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The Hay Festival

Radio 3's weekly exploration of language and literature. Ian McMillan is joined by John Lanchester, Hannah Sullivan, Rachel Parris and Nina Stibbe.

This week The Verb comes from The Hay Festival, recorded in front of an audience at the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Tent.

Ian's guests are the writer John Lanchester on his new dystopian novel 'The Wall' (Faber), poet Hannah Sullivan who recently won the TS Eliot Prize for her debut collection 'Three Poems' (Faber), comedian and 'Mash Report' star Rachel Parris on the art of the musical parody and Nina Stibbe whose novel 'Reasons to Be Cheerful was awarded The Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for comic fiction.

Presenter: Ian McMillan
Producer: Jessica Treen

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44 minutes

Last on

Fri 31 May 2019 22:00

Nina Stibbe

Nina Stibbe

Novelist Nina Stibbe has won the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse prize for comic fiction for her novel ‘Reasons to be Cheerful’. The book is set in the relative technological dark ages of the 1980’s and Nina explains how her excellent memory for half-forgotten period details helps her to evoke the period so well. She also celebrates the magazine Woman’s Own as being a manual for how to grow up, and argues for the acceptability of mowing the lawn in flip flops

Hannah Sullivan

Hannah Sullivan

Hannah Sullivan won the TS Eliot Prize for her debut collection ‘Three Poems’, and Hannah explains how her choice of technology and font helped shape the book’s appearance. Hannah also studied the impact of the typewriter on fiction, and tells Ian why poets were hostile towards it, and how it became a tool for revision.

John Lanchester

John Lanchester

How do you write boredom without boring the reader? Novelist John Lanchester lets us in on some of the writing tips he used in order to entertain the reader with boredom in his new novel ‘The Wall’. He also reminds us that perhaps our most important technology is language, and celebrates the world-building skill of JRR Tolkein.

Rachel Parris

Rachel Parris

Comedian Rachel Parris explains that the best tool for re-writing a comedian has is the audience. She also gives us some tips on writing a good parody, before leading the audience in a sing-along as they help to objectify her ankles…

Broadcast

  • Fri 31 May 2019 22:00

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