ImagesBrighton pictures of the Hay Literary Festival 2004

IMAGESBRIGHTON photography by david gray	H A Y L I T E R A R Y F E S T I V A L 2 0 0 4
	A S E T O F 9 0 P I C T U R E S
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Hay on Wye is an attractive old market town set in beautiful countryside in Wales. Back in 1961, a man called Richard Booth bought the town's ramshackle castle and set up a secondhand bookshop which, over the years, has been joined by no less than 38 others. Hay has become a "book town" and Mr Booth, a magnificent eccentric, now calls himself, with some justification but no strict legitimacy, the "King of Hay". The bookshops and the lovely location inspired an annual literary festival that has grown into a major date in the cultural calendar. Bill Clinton came in May 2001 and described it as a "Woodstock of the mind", an apt phrase given the number of romances said to blossom at the event. With so many writers, publishers and cultural glitterati in attendance, the festival has a hothouse atmosphere that is made even more intense by the small scale of the town and its exquisite rural setting. When the crowds go home, the locals, even as they are counting their takings, must breathe a sigh of relief as the country way of life returns to Hay on Wye.

Hay is full of bookshops and its festival is all about books (image 2517-193)

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