Festival for Working Class Writers to launch in 2021

The Festival for Working Class Writers is being launched in Bristol next year, hoping to shine a spotlight on authors who organiser Natasha Carthew says are underrepresented at other events.

Set to run on October 2021, the event will be part of the city's annual Festival of Ideas.

Poets, journalists and academics set to take part include Stella Duffy, Tracy King, Mahsuda Snaith, Kerry Hudson, Sam Friedman and Juno Roche.

Artistic director Carthew initially suggested the idea in 2008 using social media to gauge interest in the event and got an overwhelming response.

She said: “It is my intention to make attendance more affordable and accessible to all and to increase diversity and equal opportunities. Literary festivals are a kind of middle-class ghetto and I want to change that. It’s about making culture belong to all of us.

“Inclusivity is beneficial to everyone in society in the long term and ultimately that’s why it’s so important. Talent is everywhere in this country, opportunity isn’t, but the Festival for Working Class Writers is set to change that”

For more information, visit the festival Twitter feed.