The Overtones
Fowey Parish ChurchWe are thrilled to welcome highly acclaimed The Overtones to the Festival. During the last fourteen years, The Overtones have released seven studio albums, enjoyed many sold out tours, appeared on major TV shows and headlined in world renowned venues including the London Palladium and the Royal Albert Hall. They also performed at Queen Elizabeth...
Rupert Tower – Between Two Worlds: Inside Daphne du Maurier’s House on the Strand
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomDaphne du Maurier’s grandson, Jungian analyst, Rupert Tower, will explore Daphne du Maurier’s novel in the context of her inner life preoccupations, including dreaming in time, identity, and loss, together with her continued fascination with the past, ancestry, and power of place. He will also examine her narrative from the psychological perspective of Jungian analytical...
Bryony Gordon – Mad Woman
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomTelegraph journalist, pioneering author, podcaster and activist Bryony Gordon has long been open about her mental health, lifting the lid on a subject that was taboo for many years. Mad Woman is her phenomenal follow-up – a decade later – to the brilliant number-one bestseller Mad Girl. Join her as she talks to BBC Radio...
Jessica Hepburn – Save me from the Waves: an adventure from sea to summit
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomWe welcome author and adventure activist Jessica Hepburn to Fowey to talk about her third book, Save Me from the Waves. This remarkable and alternative adventure story, charts Jessica becoming the first and only woman (currently) to have completed the ‘Sea, Street, Summit Challenge’, which is to swim the English Channel, run the London Marathon and...
Dr Helen Doe – One Crew: 200 Years of Saving Lives at Sea
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomIn the 200 years since it was founded, the RNLI has saved more than 144,000 lives and is one of the most respected organisations in the UK and Ireland. It began with a meeting in London in 1824 to act upon a proposal by Sir William Hillary. It is his vision that still drives the...
Movie Night – Don’t Look Now
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomNicolas Roeg's classic thriller, based on a short story by Daphne du Maurier, follows a married couple as they attempt to recover from the death of their young daughter. John Baxter (Donald Sutherland) and his wife Laura (Julie Christie) are staying in Venice in an attempt to find relief after the drowning of their daughter Christine...
Sarah Harkness – Literature for the People
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomFrom an impoverished childhood in the Scottish Highlands to Victorian London, this is the inspiring story of Daniel and Alexander Macmillan, who created a publishing empire. Daniel and Alexander Macmillan, sons of Scottish crofters, arrived in London in the 1830s at a crucial moment of social change and went on to set up a publishing...
Meet the Team – A Friends of the Festival Event
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin the team that organises the Festival, for a drink and cocktail Cornish pasty. The work we do throughout the year makes it all worthwhile when we meet our audience. If you would like to attend this event and receive the benefits that come with a Friend of the Festival membership, please visit the ‘Become...
Madeleine Olivia – Make it Vegan: Simple Plant-Based Recipes for Everyone
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin Hayle based YouTuber, Madeleine Olivia, to celebrate the release of her debut cookbook, Make It Vegan. Madeleine, a self-taught home cook, has spent the last eight years sharing her life online, charting her journey to live a sustainable and eco-conscious lifestyle through her wildly popular YouTube videos. Make It Vegan aims to make vegan food accessible...
Tiffany Murray – My Family and Other Rock Stars
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomIn conversation with bestselling author Patrick Gale, Tiffany Murray will talk about her recently published memoir My Family and Other Rock Stars. It is about food, family and what happens when Freddie Mercury comes to stay! Her novels Diamond Star Halo, Happy Accidents and Sugar Hall, have variously been shortlisted for the Wodehouse Bollinger Prize and received the Roger Deakin Award...
Louis de Bernières – Light Over Liskeard
Fowey Parish ChurchLouis de Bernières is one of the UK’s leading novelists. His fourth novel, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, a love story set in World War II, has now sold over 4 million copies worldwide, was translated into 36 languages and has been made into a Hollywood film starring Nicolas Cage and Penélope Cruz. In his latest book,...
Richard Trethewey Trio
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomRichard Trethewey is a singer, fiddle and cittern player, delivering his distinct take on Cornish music. Passionate about unearthing near-forgotten gems of Cornish history, Richard breathes life into what might otherwise be overlooked. Expect material from his new album Two Halves as well as films made to accompany these songs, including the single Frenchman's Creek...
Dr Ella Westland – Reading Group Don’t Look Now and Not After Midnight
Fowey Parish Hall Browns Hill, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin Dr Ella Westland for an informal reading group discussion of two stories by Daphne du Maurier, Don't Look Now and Not After Midnight. The reading group will be a relaxed and informal opportunity for sharing ideas. Participants should have read both books, no further preparation is necessary. Just bring yourself, your copy of the stories, and...
