Wilson and Minhinnick to receive Hay Festival Medals

Jacqueline Wilson has been announced as the recipient of this year’s Hay Festival Medal for Fiction, while Robert Minhinnick will receive the Medal for Poetry.

David Harewood wins the Medal for Drama and Lyse Doucet gets the Medal for Journalism.  

The awards, inspired by the original Olympic medal for poetry, have been given out each year at the Hay-on-Wye event since 2012. This year’s festival, the first in-person event in two years, will take place between 26th May and 5th June and will feature more than 600 writers, thinkers and performers in more than 500 events. 

The much-loved Wilson has written over 100 books and is the creator of iconic characters such as Tracy Beaker and Hetty Feather. Her most recent novel, Baby Love, was published by PRH Children’s in March.

Minhinnick is the author of four volumes of essays, more than a dozen volumes of poetry, and four works of fiction. He has won the Wales Book of the Year Award three times and his poems have twice won the Forward Prize for Best Individual Poem. His collection Diary of the Last Man (Carcanet) was also shortlisted for the T S Eliot prize in 2017. 

Harewood is best known for his roles in “Homeland” and “Supergirl”. His critically acclaimed BBC documentary "Psychosis and Me" received a Bafta nomination for best documentary and he recently published his first book, Maybe I Don’t Belong Here (Bluebird). Doucet is the BBC’s chief international correspondent and has most recently been reporting in Ukraine on the Russian invasion.  

Cristina Fuentes La Roche, Hay Festival international director, said: “Hay Festival Medals will be awarded to honour exceptional work in journalism, drama, poetry and fiction as we celebrate four of the most vital storytellers of our time. While we look forward to welcoming audiences back in Hay-on-Wye next month to imagine the world anew, it’s a joy to celebrate this quartet whose work has touched the lives of many.” 

Confirmed speakers and performers for the 2022 festival include Bernadine Evaristo, Monica Ali and Damon Galgut.