The festival started in 2006 when Wanganui based author, Joan Rosier-Jones, was asked to organise a ‘literary component’ for the Wanganui Arts Festival, and although the Arts Festival did not take place at that time, the forerunner to the Literary Festival did. It was successful both financially and in terms of numbers, so Joan assisted by local writer, Val Cowan, organised the festival again in 2007, including a ‘fringe festival’ to highlight and promote local writers. Following this event, it was decided that the festival should be bi-ennial.
It is billed as a lifestyle festival and includes authors on
such topics as cooking, gardening and sports to open it up to those who might
be intimidated by the term ‘literary’. People come from all over the North
Island to enjoy the boutique nature of the festival. Visiting authors are accessible
and one of the highlights is Dinner With the Stars where patrons are able to
dine and chat with participating writers.
The programme for 2013 is designed to appeal to a wide range
of readers. It will open with an evening with Witi Ihmaera, who will later join
with Christin Leunens to discuss having their novels made in to movies.
Gardening guru, Xanthe White, will join her mother, Judith, to talk about
having “A Writer in the Family,” as well as talking about gardening design in a
separate timeslot.
Judith White’s latest novel, The Elusive Language of Ducks was released earlier this year, and
her collection of award winning short stories, Visiting Ghosts is to be republished by Wanganui publishers,
Tangerine Publications, in time for the festival.
The title for Joe Bennett’s presentation is “Bullshit and Underpants” which combines
the titles from two of his books – Where
Underpants Come From, and Double
Happiness – How bullshit works. Other participating authors are Gregory
O’Brien; music columnist and author, Grant Smithies and fishing writer for the New Zealand Herald,
with a raft of books to his name, Geoff Thomas.
On Sunday there is lunch with John Adams, who proves that
legal experts can be real people. He is both a District Court Judge and a poet
, winning the New Zealand Society of Authors 2012 Best First Book Award for Poetry. He is currently at Cambridge
University, England writing a legal treatise, but in his spare time working on
a children’s book based on Rumplestiltskin.
There will be the regular Fringe Festival for local authors
to talk about their books, the Children’s Festival with events at the library,
art gallery and museum and a Legends
Literary Bus Tour. The tour will include Wanganui places connected with
well known New Zealand writers such as James K Baxter, Janet Frame, Robyn Hyde,
Katherine Mansfield and Ian Cross.
Tickets are a reasonable $12 per event, except for catered
ones, and a Season ticket is available for sale from only $65 until 23 August,
(excluding catered events.)
Tickets will be available from the Royal Wanganui Opera House.
Tickets will be available from the Royal Wanganui Opera House.
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