Helen Hanson – ‘Do’ Look Now: Viewpoints on the Adaptable Daphne du Maurier
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomDaphne du Maurier’s brilliant control of suspense, and her vivid creation of character viewpoint are qualities which have enduring appeal to readers, and have made her stories eminently adaptable beyond the page to visual storytelling in film and television. Taking Don’t Look Now and its 1973 film adaptation as a case study, this talk will...
Caroline Quentin – Drawn to the Garden
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin us for a fun and enjoyable event with this renowned figure in British comedy. Caroline Quentin is well known for her lead roles in the award-winning British sitcom Men Behaving Badly and crime drama Jonathan Creek. Aside from her career as an actress, she has been a passionate gardener for many years. Her recently published...
Annie Price – ‘The past is still close to us’: An exploration of the Daphne du Maurier archives at the University of Exeter Special Collections
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomThe University of Exeter looks after more than 50 boxes of archival materials relating to Daphne du Maurier, including several recent acquisitions. In this illustrative presentation, archivist Annie Price will introduce the archives, and discuss the fascinating insight they can provide into the novelist’s writing process, daily life, and love for Cornwall. Annie is an...
Daphne du Maurier’s Fowey – Guided Walk
Main Car Park, Hanson Drive, PL23 1ETThis is your opportunity to learn about Daphne, her life, her novels and Fowey. You will be led by Dawn, who has been leading walks linked to Daphne du Maurier for more than 20 years. Be inspired by the landscape and the way it is intricately involved in Daphne’s works. Discover some of the inspiration...
David Gibbins – A History of the World in Twelve Shipwrecks
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomDrawing on decades of experience excavating shipwrecks around the world, renowned maritime archaeologist, David Gibbins, reveals the riches beneath the waves and shows us how the treasures found there can be a porthole to the past, to tell a new story about the world and its underwater secrets. From a Bronze Age ship built during the...
Alan Johnson – Death on the Thames
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomFollowing his series of successful memoirs – This Boy, In My Life, The Long and Winding Road and Please, Mr Postman, former Labour MP Alan Johnson joins us to discuss his latest novel in the bestselling Mangan thriller series, Death on the Thames. His career in Parliament began after a period as General Secretary of the Communication Workers...
Festival Jazz Evening – An Oscar for Ella with Joanna Eden and Craig Milverton
Fowey Parish ChurchCelebrating the pairing of two of jazz’s most iconic artists, Ella Fitzgerald, the first lady of song, and Oscar Peterson, a Jazz piano legend. When Oscar and Ella first met for Jazz at the Philharmonic, they found they were a natural pairing, and a legendary team was born. They worked together from the 1950s to...
Megan Stallworthy – Handmade Book Workshop
Fowey Parish Hall Browns Hill, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin us for a day-long bookbinding workshop with Megan Stallworthy of Celandine Books. Make two contemporary book structures, Flag Books and Fold-out Books, with beautiful sculptural forms, perfect to use as sketchbooks, for displaying artwork or photographs, or as the basis for artists’ books. You will learn bookbinding techniques using specialist tools and materials and take away...
Galen Bartholomew – The SS Suevic and the night the RNLI saved 611 lives
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin family historian Galen Bartholomew, for a remarkable account of shipwreck and survival. The SS Suevic, one of five White Star Line ‘Jubilee Class’ liners, ran aground in a storm off the Lizard Point, Cornwall, in March 1907. In appalling weather conditions, the RNLI rescued 456 people. This remains the largest number of people rescued...
Truro Senior School Musicians – Lunchtime Recital
Fowey Parish ChurchTruro School’s talented senior chamber musicians present a short recital of music. Truro School’s busy and active Music Department puts on nearly sixty concerts each year, both at the school and around the county. Pupils who benefit from a comprehensive programme of academic and extra-curricular music, regularly achieve Grade 8s and even diplomas before leaving...
Nicola Upson – Shot with Crimson
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin crime novelist Nicola Upson for the latest instalment in the Josephine Tey mystery series, Shot with Crimson. September 1939, and the worries of war follow Josephine Tey to Hollywood, where a different sort of battle is raging on the set of Hitchcock’s Rebecca. Then, a shocking act of violence reawakens the shadows of the past, with consequences...
Dr Helen Doe – From the Battle of Britain to the Great Escape
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomThe first full reappraisal of one of Britain’s great fighter aces, this bestselling book examines the truth behind Stanford Tuck’s 1956 biography to reveal the real person rather than a mythical hero. In January 1942, Bob Tuck was the top-scoring British fighter ace, with an official score of 29 enemy aircraft destroyed. With film-star looks,...
