Hay-on-Wye

Hay-on-Wye (Welsh: Y Gelli Gandryll or Y Gelli), often described as "the town of books", is a market town in Brecknockshire, Wales, very close to the border with England, within the Brecon Beacons National Park. Hay is a mecca for bibliophiles, boasting forty-one bookshops (mostly selling second-hand books, and including two "visiting bookshops") in and around a town of some 1,300 people.

The bookshops for which the town is now world-famous are a relatively recent innovation. The name most closely associated with the book trade in Hay is that of Richard Booth, who, on April 1, 1977, sought publicity by declaring Hay an "independent republic" with himself as its king. The tongue-in-cheek micronation of Hay-on-Wye and its "king" (who wields an old toilet-plunger in place of a sceptre) is today known chiefly for selling novelty low-cost "peerages" to bemused tourists.

Hay-on-Wye appears to continue over the border into England. The English part of the town is administratively separate, and is called Cusop.

Hay-on-Wye is twinned with Redu , Belgium.

The Guardian Hay Festival

Since 1988, Hay has been the venue for a literary festival, sponsored by The Guardian newspaper, which draws a claimed 80,000 visitors over ten days at the beginning of June to see and hear big literary names from all over the world.

See also

Wigtown ("Scotland's book town")

External links

• Official Site
• Hay Peerage
• The Guardian Hay Festival