an old
people’s home. This year his films - The
Nuclear Train, a 10-minute drama about a
man searching for meaning in the
wastelands of London, and Upper Spernal
Blues, a half-hour documentary about life
on a farm in the Midlands - will be
screened at the lit fest.

LILY FRASER
Was born and raised at
the celebrated Sawmills Studio on the
River Fowey in Cornwall. She moved from
the middle of nowhere to her first Cornish
village at the age of 22 and discovered
closing the curtains to get changed,
neighbours, roadside parking and milk on
the doorstep, then moved to London two
years ago. After a few years touring with
the band GlassPlanet, Lily went solo and
has worked with a variety of producers
from Steve Hillier (Dubstar) to Michael
Dempsy (The Cure).

GREY GOWRIE
Is the author of A
Postcard from Don Giovanni (poems),
Oxford University Press, 1972 and The
Domino Hymn: Poems from Harefield,
Agenda Publications, 2005. He was born in
Dublin in 1939, has taught at Harvard and
University College London and been
Minister for the Arts and Chairman of the
Arts Council. He will be reading from his
new works.

PAUL HARRIS
Paul and his brother Dennis
hail from the very musical Harris family -
Dad Tony is a well-known local jazz vibes
player - and together with bass player
Kevin Sanders have been setting standards
in the Jazz Cafe on Plymouth’s Barbican for
some time as virtually the house band.
Paul is an accomplished jazz and blues
pianist and they will be joined by vocalist
Zoe Francis in this set.

MICHAEL HOWELLS
Is the Cecil
Beaton of his day. An art director
extraordinaire, costume designer and
fashion shoot artistic director who has
worked with John Galliano, Nick Knight
and Alexander McQueen as well as the
Rolling Stones and Derek Jarman. He is the
creator of this year’s amazing revolving
Bowling Green.

SIMON JAMESON
Uptight…out of
sight. Yeah…he’s spoken in Beijing at the
invitation of the Chinese government.
Yeah…he’s spoken on a platform with Bill
Clinton. Yeah…he’s sung on stage with
Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys.
Currently you’ll find him lecturing on
culture at the Royal College of Art and
dining with kings. Yeah? This year, firstly,
he will be looking at the cultural yardstick
- an objective measure against which all
art can be judged and evaluated. A dream
of philosophers since Plato. Impossible?
No. It has now been achieved and will
be unveiled to the world for the first
time. And, secondly, lovely free cakes.
If either of these interest you then come
to Simon Jameson’s performance in the
Walled Garden.

THE JUKE BOX
Unlikely people choose
their favourie tunes for a Saturday night in
Port Eliot. Simon Prosser, of the publishers
Hamish Hamilton and Hari Kunzru herd
musical cats, followed by a couple of hours
of unusual party music from across time
and around the world. Shake your booty.
Pump up your slim volume.

HARI KUNZRU
Is the author of the
multi-prize-winning novel The
Impressionist. His second novel,
Transmission, was published last year to
great acclaim. He was chosen as one of
Granta’s Twenty Best Young British Writers
in 2003. With Francis Upritchard he is the
co-founder of the Port Eliot Historical
Society, which will be investigating the
future of Port Eliot. He will also be reading
a new piece of writing on Saturday on the
Bowling Green.

THE LIBRARY OF UNWRITTEN BOOKS
Are Caroline Jupp and Sam
Brown. Look out for their roaming mobile
library throughout the festival and on
Saturday at 14.00 you are invited to The
Round Room in the house to browse the
library's collection of 500 titles and record
your own unrealised book ideas. On
Sunday, there will be a short performance
in the Walled Garden and readings from
the books recorded throughout the festival
on stage. Hear your own work on stage...
All contributors to the library receive a
copy of their own Unwritten Book.

THE LITERARY CONSULTANCY
Founded in 1996 and firmly established
within the publishing industry, The Literary
Consultancy provides expert, marketinformed
editorial advice to writers at any
level writing in English. Its manuscript
assessment service provides developing
writers with first-class critical feedback
and can help increase chances of
publication within the UK. ‘Is your writing
ready for the bin?’ Bring along your
manuscripts to the TLC Tent.

TOBY LITT
Is the author of seven
books, from his debut, the short stories
Adventures in Capitalism to Ghost Story.
He was chosen as one of Granta’s Twenty
Best Young British Writers in 2003. Toby
goes country at this year’s festival,
performing with the John Wesley Harding
Band, and will also read from Tourbusting,
his work of fiction about a fictional band –
although not at the same time.

JOHN MICHELL
Born 1933, was
educated at Eton and Cambridge. Now the
author of 12 books (the first of which was
published in 1967), Michell is a specialist in
sacred geometry. With The View over
Atlantis (1969) and City of Revelation
(1972), he helped to change the world’s
view by illuminating the science, culture
and wisdom of past civilization.

ROSIE MOCKLER
Will be holding a
master class in belly dancing – all
welcome.

SIMON MUNNERY
Is one of Britain’s
most radical and intelligent comic
performers, best known for The League
Against Tedium. He will be presenting his
two new shows, including a preview of his
Edinburgh Festival gig.

