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The Listener’s literary editor Mark Broatch picks some highlights for next month’s Word festival.
As ever, Christchurch’s Word festival (August 23-27) will be an action-packed jamboree of ideas, chat and music, this year featuring actual overseas guests and lots of livestreamed events for the out-of-towners. In the centenary of Katherine Mansfield’s death, a small but vocal crowd of authors including the UK’s Gabriel Krauze, expat novelist Meg Mason, poet Tusiata Avia and Scotland’s David Keenan talk on Thursday about taking a chance in Risk! The Word Gala. Also chatting about putting things on the line on Friday will be Ethique founder Brianne West, Dr Emma Espiner and others with Miriama Kamo in Risky Women.
If we’re talking novelistic bang for your buck, check out Fiction, Three Ways on Friday. Carl Nixon talks about The Waters, which follows a family over 40 years. Emily Perkins talks about her hiatus-breaking novel Lioness, featuring a woman whose comfortable life begins to unravel. And Fiona Farrell talks about her pandemic-themed novel The Deck.
Poetry? There’s a serious poetry slam on Wednesday when versifiers throw down lines over three rounds. On Friday, Nathan Joe, Claudia Jardine, Isla Huia, Frankie McMillan and Ariana Tikao will be reading their work at Unruly Memories. Also on Friday, Ray Shipley hosts Khadro Mohamed, Vanessa Mei Crofskey and other poets. On Saturday Judah Band and R&B artist TJ Taotua will deliver some tunes.
On Friday, the invariably well-attended tiny lecture series returns with Cabinet of Curiosities, in which Emily Perkins, Gabriel Krauze, Andrew Paul Wood, Melody Thomas and Juanita Hepi share their personal obsessions.
On Saturday, former journalist and former Palmerston North-er Meg Mason will talk with Noelle McCarthy about her brilliantly funny-poignant novel Sorrow and Bliss, which was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. Trinidad and Tobago’s Kevin Jared Hosein will speak about his critically acclaimed novel Hungry Ghosts, and Gabriel Krauze will discuss his Booker-longlisted autobiographical novel, Who They Was.
Also on Saturday, Anke Richter, Byron Clark and Gloriavale’s Lilia Tarawa join Guyon Espiner to talk about cults and coercion. Britain’s Polly Barton and Aotearoa’s Ross Calman discuss the joys and perils of translation with Nic Low.
If you’re one of the many who bought Fungi of Aotearoa: A Curious Forager’s Field Guide, on Saturday and Sunday mornings you can accompany its author Liv Sisson on a walk along the Avon River to discover a wealth of tasty morsels.
On Sunday, the late genetic scientist Andrew Bagshaw is in the spotlight through his biography The Quiet Hero. His efforts to help the people of Ukraine cost him his life. On a lighter note, chef Sam Mannering hosts morning tea and talks food and cooking. Catherine Chidgey chats about her novels Pet and The Axeman’s Carnival, and Pip Adam discusses her new speculative fiction novel Audition. Airana Ngarewa talks about his debut novel The Bone Tree.
Also on Sunday, in matters generally ambulatory, Josie Shapiro talks about her debut novel Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, Jessica Howland Kany discusses A Runners Guide to Rakiura and Guyon Espiner (also a runner, apparently) yarns about his book on booze, The Drinking Game.
Find the full itinerary at https://wordchristchurch.co.nz/