Lesley-Ann Jones – Fly Away Paul
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomIn this definitive account of Paul McCartney's time in Wings, published on the 50th anniversary of the bestselling album, Band on the Run, music biographer, Lesley-Ann Jones, tells the extraordinary story of how Paul survived the Beatles and found his Wings. No comprehensive biography of the time he spent with Wings has ever been published....
Comedy Evening with Johnny Cowling
Fowey Parish ChurchBack by popular demand, the wonderfully talented Johnny Cowling returns to the Festival for another hilarious evening of entertainment. Famous for his Cornish charm and quick wit, Johnny has performed across the UK during his impressive career spanning over 20 years, including supporting Paddy McGuinness on tour and warming up for many popular live TV...
Creative Writing Workshop – Creating Memorable Characters
Fowey Parish Hall Browns Hill, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomHow do you create characters who are interesting and authentic? What makes a character compelling? Join playwrights Kate Aspengren and Kyle John Schmidt for a lively exploration of character. This interactive workshop will include tips, tricks, and the opportunity to create some rich, unique characters of your own. Writers of any age, experience level, or...
Daphne du Maurier’s Fowey – Guided Walk
Main Car Park, Hanson Drive, PL23 1ETThis is your opportunity to learn about Daphne, her life, her novels and Fowey. You will be led by Dawn, who has been leading walks linked to Daphne du Maurier for more than 20 years. Be inspired by the landscape and the way it is intricately involved in Daphne’s works. Discover some of the inspiration...
Amanda Prowse – Swimming to Lundy
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomWe are delighted to welcome international bestselling author, radio and TV personality Amanda Prowse to the Festival. She has written thirty novels, two non-fiction titles and seven novellas, which have been published in dozens of languages around the world. Amanda is the most prolific writer of bestselling contemporary fiction in the UK today. Her books,...
Dr Serena Trowbridge – Stories of the Stones
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomBritain’s landscape contains many stone circles, especially in Cornwall, Wales and Scotland. Their original purpose remains mysterious despite extensive archaeological investigation, and perhaps it is their obscurity which makes them so fascinating. Over the centuries they have inspired many legends, most famously of girls turned to stone for dancing on a holy day, or stones...
Harriet Evans and Veronica Henry – The Stargazers and The Secret Beach
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomBetween them, Harriet Evans and Veronica Henry have written over forty bestselling novels. They both started their writing careers as editors - Harriet in publishing and Veronica in television. They met when Harriet was working at Penguin, and she gave Veronica her first book deal. Today, they discuss their working processes, what makes a bestseller and,...
Jenny Eclair – In Conversation
Fowey Parish ChurchStand-up comedian Jenny Éclair was the first woman to win the coveted Perrier Award, the UK’s top comedy award, in 1995. Since then, she has taken multiple shows on tour around the country. She is well known for her starring role on BBC1’s Grumpy Old Women, being a co-host for the podcast Older and Wider,...
Dr Serena Trowbridge – Reading Group – Frenchman’s Creek
Fowey Parish Hall Browns Hill, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin Dr Serena Trowbridge for an informal reading group discussion on du Maurier’s Frenchman's Creek.This classic novel is one which is often described as ‘romantic’, and yet is perplexingly both romantic and pragmatic, dreamy yet realistic. Come along and discuss whether this is a ‘pirate romance’ or a clear-sighted approach to women’s lot. Dr Serena...
Dr Serena Trowbridge – Villainesses, Femmes Fatales, Matriarchs and Muses: Du Maurier’s Heroines
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomDu Maurier’s novels are filled with strong women, difficult women, interesting and dangerous women. None of her heroines are boring, but they are all very different, as though the author is experimenting with a variety of approaches to womanhood. It’s well-known that du Maurier herself was often uncomfortable with the expected social roles of wife...
Lemn Sissay OBE – Let The Light Pour In
Fowey Parish ChurchFor the past decade, Lemn Sissay has composed a short poem as dawn breaks each morning. Life-affirming, witty and full of wonder, these poems chronicle his own battle with the dark and are fuelled by resilience and defiant joy. Let the Light Pour In is a collection of the best of these poems, and a...
Kate Strasdin – The Dress Diary of Mrs Anne Sykes
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomThe hidden fabric of a Victorian woman's life, told through her unique scrapbook. In 1838, Anne Sykes was given a diary on her wedding day. Using it to collect snippets of fabric, she created a record of her life and times. Nearly two hundred years later, the diary fell into the hands of fashion historian Kate...
Loveny Male Voice Choir
Fowey Parish ChurchThe inspiration for the formation of the Loveny Male Voice Choir came from Alan Pascoe, a Cornishman from St Neot. Over 50 years later, they perform to international audiences to high acclaim. Join us for a wonderful concert where you will be entertained with a variety of music genres, bringing you a selection of traditional,...
