16 Mar 2016

Literary superstars heading to Auckland

7:07 pm on 16 March 2016

A star-studded international line-up, including Gloria Steinham and Marlon James, has been announced for the Auckland Writers Festival this year.

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Speakers at the 2016 Auckland Writers Festival include, clockwise from top left: Marlon James, Janna Levin, Paul Muldoon, Omar Musa, Bill Oddie and Gloria Steinem. Photo: Supplied

Prize-winning writers and journalists from New Zealand and overseas will attend the 2016 Auckland Writers Festival at Aotea Centre from 10 May until 15 May.

The line-up, announced tonight, includes 150 writers who will host readings and debates over the six days the festival runs.

Topp Twins

Topp Twins Photo: SUPPLIED

They include Marlon James, whose novel A Brief History of Seven Killings won the 2015 Man Booker Prize; journalist, writer and women's rights campaigner Gloria Steinem; writer, composer, musician, comedian, artist, ornithologist and conservationist Bill Oddie, who also starred in The Goodies; Oranges are not the only Fruit author Jeanette Winterson; and playwright Sir David Hare.

Janna Levin, cosmology lecturer at Columbia University, will also be speaking.

Well-known New Zealanders announced to take part in the festival include the festival's 2016 Honoured New Zealand writer Vincent O'Sullivan, broadcaster Alison Mau, the Topp Twins and award-winning writer Steve Braunias.

The 2016 line-up includes:

  • Marlon James
  • Hanya Yanagihara
  • Gloria Steinem
  • Bill Oddie
  • Paula Hawkins
  • Paul Muldoon
  • Jeanette Winterson
  • Peter Garrett
  • David Hare
  • Helene Wong
  • Brian Turner
  • Patrick Evans
  • Fiona Farrell
  • Susie Orbach
  • Vincent O'Sullivan
  • Liz Pichon
  • TheTopp Twins
  • Jane Smiley
  • Alison Mau
  • Jean Christophe Rufin
  • Emma Sky
  • Yossi Alpher
  • Suad Amiry
  • Steve Braunias
  • Janna Levin
  • James Sheard

Watch Janna Levin speak about her curiosity about the universe - as a kid, and now.

The festival will also include English bard Deborah Alma, aka the Emergency Poet, who will 'diagnose' poems to festival-goers in a vintage ambulance, King Kapisi go head-to-head against Australia's Omar Musa in a hip hop verse-off and a spoken word concert with Pulitzer prize-winning Paul Muldoon and local musicians.

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