Events

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Caroline Newark:
Risk-Taking, Rebellion and Ruffs: A Tudor Experience

Coming from a long line of risk-takers, Caroline will introduce you to a clutch of her ancestors who defied the Tudor monarchs. Henry VII may have been inclined to forgiveness, but Henry VIII and his successors were not. Fire-raising, murder, broken promises, sword fights and a spot of adultery are all on the menu as well as heart-breaking stories of young women who threw caution to the wind, risking all for love.

In Caroline’s latest book, The Mirror of Naples, it is Elizabeth Grey, half-blood cousin of Henry VIII, who must learn the true cost of defying the Tudor king.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 2:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Fiona Mathews & Tim Kendall:
Black Ops and Beaver Bombing; Adventures with Britain’s Wild Mammals

Fiona is Chair of Mammal Conservation Europe and Professor at the University of Sussex, and Tim is Professor of English Literature at the University of Exeter. Britain is teeming with wildlife, often in the most unexpected places. There are stone mines where bats hang out with pot-smoking teenagers and water voles thrive without water in Glaswegian parklands. Our coastlines are laden with seals. That’s the good news. The bad news is that a quarter of British mammals are at imminent risk of extinction. Black Ops and Beaver Bombing is a celebration of Britain’s marvellous mammals, and a rallying cry to save them.

Venue: Ilminster Arts Centre
Bar open
Time: 7.30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Calista Lucy:
Shackleton: Reader and Writer

Sir Ernest Shackleton (1874-1922) was born in Ireland. His family moved to England when he was 10, and he was educated at Dulwich College. He was a voracious reader but was bored by his studies. Nonetheless, he ranked fifth in his class of 31. He was able to leave school at the age of 16 and go to sea. Although he never reached the South Pole he has left a legacy in his writings. By looking at his reading habits we can learn something of where his literary talent came from. Calista is Keeper of the Archives at Dulwich College.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Bethany Askew:
Three Extraordinary Years: The Coleridges at Stowey

Samuel Taylor Coleridge moved to Nether Stowey at the end of 1796. The poetry he wrote here is some of the most beautiful and famous in the English language. Bethany explores the inspiration behind the poetry: the humble cottage he lived in, the beautiful countryside of the Quantock hills and his relationships with his wife Sara and William and Dorothy Wordsworth. Bethany is the author of nine novels and likes to write about women’s lives, their role in society, their position as wife and mother and the impact of marriage, children and divorce on family dynamics.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 2.30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Peter Clark:
The Men of 1924

2024 marks the 100th anniversary of the first Labour cabinet, a turning point in Britain’s political history. For the first time, Britain’s cabinet included working-class men, former miners, and immigrants. The newly elected prime minister, Ramsay MacDonald, was the illegitimate son of a Scottish domestic servant, and around him he assembled a politically diverse cabinet of former Liberals, former Conservatives, socialist intellectuals, and trade unionists. Peter Clark is a writer and translator, and a Research Associate at SOAS, University of London.

Venue: Ilminster Arts Centre
Bar open
Time: 7.30pm (Doors open 6.30pm)
Tickets (from IAC): £20.00

Dave Kelly & Bob Hall with Hilary Blythe:
An Evening of Blues, Boogie & Song

Join us for a fun evening of music from our partner organisation Ilminster Arts Centre. Friends since they were neighbours in the sixties, England’s premier blues vocalist and guitarist Dave Kelly (of the Blues Band) and blues and boogie pianist Bob Hall have had illustrious careers and won many awards for their music. Hilary Blythe joins the duo on bass and guitar; an emotive singer of classic folk blues in her own right. Expect an evening of great blues including original tunes, funny stories and a little bit of country.

Details & tickets: https://www.ilminsterartscentre.com/performances/dave-kelly-and-bob-hall-with-hilary-blythe

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café until 3pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Alom Shaha:
Why Don’t Things Fall Up? And Six Other Science Lessons You Missed at School

Alom is a Physics teacher at a comprehensive school. When not teaching, he works as a writer, filmmaker, and science communicator. The author of several books written for children, including Mr Shaha’s Recipes for Wonder, and Mr Shaha’s Marvellous Machines, his latest book, Why Don’t Things Fall Up?, is for adults. Using questions asked by children as a starting point, Alom will take us on a tour of the “big ideas” of science, reminding us that science is not just for scientists – it’s a human endeavour that enriches all our lives.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café until 3pm
Time: 2:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Amanda Craig:
The Three Graces
(Talking to Mary Chisholm)

“People talk about the infirmities of old age, but what about the firmities? What about the beliefs, the events, the politics, the odd secret? The Three Graces is a brilliant piece of storytelling that revels in the world of expat old ladies in Tuscany. It’s a novel E.M. Foster would’ve loved.” ― Andrew O’Hagan, author of Mayflies. Amanda is a novelist, critic, and journalist. She received the Catherine Pakenham Award for young women journalists. Her multi-stranded approach to writing fiction has been compared to that of Anthony Trollope, Balzac, and Dickens.