Dr Serena Trowbridge – Reading Group: The King’s General
Fowey Parish Hall Browns Hill, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin Dr Serena Trowbridge for an informal reading group discussion on du Maurier’s The King’s General. Written at Menabilly and deeply rooted in Cornish history, this novel in the Gothic genre is set during the English Civil War, and contains some of Du Maurier’s most striking characters. This session is an opportunity to explore the historical,...
David Parker – For Those in Peril
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United Kingdom‘And that’s when things got a bit rough because I knew I was the one who was going to have to go into that hold to rescue the two men trapped’. These are the words of RAF winchman Eric Smith, who won the George Medal for his bravery at sea. Eric's is just one of...
ARKangel – Lunchtime Recital – Cider with Rosie
Fowey Parish ChurchCapturing Laurie Lee’s richly descriptive language in a powerful narrative, coloured with a feast of music, ARKangel’s Cider with Rosie explores Laurie’s much-loved memoir of childhood in an age of social change; the damp, cramped Cotswold cottage, the rural poverty following the First World War, an explosion of doves, and his never to be forgotten...
Susan Smillie – The Half Bird
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomThe Half Bird is a beautifully written piece of narrative nonfiction. Join Susan as she talks about her incredible story of one woman's solo journey, from Land's End to the shores of Greece, exploring the unexpected joy of solitude, self-discovery, and resilience. When she set sail from the southwest coast of England on her beloved...
Adam Sisman – The Secret Life of John Le Carré
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomJoin John le Carré's biographer, Adam Sisman, as he reveals the tale of an extraordinary secret life of the great novelist, which he was unable to publish while le Carré was alive. The Secret Life of John le Carré is the story of what was left out, and offers reflections on the difficult relationship between...
Iain Dale and Friends – Kings and Queens: 1200 years of British and English Monarchs
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomThe British monarchy is one of the oldest in the world – dating back so far that its very origins are the subject of debate: was William the Conqueror the first king of England, or Alfred the Great? In a series that began with The Prime Ministers and The Presidents, award-winning broadcaster and presenter Iain...
John O’Farrell – Family Politics
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomAll across Britain, a generation of grown-up children are graduating from university, moving back into their old bedrooms and showing their gratitude by berating their parents for their out-of-date politics. But for proud and high-profile left-wingers Emma and Eddie Hughes, the return of their only child is a far greater challenge than they ever could...
Strands of Time – Guided Walk
Par Beach Car Park, Par, PL24 2ASDaphne du Maurier wrote two of her later novels based solely on the area around Par and Tywardreath. Dawn will lead you on this walk which will take you to both villages and look at them both historically and with a view to seeing how they were treated in du Maurier’s books. Dawn is a...
Lisa Woollett – Lost to the Sea
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomLisa Woollett, celebrated author and photographer of several award-winning books. Her acclaimed book, Rag and Bone, won the coveted Royal Society of Literature, Giles St Aubyn Award for Non-fiction. On a series of coastal walks, Lisa will take us on an illuminating journey, bringing to life the places where mythology and reality meet, at the very edges...
Orlando Murrin – Knife Skills for Beginners
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomCooking up the Perfect Crime, Orlando Murrin, past Masterchef semifinalist and renowned food writer, has turned to crime writing, with the publication of his debut novel, Knife Skills For Beginners. He talks to Veronica Henry about how he progressed from writing recipes to whodunits, and how to cook the perfect red herring. After being flung into the...
Vernon Bogdanor – The Strange Survival of Liberal Britain: Politics and Power before the First World War
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomBritain’s best-known constitutional historian, Professor Vernon Bogdanor, says the 20 turbulent years before the outbreak of the First World War, heralded a new agenda that still dominates today. The years saw a transition from aristocratic rule to mass politics. Vernon claims that we are still grappling with the same complex and difficult issues that the Edwardians...
Robert Hardman – Charles III: New King. New Court. The Inside Story
Fowey Town Hall Market Street, Fowey, Cornwall, United KingdomFaced with family dramas, political crises and questions about the future of the monarchy in Britain and elsewhere, the new King had no shortage of challenges. During this talk, acclaimed royal biographer, Robert Hardman will discuss the story of transition at the very top – and of a sovereign resolute in making his mark. With...
For The Many Live with Iain Dale, Jacqui Smith and Johnny Mercer
Fowey Parish ChurchJoin us for what promises to be a hilarious evening of politics as you have never heard it before! We are thrilled to welcome acclaimed political broadcaster, Iain Dale, and former Labour Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, for a live edition of their award winning For The Many podcast. Expect political insight and analysis, gossip and...
