Another day at the Hexham Book Festival

I was lucky enough to attend 4 talks on the last day of the Hexham Book Festival. (What a great festival it has been - only rivalled by a certain Walking Festival the previous week!)

Mum was confined to home because of her respiratory infection, although she is definitely on the mend.

The other Marjorie had her ticket for the first talk, The House in Damascus by Diana Darke. She gave a clear account of the history of  Syria and of the war. The main subject of her talk was the house she owns in Old Damascus and the metaphor it provides for events in the war and in the future. It was very moving and illuminating.

Then to the Abbey where I had a cancelled ticket for John Simpson, The Word Detective. This sold out early and I suspect that a number of people thought it would be the other John Simpson. This one was the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary until recently. He was interviewed and both he and the interviewer spoke far to quickly. His words ran one into another and some people could not hear what he was saying. I felt compelled to talk to him about this after the book signing...... Hope that helped for the future. Disappointing.

Back to the Queens Hall for Gary Younge's Another Day in the Death of America. This book is about 10 young lives lost to gun violence in the course of 24 hours across 8 states. It was inevitably a sobering discussion but I found his approach thoughtful and very interesting. I've bought the book. (He is pictured in my blip.)

Finally, Mark Lawson was interviewed about his book The Allegations. Somehow, I missed the news when he was sacked from Front Row  due to allegations of bullying. One of the characters in his book is a history lecturer who has similar allegations made against him. The other is an historian accused of historical sexual abuse. These are very difficult issues to tackle. Mark L was sacked without ever knowing what the allegations were and had no right to refute them. He suffered a nervous breakdown but is back working again, although not on Front Row.

We had an interesting discussion at the end. In the past no one believed people who had been abused, then we started to, then we began to say that all must be believed. The pendulum will surely swing back to a more central position in time, but there will never be neat and tidy solutions. (My opinion - and I learned a lot when I worked for the police seeing women and children who had been sexually assaulted in the 1980s.)

Julie and I went to The Valley for a curry afterwards. The food was excellent and the conversation the same!

Phew!