PAUL NEWMAN
Worked as an English
teacher, a mill-hand in a cider factory and
part-time gorilla at a holiday camp before
turning to writing in the 1970s. Now the
author of 10 books who lives in St Austell,
his Arthurian novel Galahad won the
Peninsula Prize in 2003. Recently he
completed the script for a feature film That
Summer in Lamorna (dramatising frictions
between Aleister Crowley, Lamorna Birch
and Dylan Thomas in the summer of 1938)
and Who Killed Ka Cox? a study of a
sensational but forgotten West Country
mystery.

MARTIN PARR
Is a photographer, a
professor of photography at the University
of Wales and a member of the Magnum
Photographic Corporation. In 2002 a large
retrospective of Parr’s work was initiated
by the Barbican Art Gallery. Among his
myriad subjects are bored couples, visits
to the dentist and signs of the times.

TOM PAYNE
Is a classically trained
musician, and has been the literary
manager of the Southwark Playhouse and
deputy literary editor of the Daily
Telegraph. He is the author of several
plays and his poems have appeared in
Poetry Review, PNR, The Spectator and
Stand magazine’s young poets symposium,
and is set to join the English department of
Sherborne in September. At the festival, he
will read a selection of his new poems and
interview Hugo Williams.

DANIEL PEMBERTON
Was influenced
by the statuesque electronic artists Jean
Michel Jarre, Tomita and Vangelis. He
began collecting keyboard gear from an
early age. He is a writer, composer and DJ.
He will be DJ-ing with Hari Kunzru on
Saturday night and, along with Neil
Boorman, will be discussing their
upcoming book Devil’s Dandruff Guide to
Nightlife (Duckworth), a razor-sharp look
at people in clubs – from the cloakroom
girl to the DJs, from the venue owner to
the undercover policeman.

HANNAH POOL
Is the author of My
Fathers’ Daughter, the story of her
adoption from an orphanage in Eritrea in
1974, her life as the black daughter of
white adoptive parents in England and a
moving account of her journey back to
Eritrea in search of her father and
brothers.

POWERFUL SAM
Is a master drummer
and drum-maker from Accra in Ghana and
has lived in the UK for five years and hosts
a stall at Totnes market. Sam will be
opening the lit fest on Friday at 19.30, and
will also appear around the site after that.
Follow the drum beat…

M REONOVICH
Is an American from
the Deep South. He is a specialist in
writing, performing and organising Haiku
contests. He will be running a Haiku
workshop (cups of tea compulsory) in the
TLC tent on Sunday afternoon.

STUART RYAN
Is an award-winning
acoustic guitarist, who will give a solo
recital of jazz, Celtic and World music. He
will also perform pieces from his CD The
Coast Road.

SCAVEL AN GOW
(the name means gossip,
or
‘bench of lies’, in the Kernewek
language) is a group of leading Cornish
writers dedicated to the creation of new
work for live performance. They will be
presenting Cornish poetry, performance
and readings.

RICHARD SILLS
Is a 24-year-old worldclass
South African surfer, sponsored by
Salt Rock, a British surf enterprise. He has
surfed all the oceans of the globe,
including the terrifying 50ft waves of
Hawaii, and had encounters with whales,
sharks and hostile locals. He will tell
Festival Co-Director Cathy Wilson about
his experiences and the life of an itinerant
professional surfer.

JANE SIMPSON
Is known for her
elegant sculptures that transform the
familiar, bringing a magical quality to
everyday objects. Teacups, a balustrade, a
sewing machine are created in unexpected
materials such as rubber and ice. She has
had solo projects recently at Galeria Javier
Lopez in Madrid and the Gagosian Gallery,
London, among many others. Simpson’s
work was included in the landmark
exhibitions Some Went Mad, Some Ran
Away, curated by Damien Hirst, and
Sensation (Young British Artsts from the
Saatchi Collection). A monograph on
Simpson’s work, Fresh Fresher, was
recently published by Other Criteria,
London, with an introduction by Norman
Rosenthal. She will be setting up her
cocktail tent in the Walled Garden on
Sunday afternoon, serving martinis and
canapes.

ALI SMITH
Was born in Inverness in
1962 and lives in Cambridge. Her first
book, Free Love, won the Saltire First Book
Award, and her novel, Hotel World (2001),
was shortlisted for both the Orange Prize
and the Booker Prize in 2001 and won the
Encore Award, the East England Arts
Award of the Year and the Scottish Arts
Council Book of the Year Award in 2002.
Other books include The Whole Stories
and Other Stories (2003) and The
Accidental, published by Hamish Hamilton
in 2005. She will be performing Kultural
Karaoke - a rare chance to see work by
some of the very best filmmakers and
artists working in the short form - with
Sarah Wood of the Cambridge Film
Festival. Take a journey through a world
constructed from daytime TV, the fading
glitz of Hollywood, the exuberance of pop,
the freaky shine of materialism.

