Gina Miller tops line-up for UEA Spring Literary Festival
By: News Archive
From a legendary 90s pop star to one of the most outspoken campaigners on Brexit, UEA’s Spring Literary Festival will offer something for everyone in 2019.
The festival runs from Wednesday 13 February to Thursday 2 May and will welcome eight of today’s best writers, thinkers and speakers to Norwich.
Topping the star-studded line-up is Gina Miller, who took the government to court over its authority to invoke article 50 and trigger the UK’s departure from the EU. With ongoing Brexit uncertainty, Gina continues to be at the forefront of UK politics. Her book Rise, mixing memoir with message, provides an extraordinary account of what it means to stand up for justice.
Also speaking will be former Everything But The Girl singer songwriter Tracey Thorn and UEA Creative Writing alumni John Boyne, author of worldwide bestseller The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, whose next novel, A Ladder To The Sky, is partly set at UEA.
Other award-winning writers at the festival include Man Booker Prize winner Marlon James and former Stonewall Writer of the Year, Damian Barr. Max Porter won 2015’s Sunday Times PFD Young Writer of the Year for Grief is the Thing with Feathers, and will speak about his new novel, the remarkable and moving Lanny. The line-up is completed by two fine contemporary novelists, Tessa Hadley and Rachel Cusk.
Director of the Spring Literary Festival, Dr Philip Langeskov said: “I couldn’t be more delighted with this year’s line-up, which is wonderfully varied, featuring one of our coolest and most thoughtful pop stars, Tracey Thorn, and one of our bravest and most inspiring public figures in Gina Miller.
“If that’s not enough, we also have six writers who have produced in recent years some of the most innovative, consoling and provoking works of fiction you could possibly imagine. I can’t wait for the festival to begin, when Norwich will prove once again that it has the best audiences a writer could hope for.”
Tickets go on sale on Wednesday (12 December) at 12pm and can be purchased from the Literary Festival website. A season ticket for all eight events costs £63 (concessions £54) with individual tickets £9 each (£5 for students). Profits from the festival are used to fund scholarships for UEA writing students.
All events take place at UEA’s Lecture Theatre 1 at 7pm on the stated date.
The full Literary Festival line-up:
Wed 13 Feb Tracey Thorn
Web 20 Feb Tessa Hadley
Wed 27 Feb Marlon James
Wed 6 Mar Gina Miller
Wed 13 Mar John Boyne
Wed 20 Mar Rachel Cusk
Wed 27 Mar Max Porter
Thu 2 May Damian Barr
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