Literary festivals

Literary festivals give readers the opportunity to see their favourite authors – but they're also a chance for authors to meet their heroes too. 

There are a few writers whose gifts make you curious about their public persona, So it will be intriguing to hear from them.

At the back of my mind I am sure I wish I had seen Dickens, Conrad, or Tennyson, reading . . . One hundred years and more on, they are still mighty "draws", if only in the imagination. A hundred years from now I feel people will envy us for being able to go and see some of the most perfect poets alive. There is something in their work both ancient and modern. I read him like I might check the sky for stars. They embody the poetry, grave and humorous both, the democratic ambassador of a landscape of wonders and fidelities.