TAUNTON’S popular Literary Festival is set to return for another successful year.

The festival, organised by Lionel Ward who owns independent book store Brendon Books, has once more managed to attract an eclectic mix of talks, performances, and activities for children.

Mr Ward said: “We are really looking forward to this year’s festival, and as always there’s a lot going on and we’ve really tried to cater for everyone.

“The festival features more than 40 authors, plus performances and workshops across a wide variety of subjects.

“The festival starts on November 5, with a sceptic discussion from two Somerset authors on William Shakespeare.

“Malcolm Elliott from Ilminster is the author of Christopher Shakespeare: The Man Behind the Plays and Alexander Waugh, Evelyn Waugh’s grandson, is the author of Shakespeare Beyond Doubt?

“They will be discussing the evidence they’ve found to suggest that William Shakespeare didn’t write a lot of his plays and we’re encouraging people to come along and have their say as well.”

And that’s not the only Shakespeare themed event to be taking place as part of the Literary Festival.

Mr Ward added that the festival was joining in the celebrations that had been taking place throughout this year to commemorate 400 years since the death of the playwright. “We’ll also be holding another participation event at Taunton Library, where everyone will be able to join in the reading of one of Shakespeare’s plays, we did this last year and it was really popular.

“The festival culminates on November 26 with an event by the Taunton Thespians, who will be introducing key moments of some of Shakespeare’s plays, and explaining why they’re so important before performing them.”

There’s even a pre-festival event tonight (Thursday, October 20) with former MP, journalist and author Chris Mullin.

Among his many achievements is his successful campaign to free the innocent people convicted of the Birmingham bombings, which was described as ‘one of the greatest feats ever achieved by an investigative reporter’.

He’ll be discussing his memoirs Hinterland .

“As always we’ve got a mix of famous names and important authors from around Somerset and Devon.

“You wouldn’t believe it but I get so many rejections, but the key is persistence, it’s all about convincing people that Taunton is a great place to come to and that people do want to come to the festival.

“This is our sixth year and we’ve had some really good feedback.

“There’s a wide variety of fiction, and events on history, science events, philosophy events, agriculture, a bookbinding event and events for children.

“As well as his Shakespeare discussion, Alexander Waugh will be interviewing Philip Eade who wrote about his grandfather Evelyn Waugh which we’re hoping to get some great stories from.

“Lord David Owen will be giving a really interesting talk on the cabinet during World War Two, and how we almost negotiated peace with Hitler instead of going to war.

“Salley Vickers will be coming to the festival on November 14, which is really exciting as she was at the first festival six years ago at the Castle Hotel.

  • n For more information on the Taunton Literary Festival, and to buy tickets, see tauntonliteraryfestival.net