Literary Leicester festival celebrates tenth year with diverse new programme of events throughout the city
Literary Leicester- our free international literature festival celebrating the written and spoken word- is taking place this week.
Organised by our University, the four-day festival will take place from Wednesday 15 November to Saturday 18 November and will feature acclaimed guest authors, the dramatic arts and several school events.
The programme for 2017 takes the festival in a fresh direction - jam-packed with a new range of experiences tailored to suit literature enthusiasts of all ages and interests.
Highlights include numerous talks from acclaimed literati, such as Douglas Dunn, Jonathan Bate, and Leicester alumni Adele Parks and Rory Waterman. Award-winning novelist Gwendoline Riley will host a Q&A on her new novel First Love.
The festival will feature journalist and TV presenter Anne Robinson as a guest speaker alongside Craig Brown, Ferdinand Mount, and Alexander Waugh, and Shrabani Basu, whose Victoria and Abdul has recently been adapted into a film starring Judi Dench and Michael Gambon.
Setting this year apart from its predecessors is the festival’s increased locational reach, with events across the city, from the University of Leicester campus out to the National Space Centre for sci-fi talks with Philip Reeve and Alistair Reynolds, the Phoenix cinema, the King Power Stadium, and local schools.
Festival Director Professor Martin Stannard, from our School of Arts, said: "Literary Leicester is bigger and better this year than ever: an equally glamorous line-up of celebrity guests, a wider distribution of venues, and a terrific outreach and diversity programme."