Bill Clinton once called the Hay Festival the “Woodstock of the mind,” and it’s been referred to in The New York Times as “Sundance for Bibliophiles.” Authors, readers, artists, musicians, intellectuals and Pulitzer-prize winners will travel from all over the globe to attend and participate in the organization’s programming — and many of them will be traveling to Dallas next week for that very reason.
Since its inception, Hay Festival Forum Dallas has been a small event hosted by Bishop Arts bookstore-bar and venue The Wild Detectives. It's usually a day or two of discussion groups, speakers panels and live music. But for the 2024 edition, kicking off the evening of Friday, Oct. 11, Hay Festival Global has tripled the size of the Dallas event.
Hay Festival Global is a long-running charity that produces arts and culture events around the world.
Sam Hardwick
A few of these dialogues will include Mariana Enriquez, the best-selling Argentine author of Things We Lost in the Fire, and The Dallas Morning News writer Sarah Hepola in conversation about the horror genre; Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists Toluse Olorunnipa and Robert Samuels, who will discuss their book, His Name is George Floyd; and authors Heather Cleary and Dahlia de la Cerda, talking Latin American narratives in the U.S. with literary translator Dolores Reyes to shed insight on the process and impact of English translations of foreign books (a specialty focus of the internationally-renowned Dallas based publisher, Deep Vellum).
The Hay Festival Dallas forum will also offer a series of interactive book clubs where attendees are encouraged to bring their own book on a specific theme, like “The Many Faces of Identity — Exploring Cultural and Personal Narratives” for a session on Sunday, Oct. 13, at The Oak Cliff Assembly. Following an hour of silent reading together, participants will gather to share their thoughts and reflections.
A guided walking tour of Oak Cliff will illuminate the neighborhood’s European history as the short-lived 1855 utopian colony La Reunion, with bar stops along the way for period-inspired cocktails. Children will be treated to a live interactive storytelling event with percussion instruments. The Texas Theatre will host a screening of the film Amores Perros, followed by a discussion with screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga, who also wrote the award-winning films 21 Grams (2003), and Babel (2006).
One of the standout events on the Hay Festival Forum Dallas program is an intimate performance from Roxy Music’s Phil Manzanera, followed by a conversation with beloved musician and KXT radio host Paul Slavens. Manzanera is a pop music legend who contributed to some of Roxy Music’s best albums (For Your Pleasure, Stranded and Avalon) and collaborated with some of his generation’s most influential musical minds (including virtuoso Brian Eno and Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour).
Hay Festival Forum Dallas is open to the public, and 17 of the 27 events are free. Program events that are ticketed run at accessible pricing, charging from $5 to $22 per entry. Tickets to these forum events a la carte are available online and at the door (depending on capacity). A full weekend pass including entry to all ticketed events, food and drinks is $100. Day passes including entry to all ticketed events and food cost $85 for Saturday and $65 for Sunday.
The Hay Festival Forum Dallas takes place Oct. 11–13 in Oak Cliff's Bishop Arts District.
