Transmission ll is a collaboration between Hay on Wye Literary Festival and NERC (Natural Environment Research Council) that aims to communicate cutting-edge science to a wide audience by pairing award winning authors with leading environmental scientists.
The Drought Risk and You (DRY) project was selected as this year’s UK partner. Professor Lindsey McEwen, Dr Sarah Ayling and colleagues Dr Jill Thompson (from Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Edinburgh) and Sally Stevens (from Institute of Analytics, Reading) worked with author Patrice Lawrence to produce a short story that would help a non-scientific audience understand why we need to be aware of the risks associated with drought and other aspects of climate change. Patrice created a story that used a light touch to combine the serious issues associated with climate change with an important but everyday event in the life of a teenager. (no spoilers here!)
The actual story and a film of the story were to have been presented at the Hay Literary Festival. However, due to Covid 19, this year’s Hay Festival became ‘Hay Festival Digital’ (https://www.hayfestival.com/)
You can watch a film of the story at the link below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rb427N9BWLM
On Monday May 25, Lindsey and Sarah took part in a conversation with Patrice and Andy Fryers (Head of Sustainability at Hay) about the process involved in creating the story, followed by a Question and Answer session with a digital audience.
Lindsey, Sarah and Patrice