Venue: Warehouse Theatre
Tea/coffee – Bar open
Time: 7.30pm
Tickets: £12.00

Alan Johnson – in conversation:
From Fact to Fiction to Fact

Alan (ILF Patron) held several posts in the Blair and Brown governments, including Health Secretary and Home Secretary. He has written 4 volumes of memoirs and 3 novels. With two more books out this year, Alan hopes to enhance his credentials as a novelist before going back to non-fiction with a biography of Harold Wilson. “The writing process is very different for each sub-genre – memoir, fiction and biography. I expect my future efforts to be confined to thrillers although I suppose I could try my hand at a children’s book to increase the diversity even further.”

Venue: Warehouse Theatre
Time: 10:00am – 3:00pm
Tickets: £10.00 per child

Children’s Arts Awards Day, Tutor – Lucy Driver

Arts Award Discover, aimed at children in Key Stage 1 (aged 5 to 8), is the start of the Trinity College London Arts Award adventure. Young people can explore the arts all around them, investigate different art forms, research an artist, and then share their discoveries with others. Arts Award Discover boosts children’s creativity, curiosity, confidence, and communication skills. A certificate will be awarded at the end of the day.

ILF is pleased to sponsor this event so that parents of children taking part will pay only £10 per child. 12 places maximum are available.

To book a child onto this course please email the Festival office – ilminsterlitfest@gmail.com. Our Secretary will confirm the place, if places remain, and arrange the £10 prior payment with you.

Info: www.trinitycollege.com/qualifications/arts-award

Venue: Warehouse Theatre
Tea/Coffee – Bar open
Time: 7.30pm
Tickets: £12.00

Wes Streeting:
One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up
(in conversation with Alan Johnson)

Wes Streeting is a Labour Party politician and Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care. Previously he was Shadow Secretary of State for Child Poverty and before that for Schools.

Repeating an appearance at Cheltenham Literary Festival, Wes will be in conversation with Alan Johnson, a former politician himself and one of ILF’s patrons. Their topic will be Wes’s book One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up, about growing up in the East End of London and how family and education helped him escape poverty and transform his life.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café until 3pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Simon McDonald:
Beyond Britannia

A former Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and head of Diplomatic Service, Simon now sits in the House of Lords as a crossbencher. What should the future of British foreign policy look like? For too long successive governments have shied away from acknowledging uncomfortable truths about the decline of Britain’s military capabilities. In his new book, Simon shows how the UK’s significant soft-power strengths can be harnessed to expand our international influence.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café until 3pm
Time: 2:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Robert Hardman:
Charles III – The Inside Story

Robert is a British journalist, author, and documentary filmmaker. An authority on the Royal Family, he has been part of the BBC commentary team at every major state occasion of recent years, including the coronation of King Charles and funerals of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip. He has been Royal Correspondent for The Daily Telegraph and currently writes for The Daily Mail.

Venue: Warehouse Theatre
Time: 7.30pm
Tickets: FREE

Ilminster Entertainments Society:
Play-reading Evening – Free Event

This free event, open to all (over 16), will be run by the Play-reading Group at the Warehouse Theatre in Brewery Lane. Lucy Driver (IES Chair) says: We hold regular readings of plays at the theatre. Some of these are just for fun and others are for plays we are considering performing. Anyone over 16 is welcome to come along. Everyone who wants to will get a chance to read, but there’s no pressure to do that if you prefer just to listen.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café until 3pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Paul Dicken:
How to Fail the Turing Test

Paul is a writer and philosopher. He received his PhD from Cambridge and has held academic positions in the UK, Germany and Australia. He is the author of A Critical Introduction to Scientific Realism and Getting Science Wrong. He has recently been focusing on Artificial Intelligence and the legacy of Alan Turing. Turing speculated about building a computer capable of talking to a human; but the real danger might be that we are building humans only capable of talking to a machine.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café until 3pm
Time: 2:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Duncan Minshull:
The Joys of Hitting the Road

In his book Globetrotting – Writers Walk the World, Duncan Minshull brings together over fifty walker-writers who have travelled the world’s seven continents. Duncan is a freelance audio producer and anthologist, and formerly a senior producer at BBC Radio where he commissioned and produced the series Book Of The Week and Book at Bedtime. He has written extensively about walking. He leads walking tours—“walk and talks”—across various parts of the UK. After this talk, Duncan will lead a walk around the Ilminster countryside for those who like a stroll. En route, he would like to hear from his fellow strollers – perhaps you have some interesting reasons for “hitting the road”.

