Welcome to Elaine Roberts with another in her interesting series about
literary festivals and workshops.
This month Elaine interviews Liz Pike from the Yeovil Literary Festival.
This month Elaine interviews Liz Pike from the Yeovil Literary Festival.
Welcome to the RNA blog Liz. Can you tell us something about the Yeovil Literary Festival, how it came
about and how long its been running?
We had been
talking about developing the arts in Yeovil for many years and really wanted a
Yeovil
Literary Festival, but all dreams need something else to make them come
true. It was a case of waiting for the
right people to be in the right place at the right time. Our wonderful theatre, The Octagon Theatre in
Yeovil, was developing into a major venue for the West Country with a vibrant
new manager, Adam Burgan. Adam, Marcus
Bishop, our Waterstones’ manager, and me, Chair of a local group of volunteers
the Yeovil Community Arts Association, who do their best to promote the arts
locally, came together and talked. The
seed was germinated. With complete
backing from South Somerset District Council we had our main venue, our
theatre. This is now our fifth Yeovil
Literary Festival and it’s growing at a thrilling rate. We have other venues
now to add to our theatre, making this a festival to come to for the duration
moving between events in The Manor Hotel, The Library and the fantastic
Brimsmore Gardens. We can also hold major events in our latest venue Westlands.
Who are your main speakers this year?
As our blog is for writers can you tell me how
your festival would benefit our members?
The Yeovil
Community Arts Association administers annually the international Yeovil
Literary Prize writing competition. When
we hear that people who have been published after entering and doing well in
our competition are nominated for Romantic Novelist of the Year, then we are
proud.
We hold an
event for Yeovil Literary Prize Past Winners at our Yeovil Literary Festival
and we meet people who are now published and doing extremely well in the world
of books. Kiran Millwood Hargrave, who
won our poetry category a few years ago and is judging our Writing Without
Restrictions category this year, has won the Waterstones’ Children’s Book of
the Year with The Girl of Ink and Stars.
David Young has gained literary success with his books Stasi
Child and Stasi Wolf. Babs Morton and Sophie Duffy are brilliant
writers who have several books published.
There are many more who tell us their success stories.
Is there anything to enter, if so could details
be provided?
The Yeovil
Literary Prize is linked with our theatre and the festival as the people who
run our writing
competition are also involved in organizing the festival. This competition opens on January 1st
each year with a closing date of 31st May. Our entries come to us from all over the
world and it’s wonderful to hear the voices from other countries and cultures
in the entries.
How about staying over for the whole event.
Where can people stay?
One of the
festival venues is The Manor Hotel, situated opposite the Octagon Theatre.
There is
Yeovil Court Hotel and two Premier Inns in the town. We have The Keep sleep boutique and several
B&Bs locally.
What does it cost to attend?
Ticket
prices range from £6 up to £25 for the Literary Dinner with Biggins. We often do an inclusive ticket price with a
book, and always have a Members’ rate for people who are members of the YCAA,
The Footlights Club at the theatre, hold a Waterstones’ card, or a Somerset
Libraries card. We also give Discovery
Tickets for some events that people may not be familiar with when they purchase
tickets for major speakers. To listen to
an ‘unexpected’ speaker really widens horizons and these tickets are
appreciated.
Do workshops/talks fill up quickly?
Yes. We are
now mid-July and many tickets for our early events have been sold. Once the
main programme is launched in early-September there are queues out of the door
at The Octagon, and, of course, tickets can be bought on-line.
How much time does it take to organise the
festival?
It’s rather
like a jigsaw. It starts immediately after the last one. We each beaver away
using our own skills and contacts, then by May we know how the whole festival
is coming together. There is still time for last minute speakers to become
available and then we promote them alongside our programme.
We like to
include local groups with a Mini-Art exhibition, the Yeovil Floral Society with
Yeovil In Bloom enhance the festival with floral contributions. Our local
library always supports magnificently, and we have pop-up Waterstones at every
event. It takes teamwork and Yeovil is
blessed with people with the ‘can do’ attitude needed to launch a successful
festival.
Dates for this year and possibly next.
Thursday 26
– Sunday 29 October 2017.
2018 dates
TBC.
Link to website:
Email for queries:
Elaine Roberts
Thank you Elaine and Liz for an interesting interview and good luck with the festival, Liz.
