Barnes BookFest welcomes an astonishing range of speakers to its festivals and our audiences are always delighted. Past speakers include:
2025 Festival
Joanne Harris * William Boyd and Harriett Gilbert * Tama Matheson and Kate Vigurs * Charlie Higson and Simon Ward (Ian Fleming Publications) * Roger McGough and LiTTLe MACHiNe * Gordon Corera and Libby Spurrier * Alex Edmans * Adam Nicolson and Stephen Moss * Clive Aslet and John Goodall * Harriet Cullen and Victoria Mather * Christina Lamb and Matt Frei * Dolly Jones and David Gandy * Gyles Brandreth * Michael Morpurgo and Jonathon Porritt * Jonanthan Sumption and Simon Heffer * Hallie Rubenhold and Wendy Jospeh KC * Simon Hart and Anne Mullins * Mishal Husain and Maria Sturdy-Morton * Aled Jones and Rhidian Brook * Nussaibah Younis and Harriett Gilbert * Trevor McDonald and Eleanor Oldroyd * Michael Heseltine and Chris Patten *
2023 Festival
Matt Frei * Lawrence Dallaglio and Owen Slot * Trevor Phillips and Stephen Bush * Richard Harries * Dipo Faloyin and Edward Paice * Hannah Rothschild and Gyles Brandreth * William Sieghart * Jacqueline Crooks, Pricilla Morris and Harriett Gilbert * Sam Delaney and Irvine Welsh * Ferdinand Mount * Robert Peston and Chris Blackhurst * Alicia Foster and Chloë Ashby * Tom Courtenay and Michael Billington * Ysenda Maxtone Graham and AJ Pearce * Oliver Soden and Patricia Hodge * Leo McKinstry and Joshua Levine * Simon Heffer and Allan Mallinson * Anne Glenconner and Gyles Brandreth * Helen Czerski and Tracy Edwards * Anthony Seldon and Sonia Purnell
2021 Festival
Gyles Brandreth * Hayley Miles * Laura Shepherd Robinson and Antonia Senior * Andrew Graham Dixon * Bernard O’Keefe * Rukmini Iyer * Alice Ross and Matthew Vincent * Sebastian Faulks * Edwin Mullins and Denis Moriarty * Anja de Jager and Victoria Dowd * Hadley Freeman * Simon Heffer * Richard Harries * Ursula Buchan and Joanne Finney * Ian Williams and Chris Patten
Robert Harris and Simon Heffer* Elizabeth Rizzini * Frank Gardner and Libby Spurrier * Thurston Moore and Roger Miles * Emily Howes and Antonia Senior * Laurie Bristow * Roxanna Panufnik * Daisy Dunn * Tomiwa Owolade and Jemima Kelly * Nigel Biggar * Gill Johnson and Rory Ross * Miriam Margolyes and Patricia Hodge * Laura Cumming * Hayley Mills and Michael Billington * Bernard O’Keeffe * Henry Hemming * Gyles Brandreth and Leigh Lawson * Chris Blackhurst * Annie Garthwaite and Matt Lewis * Chris Patten * Vernon Bogdanor and David Kynaston * Sue Prideaux * Abi Daré and Harriett Gilbert * David Gower and Eleanor Oldroyd
2022 Festval
Jonathon Porritt * Ben Macintyre * Dame Eileen Atkins and Gyles Brandreth * Tim Marshall * Theo Fennell and Richard E. Grant * Leslie Thomas KC and Thomas Grant KC * Peter Snow and Ann MacMillan * Hugo Vickers and Simon Heffer * Hilary and Michael Whitehall * Anthony Horowitz and Libby Spurrier * Patricia Hodge and Michael Billington * Yara Rodrigues Fowler, Natasha Brown and Jo Hamya * Helen Rappaport and Trevor Sterling *Bonnie Garmus and Ben Hunt-Davis * Andrew Wilson * Gill Hornby and Harriett Gilbert * Peter Conradi and John Sweeney * Robert Harris and Leanda de Lisle