Featuring a mix of live podcasts, networking, and workshops, a range of topics will be covered over the two days, including music, sport, comedy, witches, lifestyle, climate change, business creativity and more.

See the full programme and details, plus book your tickets at chelmsfordforyou.co.uk.

Essex Podcast Festival – An Audience with Manifesto for Essex

An Audience With Manifesto For Essex
Hosted by Marina Cusí with special guests Ada Mazi and Steve Mortimer
Part of Essex Podcast Festival

Starting with humble beginnings at the Essex Book Festival in 2020, Manifesto for Essex is a response to festival director Ros Green’s question, what is the most pressing issue of the day and who is most affected by it?

The discussion will be chaired by Marina Cusi who is joined by Ada Mazi, one of the outstanding young people who have been part of their Writing and Talking National Saturday Club based at ARU. We will also be welcoming Steve Mortimer to the panel, producer of the film Connect: A Creative Response to Climate Change, which was selected for over 140 international film awards. Steve is also the founder of The Black Chapel Collective, which is a creative group of musicians, video artists, film makers, DJ’s, rappers, poets and dancers that create exciting, transformative and contemporary live art projects around climate change.

This event is part of the Essex Podcast Festival, featuring a jam packed line-up of Essex inspired podcasts staged in front of a live audience. For more information, visit chelmsfordtheatre.co.uk.

Saturday 28 September, 2.30pm (Duration: 45 minutes)
Venue: Chelmsford Theatre Studio, Fairfield Road, Chelmsford, Essex, CM1 1JG
Tickets: £5.00 A £2 fee is applicable per transaction
Box Office: chelmsfordtheatre.co.uk/events/an-audience-with-manifesto-for-essex/

Wheelchair accessible and essential companion tickets must be booked via the Access Scheme

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John Crace will be talking about his latest book Depraved New World, a blisteringly hilarious tour through the whirlwind of post-Brexit Britain, plus all the latest goings-on in British politics. One thing’s for sure, there will be a lot to discuss!

If you already had a ticket for John Crace’s event, we really hope you can make the new date. The box office will be in touch with you soon to confirm.

More information and book tickets for John Crace, Depraved New World here.

The post John Crace: New Date and Venue Announced appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

Think ‘feathers’ not ‘sequins’, ‘birdsong’ not ‘pop’, and join us for our fabulous array of events at Hylands House in Chelmsford as part of our Restless Brilliance Day: our homage to Chelmsford-born writer J.A. Baker of The Peregrine fame, widely considered to be a literary masterpiece.

Peregrines aside, where do the swifts come in? The festival is thrilled to be welcoming nature writer Mark Cocker, also widely considered to be something of a literary genius, to Chelmsford to talk about his latest book, One Midsummers Day: Swifts and the Story of the Earth.

As for ‘birdsong’ rather than ‘pop’, Andrew Millham, the wonderful nature and folk history writer, whose work has featured in a wide range of national publications including BBC Wildlife, Coast, and The Countryman, will be discussing his book Singing Like Larks, and beyond that the legacy of J.A. Baker’s The Peregrine and what it means to Essex.

The post A ‘Swiftie’ Twist … appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

It is open to all 13-16 year olds living in and around the Chelmsford area who are passionate about writing and talking. Our young participants will explore multiple forms of writing, including zine-making, poetry, fiction, non-fiction, blogging etc, and talking, including spoken word poetry and podcasting.

The programme includes two trips to London: one for a visit backstage at Royal Opera House to see its workings, the other to attend the national exhibition of work at Somerset House, which will be showing work from National Saturday Clubs across the UK.

It is free to sign up but please note that there are only 15 places available so if you know someone who would benefit from taking part in the Club, make sure they get in quick. More information about the Club and the sign up link can be found here: https://saturday-club.org/club/essex-book-festival-aru-writing-talking/

The post New Writing & Talking National Saturday Club launched appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

Co-curated by Chelmsford Museum and the University of Essex, Restless Brilliance: The Story of J.A. Baker and The Peregrine will be the first exhibition to explore the life and works of the influential yet relatively unknown nature writer. It will share his story through more than 60 objects, mostly loaned from the university’s extensive J.A. Baker archive.

Restless Brilliance will highlight Baker’s prominence in Chelmsford’s history. Born in Chelmsford in 1926, John Alec Baker lived in the district for most of his life. He was an enthusiastic bird watcher and environmental campaigner. The author is best known for his first and most successful work, The Peregrine, widely considered to be a literary masterpiece.

Baker was passionate about the Essex countryside. Over many years he recorded his observations of the landscape during frequent walks and cycles around the Blackwater estuary, Danbury Hill, and Chelmsford.

Published in 1967, The Peregrine summarises ten years of his obsessive observations of the bird, especially around Chelmer Valley and the Essex coast. The uniquely poetic book won the prestigious Duff Cooper Memorial Prize for the “evocative power and sheer beauty” of Baker’s writing.

The Peregrine quickly became a cult classic in British nature writing, and over the years it has attracted a remarkable list of famous advocates and admirers. Nature writer Robert MacFarlane described it as “a masterpiece of twentieth-century non-fiction”, while filmmaker Werner Herzog includes it as one of three texts that his film students must read. Broadcaster and national treasure, David Attenborough, is also a fan, having narrated the audiobook in 2019.

The post Chelmsford Museum exhibition to explore legacy of legendary local nature writer appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

They want to hear from you if you’re passionate about creativity in Chelmsford. Applications are welcome from every section of the Chelmsford community; and they would mentor successful candidates who wish to grow their knowledge of what it takes to be a Trustee.

If you’ve got particular experience in finance, fundraising, marketing & comms or you’re just passionate about Chelmsford’s cultural future please get in touch with them.

For more details and to apply online visit culturechelmsford.org.uk/opportunities

If you want to talk to Culture Chelmsford first before applying email [email protected]

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Anglia Ruskin University, Bishop Hall Lane, Chelmsford, CM1 1SQ
Friday 2nd June, 7.30pm

We are delighted to be launching this year’s Essex Book Festival with Guardian columnist and broadcaster Polly Toynbee. One of the most respected, prolific, and razor-sharp voices in social commentary uses the prism of her extraordinary family to examine the true state of class in Britain.

An Uneasy Inheritance: My Family and Other Radicals

While for generations Polly Toynbee’s ancestors have been committed left-wing rabble-rousers railing against injustice, they could never claim to be working class, settling instead for the prosperous life of academia or journalism enjoyed by their own forebears. So where does that leave their ideals of class equality?

Through a colourful, entertaining examination of her own family – which in addition to her writer father Philip and her historian grandfather Arnold contains everyone from the Glenconners to Jessica Mitford to Bertrand Russell and features ancestral home Castle Howard as a backdrop – Toynbee explores the myth of mobility, the guilt of privilege, and asks for a truly honest conversation about class in Britain.

About the author

Polly Toynbee is a journalist, author, and broadcaster. A Guardian columnist and broadcaster, she was formerly the BBC’s social affairs editor. She has written for the Observer, the Independent and Radio Times and been an editor at the Washington Monthly. She has won numerous awards including a National Press Award and the Orwell Prize for Journalism.

Follow Polly on Twitter @pollytoynbee

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