The first details have been announced about for the 2018 Huddersfield Literature Festival ... and the town’s brewery Magic Rock will be staging some of the events.
Huddersfield favourites, author Joanne Harris and poet Simon Armitage, will once again be among the line-up.
The events at the Magic Rock Tap are Garden Gate Arts presents Ms Shakespeare Through Time, Extraordinary Tales from Yorkshire’s Women, as part of International Women’s Day; rapper Jehst and innovative electronic music producer Bambooman and Huddersfield poet Simon Armitage, who will be launching his book at Vinyl Tap record in Huddersfield town centre, then offering up a DJ set alongside special guest Stuart Maconie at the Magic Rock Taproom for the festival’s closing party.
The festival will welcome women’s rights campaigner Helen Pankhurst, great-grandaughter of suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst, who will be talking to Joanne Harris about her new book Deeds Not Words.
Joanne Harris will, herself be in conversation with David Barnett to talk about her latest fairytale, A Pocketful of Crows, and her forthcoming fantasy novel The Testament of Loki, inspired by her love of Norse mythology.
Details are being finalised to bring The Trouble With Women Is Men to the festival – a show of poetry, anecdotes and humour – created by poet Leo Aylen.
The festival’s popular regular events will include the literary afternoon tea, Stafflex free family day and the LGBT event Polari Up North which will include singer David McAlmont among its featured performers.
The winner of next year’s HLF Poetry Slam will win a place at the Manchester Word Wars, whose winner will in turn go on to national finals.
New events for 2018 include a Fables & Fiction Cosplay Ball and a poetry cabaret hosted by Rose Condo and featuring all-northern poets.
The festival will also host the launch of Ill Will, a new novel from award-winning author Michael Stewart, imagining Heathcliffe’s journey during his three years away from Wuthering Heights.
And there will be events around autism, including a sensory exhibition at Huddersfield Library and an In Conversation event sponsored by One17 Charitable Trust, with the author of A Pony in My Bedroom, Susan Dunne, who has Asperger’s.
Festival director, Michelle Hodgson, announced that a major name had been booked as a mystery guest for Huddersfield Town Hall with details to be announced as the brochure goes to print in mid-January.
A special launch attended by more than 100 people at Huddersfield Library was hosted by Shuddersfield trail creator Rebecca Winwood.
Guests at the launch event were able to view the library’s current Harry Potter: A History of Magic exhibition, and were treated to a number of magical activities.
The festival had organised a drawing competition for youngsters to draw what they perceive The Iron Man to be.
This is the character from the Ted Hughes short story from 1968 The Iron Man, not the Marvel comics hero.
It was won by Muhammad Amar, with Thomas Saxon second and Dylan Milburn third.
Muhammad’s drawing will appear in the HLF2018 Festival brochure (25,000 copies) to illustrate a free, children’s Iron Man Sculpture Workshop.
To find out more and book tickets, audiences should visit the brand new HLF website (www.HuddLitFest.org.uk) and sign up for the Festival newsletter for advance information.
Women are urged to take part in a writing competition and the winners will be showcased at the opening of Huddersfield Literature Festival.
The Ms Shakespeare Project profiles women in the arts and after a successful evening of poetry and art last March the next event will again be held on International Women’s Day as a part of the festival.
Now they are looking for three writers who they will commission to write a 2,000 monologue to be performed at the festival’s first night.
Organisers are putting on a night of stories, told and written by women, and each of these stories will be inspired by women from Yorkshire’s past.
They want the stories of grandmothers and great-grandmothers, half-forgotten tales told by family members or people in the community.
Sarah Barker from the project said: “We will capture these women’s narratives before they fade into forgotten history, all the time using the initiative to support female artists in the region.
“We are commissioning three up-and-coming Yorkshire authors to rediscover forgotten women’s narratives through researching records and personal histories. The writers, all of whom will be female or identify as women, will retell these stories in their own words and styles.”
Each will have their work performed to the Ms Shakespeare audience on International Women’s Day on March 8 at the opening of the Huddersfield Literature Festival.
People wanting to enter should submit 1,000 words (can be in the form of prose or a dramatic monologue), plus 500 words about themselves as a writer and how they connect with their region. They need to be submitted by January 3 and winners notified on January 10.
The three selected authors will receive a commission to write a 2,000 word monologue based on the narratives of local working women. Each will receive £300 and their work will be performed in front of an audience at the Huddersfield Literature Festival on International Women’s Day.
The event will be at the Magic Rock Tap, Willow Park Business Centre, Willow Lane, Huddersfield, on March 8 and will be free.
