In the northernmost tip of Brecon Beacons National Park, where the Dulas Brook joins the River Wye just west of the English Midlands, lies the small Welsh market town of Hay-on-Wye. Like many communities in this stretch of rural Wales, Hay-on-Wye (or simply “Hay”) is sparsely populated. As of the 2021 census, only 1,675 people reside in the tiny town. What distinguishes Hay from neighboring communities is not its castle (Wales has more castles per square mile than any other country in the world!) but its dedication to books. Hay has over twenty bookshops and many boast that they carry antiquarian stock (and most of these appear to be more generalized in their offerings), but a significant number specialize:
- The Children’s Bookshop is a charming cottage filled with used children’s books for all ages.
- The Literature Laboratory is a child-centered bookshop, but it’s more than a collection of children’s literature. It also emphasizes books on parenting and has a partnership with local schools to promote literacy.
- Gay on Wye carries books that speak to the LGBTQ+ community’s experiences, be they trials or triumphs.
- C. Arden (Bookseller) is a treasure trove for naturalists. It sells books on natural history, ornithology, beekeeping, gardening, and more.
- The Poetry Bookshop boasts that it’s the largest poetry specialty store in the U.K.
- North Books is one of the only bookstores to advertise that it specializes in new books. It also focuses on selling women’s writing and Welsh literature
With three stories packed full of books, Richard Booth’s Bookshop is the largest in Hay-on-Wye.Though Portlanders and book enthusiasts know Powell’s as the largest independent bookstore in the world, Richard Booth held the Guinness World Record as the largest secondhand bookstore in the late 1970s and ’80s. (Fun fact for our Portland readers: Richard Booth’s website includes Powell’s on an illustrated map on their website!) Booth started his shop in 1961 after purchasing containers of books from closing US libraries and bargain hunting at colleges, monasteries, distributors, and country estates. He’s credited with leading Hay-on-Wye to become the world’s first “Town of Books.”
I had the pleasure of visiting Hay-on-Wye while traveling in Wales in 2017, and I can vouch that the town lives up to its moniker. Some bookstores extend their stock outside, where they live in weatherproof, lockable shelves. But I came across books in unexpected places all throughout the town—most notably along the retaining walls of Hay Castle. Books are ingrained into the fibers of this community’s identity, but the bookstores alone aren’t responsible for turning Hay-on-Wye into a tourist destination. That is the doing of the Hay Festival.
The Hay Festival of Literature & the Arts began in 1987 as a way to celebrate Hay-on-Wye’s unique book culture. As Christopher Bone writes in his festival profile on Wales.com, the festival’s mission evolved over the years “to bring writers and readers together to imagine the world as it is, and as it might be, sharing stories and ideas through sustainable events that stimulated a global conversation around progress.” Some 2,200 people came to the first event, but by the time of its 30th anniversary in 2017 (an event I was just a few weeks too early to attend), 250,000 tickets were sold for the 10-day festival and its 500 events. By that time, “literary” had been dropped from the festival name for years, but founder Peter Florence was still as passionate about books and their role in the festival as he was at its inception, saying in his interview with The Guardian, “Books are the way we have recorded everything we know. The whole dream here is to make books more accessible by giving them a human context, to take all this extraordinary energy and make it more widely accessible and useful.”
Hay Festival has grown into a global movement with sister festivals being hosted in Kenya, Mexico, Spain, Peru, and Colombia. While festival events cover politics, science, comedy, music, and art, literature remains at its heart. Over the years, a number of great writers have appeared in the Welsh lineup, including:
- Arthur Miller
- Margaret Atwood
- Salman Rushdie
- Kazuo Ishiguro
- Zadie Smith
- Colm Tóibín
- Monica Ali
- Kate Atkinson
This year, the festival is set to run from May 22 to June 1. Many of its 600 events will feature novelists, including:
- Hanif Kureishi
- Alexander McCall Smith
- Katherine Rundell
- Abdulrazak Gurnah
- Elif Shafak
- Roisín O’Donnell
The program is made up of a variety of talks, performances, and workshops. For those who can’t make it to Wales this year, they offer an online festival pass, through which select events will be available to watch from the comfort of your home. And if you need a free sample first, the Hay Festival official YouTube channel offers a variety of clips from past years.
Found names of attending authors from a few sources:
- https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/mar/09/hay-festival
- https://www.wales.com/culture-and-sport/art-and-literature/hay-festivals-around-world
- https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/mar/11/michael-sheen-jameela-jamil-and-hanif-kureishi-join-packed-hay-festival-lineup#:~:text=Michael%20Sheen%2C%20Yulia%20Navalnaya%20and,%2Don%2DWye%2C%20Powys.