The Reading Agency Lecture 2016

Radio personality and journalist Gemma Cairney opens the BBC’s #LovetoRead weekend

In conversation with Reading Agency Chief Executive Sue Wilkinson, Gemma discusses what reading means to her, the barriers faced by people who struggle to read and her activism around young people’s mental health. Her guide to life for young adults, Open: A Toolkit for How Magic and Messed Up Life Can Be will be published by Pan Macmillan in March 2017.

This is the fifth in a series of annual events organised by The Reading Agency, designed to be a platform for leading writers and public figures to share original, challenging ideas about the future of reading in the UK. Gemma Cairney follows in the footsteps of Jeanette Winterson, Neil Gaiman, Russell Brand and Shami Chakrabarti.

This event is part of #LovetoRead , is a BBC campaign to encourage reading for pleasure and to create a national conversation about books. The campaign culminates with the #LovetoRead weekend on the 5th and 6th November when everyone, young and old, will be encouraged to take time out and curl up with a book. Across BBC television documentaries and special programmes, radio stations, book clubs, social media and libraries this is a national discussion about the books and reading that matters most to us, and to inspire new discoveries.