St Peter's Church, Huddersfield

Festival 2008 - The Glorious Past

Huddersfield Literature Festival is now in its 3rd year.

EMAIL: brochure@litfest.org.uk or litfest@hud.ac.uk

About the 2007 festival

This year we presented 16 events and workshops and introduced debut authors Adam Foulds and Robert Low. Poet laureate, Andrew Motion, launched our festival which also included appearances by Joanne Harris, Dorothea Smartt, Joolz Denby and SImon Scarrow. Chol Theatre also performed their new work in progress 'Beast Market' which we plan to premiere at next year's festival.

A new addition for us were our writing workshops and we intend to develop our workshop program in the future to offer even more opportunities for budding writers to get involved.

Our 'Adaptation' event - where poems were adapted into short films - was one of the most popular events of the festival and we'll certainly look to collaborate with Comma Film and more Yorkshire filmmakers and writers next year.

In 2007 we were funded by the University of Huddersfield and Kirklees Council, with support from the Media Centre Network, The Poetry Business, Chol Theatre, Small is Beautiful, Lawrence Batley Theatre, Cafe Ollo, Huddersfield Art Gallery, Transpennine Express and Comma Film.

Montage of all 2007 authors and guests

2007 line-up (in order of appearance):

...Andrew Motion, Joanne Harris, Adam Foulds, Joolz Denby, Simon Trewin, Simon Scarrow, Robert Low,Dorothea Smartt, Gaia Holmes, Shamshad Khan...

Workshops were led by:

... Lee Hughes, David Wheatley, Rommi Smith, George Green, Michael Stewart, Sol B River...

Poetry Competition

In 2007 we ran a poetry competition in collaboration with The Poetry Business, Huddersfield and a short story competition in collaboration with the Huddersfield Examiner

From over 300 entries to our poetry competition we chose joint winners. Well done to Philip Holland and Wils Wilson.

About the 2006 festival

In 2006 we offered the chance to meet 36 authors during 16 events held over 4 days. We attracted audiences from across the UK, with 2 sell-out events and positive audience and author feedback.

In 2006 we were funded by the University of Huddersfield and the Arts Council, with support from the Media Centre Network, Cafe Ollo, Huddersfield Art Gallery, Kirklees Metropolitan Council, Transpennine Express and Cooper's Coffee.

montage of all authors

2006 lineup (in alphabetical order)

...Abdellatif Akbib, Francesca Beard, Martyn Bedford, John Boyne, Donna Daley-Clarke, David Stuart Davies, Gideon Defoe, Jeremy Dyson, Paul Farley, Mark Gatiss, George Green, Sarah Hall, Stephen Hall, Geoff Hattersley, Peter Hobbs, Gaia Holmes, Simon Ings, Heleln Ivory, Chris Kerr, Shamshad Khan, Frances Leviston, Mil Millington, Julie Myerson, Patrick Neate, Jacob Polley, Geoff Ryman, Adam Strickson, George Szirtes, Harriet Tarlo, Sophie Wainwright, Louise Welsh...