Alan Hollinghurst at Central Library

Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor

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An Evening with Alan Hollinghurst in conversation with Andrew McMillan

17 January 2025

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a white older man with grey hair in a blue shirt and wearing glasses leaning against a grey brick wall..
Alan Hollinghurst. Image by Robert Taylor
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Alan Hollinghurst was missed at Manchester Literature Festival back in October, but here he is to cheer up January, chatting to poet and novelist Andrew McMillan.

This “in conversation” event was due to take place on Monday 7 October 2024 but was rescheduled due to illness. Join Alan Hollinghurst – “one of the finest writers of our age” – as he reads from and talks about Our Evenings, his first novel to be launched in seven years.

‘Did I have a grievance? Most of us, without looking far, could find something that had harmed us, and oppressed us, and unfairly held us back. I tried not to dwell on it, thought it healthier not to, though I’d lived my short life so far in a chaos of privilege and prejudice.’

Aa you will discover, Our Evenings is a “dark, compelling and wickedly funny” account of narrator Dave Win’s life from his time as a scholarship pupil at a local boarding school, through his early loves, his life in London and on the road with an experimental theatre company, to a late-life affair which transforms his sixties. It is described as: “A portrait of modern England, the novel is an acutely observed tale of race and class, theatre and sexuality, love and the cruel shock of violence.”

Alan Hollinghurst is the award-winning author of seven novels including The Swimming Pool Library, winner of the Somerset Maugham Award, The Folding Star, winner of the James Tait Memorial Prize, and The Line of Beauty, winner of the Booker Prize.

This Manchester Literature Festival event is hosted by Andrew McMillan, author of poetry collections physical, playtime and pandemonium and the novel Pity, and Professor of Poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University’s Manchester Writing School. It is sponsored by The Midland Manchester. Manchester Literature Festival will return in October 2025.

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Where to go near Alan Hollinghurst at Central Library

St Peters Square Manchester
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St Peter’s Square is a public space in Manchester – home to the city’s iconic library, town hall, Pankhurst statue, art gallery and famous Midland Hotel.

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Ban Di Bul

Ban Di Bul is a longstanding Korean restaurant in the very centre of Manchester.

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The Alan

This high-end city-centre restaurant has an excellent afternoon tea option that more than matches up to the superb main menu.

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Salut Wines

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