Ten Memorable Sessions
An hour with Loretta Napoleoni
The New Zealand Listener Opening Night
An hour with Sarah Hall
Where do underpants come from?
An hour with J.M.Coetzee
An hour with Hermione Lee
An hour with Simon Montefiore
An hour with Tusiata Avia
Edith Wharton and the Young Stalin
An hour with Michael Pollan
Five Praiseworthy Chairs
Mark Sainsbury
Peter Wells
Manying Ip
Selina Tusitala Marsh
Chris Trotter
Five Sessions Missed with Great Regret
An hour with Shonagh Koea
An hour with James McNeish
An hour with Philippe Claudel
Travel writing workshop with Thomas Kohnstamm
Ryan Knighton – As slow as possible
Note: One cannot be in two places at the same time, regrettably!
Baker’s Dozen to Read in the Next 12 Months
Sashenka (Montefiore)
Rogue economics: capitalism’s new reality (Napoleoni)
Haweswater (Hall)
Street without a name: childhood and other misadventures in Bulgaria (Kassabova)
Lucky bastard (Wells)
Young Stalin (Montefiore)
The Welsh girl (Davies)
Edith Wharton (Lee)
Coming up roses (Laing)
Black mass: apocalyptic religion and the death of utopia (Gray)
The pleasures of Eliza Lynch (Enright)
In defence of food (Pollan)
Do travel writers go to hell? (Kohnstamm)
Memorable Quotes
“We need to get out of the matrix of illusion… (Napoleoni)
How do you write about silence…(Burnside)
Fiction will deal with what’s in the soul… (Burnside)
Key lesson – I lost my prejudice of China and its people… (Bennett)
I’d die if I couldn’t read… (Dίaz)
It is an illusion to believe the world can be explained… (Dίaz)
The work will only be enjoyed by intellectuals… (censor reviewing a work of Coetzee)
The work lacks popular appeal… (censor reviewing Waiting for the Barbarians)
Are you going to be fair to Comrade Stalin? (Janitor/Professor to Montefiore)
The issue is not ethics but truth… (Montefiore)
Memorable Performances
Witi Ihimaera’s contribution to the Opening Night function
Chris Trotter’s singing from Dylan’s Chimes of Freedom to close the session and Festival
Tusiata Avia and Karlo Mila on stage together
Junot Dίaz and Anne Enright’s patience and tolerance, while noticeably frustrated
Bouquets, brickbats and requests
Bouquets
Quality and range of speakers
The glorious weather – enjoyed at intermission time
Venue
Highly competent chairs
General organisation (e.g. timekeeping)
Brickbats
Difficulties with the sound system on too many occasions were a frustrating and distracting factor.
Intrusive chairs – we come, principally, to hear the guest writers!
Inane questions and/or speeches from the audience at question time.
Chairs in the lower NZI Room were not the most comfortable.
The lighting at question time was not ideal.
Kate Camp for her rather snide and distasteful putdown of the home of 78,000 people (Palmerston North) and a guest panellist – we actually enjoy living here! May we extend an open invitation to Kate and Joe Bennett to visit Palmerston North. Perhaps their prejudices, built I suspect on ignorance of place, might dissolve fairly rapidly. I would have expected writers to be somewhat more discerning – you can’t judge a book by its cover!!
Requests
More information, in display form or oral and visual insights/interviews,
on individual writers and their works.
More music!!!
Thanks
Peter Wells and Stephanie Johnson, Creative Directors.
Volunteers who made us so welcome over the time of the Festival.
The writers/artists who inspired us over the Festival.
Chairs for taking on a difficult job.
My professional colleagues, both at the event and back at home feeding the souls of our patrons.