RALPH STEADMAN
Was brought up
in North Wales as a 'bomb refugee' and
ended up rooming temporarily above one
of his father's Ladies' Drapery Emporium
customers. Ralph’s father was a travelling
salesman who ‘travelled in Ladies'
Knickers’ (his joke!). Ralph buggered about
a bit before discovering an aptitude for
drawing and developing his skill into a
savage tool. Ultimately, he used his new
skill to express opinions and delineate the
Spirit of Gonzo through American politics
and Hunter S. Thompson's Fear & Loathing
in Las Vegas. He is the greatest illustrator
of his generation and has published many
books. His wine book, The Grapes of
Ralph, is out this Autumn, in America
anyway. He is trying to write another book
now called God's Drawing Board which he
says is ‘bloody difficult’. See him on
Saturday night dressed up in his 'Hunter
outfit' and talking with Mick Brown on his
life and work with the late Hunter S.
Thompson. He will show us some of his
Hunter drawings not seen before, and
reading a poem that Hunter wrote to him.

RATTLE BAGS
Are from Devon and
specialise in fun for 0 to 5s: early-years’
music, fun and games sessions with two
women, one man, a tent, instruments and
a vast array of dressing-up clothes.

CATHERINE STORY
Is an artist based
in London: ‘Some of my work is to do with
containing my sense of shock and wonder
at the big picture, and I try to translate
ogres and memories and reactions as well
as blissful scenes.’ She and her team will
be presenting a 2ft-wide portable museum
with tiny art by selected artists from
around the world. Miniscule prizes will
also be awarded at the museum and
festival-goers will also be able to make
their own artwork for the museum, the
best of which will be featured on the
website (www.minimuseum.org.uk) after
the event. ‘The Minimuseum was devised
as a way to collaborate with artists who
use different media and methods. I am also
interested to see how serious ideas can
emerge from a lighthearted context.’ Find
the Minimuseum in the Orangery.

TALKAOKE
Is hosted by Mikey
Weinkove, a comedian and all-round
blagger. Considered the thinking man’s
karaoke, audience-driven subjects and
discussions are taken to the edge of
reasonableness and sometimes beyond.
Mickey insists on two rules only: no
singing, no punch-ups.

MATT THORNE
Is the author of several
novels, beginning with Tourist, as well as
the founder, with Nicholas Blincoe, of the
New Puritans movement. He will be
performing a two-handed short play.

GAVIN TURK & DEBORAH CURTIS
Turk is one of Britain’s most controversial
artists. This year at the lit fest he is
presenting, in conjunction with his studio
crew, Livestock Market, a puppet show
called In the Woods, at midnight on
Saturday. See map for location of this
original and extraordinary show.

FRANCIS UPRITCHARD
Is an artist,
born in New Zealand, but based in London.
In the past year her work has been shown
in Basel, New Zealand, Liverpool, at Beck’s
Futures, and the Saatchi Gallery. With Hari
Kunzru she is the co-founder of the Port
Eliot Historical Society, which will be
looking at the future of Port Eliot.

ANDY WALKER’S FAME FRAME
‘In the future everyone will be famous for
three minutes,’ Andy Walker. The fame
frame is an 8ft frame with a microphone
and a single light on a timer. People are
invited to bring performances that are no
larger than the frame, and not longer than
3 minutes. The first ten contributions
welcome. Book your slot with Mark
Collingwood at the side of the Bowling
Green over the weekend.

HELEN WALSH & KEVIN SAMPSON
Literature’s naughtiest couple
will read from their novels Awaydays,
Outlaws, Brass, and Helen’s forthcoming
opus, Hide, focusing on the Northern
heartlands of their stories and the extent
to which location and a sense of place
colours and defines their work. Both
authors have been described as ‘cinematic’
and it’s with landscape in mind that they
will select and introduce their readings.
Their show, It’s Grim Up North - (And It’s
Great!) will be on the Bowling Green on
Saturday night.

CHARLIE WILLIAMS & ROBERT LEWIS
Charlie Williams was born in 1971
in Worcester and read English at Swansea
University. During a brief return home he
was arrested for fighting a bouncer and
bound over to keep the peace for six
months. He moved to London but couldn’t
resist the lure of his hometown and moved
back to Worcester in 2003. His first novel,
Deadfolk, was published in 2004. He is the
inventor of the fictional town of Mangel.
Robert Lewis is from the Black Mountains,
in the Brecon Beacons. He has been a
waiter, painter, secretary, salesman,
banker, high-voltage cabler, housing
officer, mailboy, audit junior, welder’s
assistant and unemployed. Now 26, he has
just graduated as a mature student from
the University of Wales, Aberystwyth. The
Last Llanelli Train is his first novel. They
will present Noir Academy – with the
possibility of winning books, whiskey,
films, cigarettes and a vague feeling of
lingering doom.

HUGO WILLIAMS
Has scraped a living
on the fringes of literary journalism. For
the past 15 years he has written the
Freelance column in the TLS. His latest
book of poems, Billy’s Rain, won the T.S.
Eliot Prize. He was awarded the Queen’s
Gold Medal for Poetry for his Collected
Poems and at this year’s fest will be
reading from his work and interviewed by
Tom Payne.