Writers hit capital for NZ Fest
Some locally and internationally acclaimed writers will converge on Wellington for the New Zealand Festival of the Arts.
Writers have been a highlight of the festival’s programme for more than 30 years.
New this year, the writers’ events run across three full weeks, complementing the new model of three artists, Lemi Ponafaio, Laurie Anderson, and Bret McKenzie, curating a week each.
Here are a few writers’ events you can head along to this week, relating to the programme designed by Laurie Anderson. All the following take place in the Renouf Foyer, Michael Fowler Centre, and tickets are $19.
Long Litt Woon
Currently living in Oslo, Norway, Long is heading to the festival to take part in two panels. According to Chinese naming tradition, ‘‘Long’’ is her surname and ‘‘Litt Woon’’ her first name.
Coming to Our Senses is a talk between Long, author Laurence Fearnley, and host Jessie Bray-Sharpin about navigating loss through an intimate relationship with the environment.
See this on Saturday at 10am.
She is also discussing her book, The Way Through the Woods.
An anthropologist and writer, Long is a Norwegian Mycological Association-certified mushroom professional. When her husband died, she faced the question of how to continue when loss was overwhelming.
She talks to rongoa¯ Ma¯ ori practitioner and writer, Arihia Latham, about the encounters that helped her keep going and the hobby that healed.
See this tomorrow at 5pm.
Lisa Feldman Barrett
Canadian Feldman Barrett is a writer and psychologist, and one of the world’s most respected scientists in the field of emotion.
With a PhD in psychology, her book How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain radically changed our understanding of the way we feel.
In a rare Australasian appearance, she will discuss the way culture, environment, and personal history create emotion.
‘‘How Emotions Are Made did what all great books do,’’ says best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell. ‘‘It took a subject I thought I understood and turned my understanding upside down.’’
See her tomorrow at 8pm.
Bart van Es
Van Es, born in the Netherlands, is an author and professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford, and a fellow of St
Catherine’s College.
With poet Karlo Mila and essayist Rose Lu he reveals what keeps him awake in the small hours in What Keeps Me Up at Night?
On his own award-winning book, biography The Cut Out Girl, van Es speaks with museum specialist Miri Young-Moir about what happens to children during war.
See this on Saturday, at 1pm.