Venue: Herne View Primary School
Time: 6:00pm
Tickets: Not required

Children’s Poetry Recital Final

Engaging with people of all ages is one of the aims for the Festival. Each year, our Poetry Recital Competition encourages children to recite a chosen poem from memory. Local participating schools select representatives from several Key Stages to go forward to the competition final held at Herne View Primary School, Silver Street/Wharf Lane, Ilminster.

Venue: Warehouse Theatre
Time: 7:30pm
Tickets (from IES): £10.00

Ilminster Entertainment Society:
An Evening of Poetry, Prose and Prosecco

This evening, the Warehouse Theatre will present an entertaining mixture of Poetry and Prose performed by IES members and a few special guests.  As part of this special event, they will be opening their Prosecco Bar so that you can indulge in a glass of bubbly, sit back, and enjoy the evening.  

Tickets: www.thewarehousetheatre.org.uk or from Ilminster Home Hardware, Silver Street.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Paul Rosser:
A Sister for Venus

A Sister for Venus is a climate fiction novel that explores one of the innumerable futures that could lie beyond our past and present failure to recognise that we are conducting a vast and unthinking experiment with our planet’s biosphere. Peter is a local author who seeks to engage readers with the topic of Climate Change through their imaginations rather than through the scientific data which has been available to us now for several decades.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 2:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Felice Hardy:
The Tennis Champion Who Escaped the Nazis
(Talking to Mike Lanigan)

In 1930, at 26, Liesl Herbst was the Austrian National Tennis Champion, a celebrity in Vienna. Liesl, her husband David and their daughter Dorli came to Britain after escaping the Nazis. On arrival the family had already been stripped of their Austrian citizenship and rendered stateless aliens. Nevertheless, both Liesl and her daughter Dorli competed at Wimbledon. They remain the only mother and daughter ever to have played doubles together at The Championships. This moving story of escape and survival is told by Liesl’s granddaughter. Felice Hardy is a journalist and Amazon No.1 Bestselling author. As a travel writer, she has toured the world for a variety of publications including the Guardian, Telegraph, Condé Nast Traveller and British Airways’ High Life magazine.

Venue: Ilminster Arts Centre
Bar open
Time: 7:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Tim Mirfin:
The Opera Singer Phenomenon

Returning for a second time to ILF, Tim is a professional opera singer, living in Devon but singing in venues around the world. A trained operatic voice reaches the back row of a theatre’s ‘gods’ at the same time creating deep emotional responses in audiences. That requires years of dedication, training, and practice. This illustrated talk is a lighthearted look at how those voices make such an impressive sound and impact, sprinkled with entertaining examples from Tim’s professional life. To enjoy the event, there’s absolutely no need to be an opera fan!

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 11:00am
Tickets: £8.00

Helen Pugh:
Unsung Women in Somerset

Unsung Women in Somerset is a book of real and legendary women who lived, loved, worked and struggled in Somerset – queens and saints, women with courage, kindness, innovation and some who smashed the rules! Meet the woman who had two funerals, the African princess who survived and thrived despite the odds, the woman who voted… before it was legal, and many more! These are the unsung women of our county. This is the history of Somerset like never before.

Venue: Monks Yard, Horton
Café open until 3:00pm
Time: 2:30pm
Tickets: £8.00

Scotty Mills:
The Commando Rules for Life

From the backstreets of South London, Scotty Mills went on to lead the Royal Marine Commandos around the globe, becoming the highest-ranking black officer, and learning all there is to know about high performance and leadership. He now uses his skills to inspire others in business and industry to reach full potential. He worked with the Gareth Southgate’s England squad to help raise their performance from low to championship level. In 2012 was selected as an Olympic flag bearer and in 2018 was voted the most inspirational serviceman across the entire armed forces, receiving a National Award.

Venue: Warehouse Theatre
Bar open, interval
Time: 7:00pm – (please note the earlier start)
Tickets: £10.00

Simon Whitehouse:
Oscar Wilde in Theatreland

Simon is a professional actor and an award-winning Blue Badge London Guide who has worked as in-house lecturer at Shakespeare’s Globe, the Royal Opera House and the National Gallery. He has a special interest in Oscar Wilde and in this talk he’ll reveal the impact the dramatist, writer and wit had on London’s West End. Wilde sprinkled stardust across theatreland, but his popularity ended abruptly when he found himself starring in the most sensational criminal trial of the 19th century. Fortunately, his plays live on and, after an interval, Mick and Irene Glynn from The Warehouse Theatre will perform 2 scenes from one of them – An Ideal Husband.

AT THE END OF THE EVENING WE’LL BE RAFFLING OFF A COPY OF EACH OF THE BOOKS FEATURED IN THIS YEAR’S FESTIVAL.