It is perhaps fitting that the first thing you notice upon entering HowTheLightGetsIn’s festival field at Kenwood House is the wonky floors. The philosophy-and-music festival – whose theme last weekend was "Danger, Desire and Destiny" – is housed on a hill, with views stretching beyond the breathing green belt of Hampstead Heath towards the city. And indeed it is this sense of one's intellectual footing being destabilised that characterises HTLGI’s appeal and approach. The festival of "big ideas", whose focus since its founding in 2008 has been to "get philosophy out of the academy and into people’s lives", takes place every year, in London and in Hay. I joined the revellers last weekend for two days of debate, discussion, drinks, and – at night, speckled by the soft and distant lights of London – tangled dancing across those sloped, tarpaulin floors.
HTLGI boasts an impressive list of past speakers and performers: Noam Chomsky, Ed Miliband, Kimberly Crenshaw, Brian Eno, James Acaster, Hot Chip. This year’s headline names included Michio Kaku, Peter Singer (who appeared via Zoom) and Rory Stewart, alongside artists like Badly Drawn Boy and Blair Dunlop. This energetic range is the festival’s calling card. There are debates on straight philosophy, but also on science, tech, culture and politics – always with an emphasis on interrogating first principles and asking the big questions.
Illustrative of HTLGI’s orthodoxy-prodding programme was the spirited discussion held in the Hat Tent between Natalie Bennett, former Green Party leader and current member of the House of Lords, and Kerry McCarthy, Labour MP and Shadow Minister for Climate Change. It was chaired by Mike Berners-Lee, a prominent academic and leading expert in carbon footprinting. Berners-Lee opened the discussion by attempting to dispel certain sticky myths surrounding the policy and philosophy of climate action. Chief amongst these is the misconception that the bottleneck we face to secure an equitable and safe global future is technological rather than political in nature. We largely now know, he said, what to do, and how and by when to do so. Science is not the problem, though of course it must feature in the solution. Instead it's the “conscious dishonesty” on the part of a patchwork of select, determined actors – a complex of industrial and political players – that is to blame.
Bennett and McCarthy seconded this argument. Yet soon the fault lines between the former Green Party MP and the current Labour MP became clear. Bennett argued for rapid and revolutionary social innovation, highlighting as one example among many the pressing need to ban all single-use plastics (which in practice, she admitted, means banning virtually all consumer plastics) as soon as possible. Her justification: political change does not happen gradually, but rather with giant leaps and sharply felt shocks. McCarthy felt such methods and measures lack in practical sense what they carry in emotional and philosophical currency. The audience in turn – a large turnout packed so tightly in the tent that there were people sprawled sideways between the seats and still others straining knees and necks to peek in from outside – seemed to sway in Bennett’s direction, if we are to judge by the grunts of approval.
Of course, this is perhaps to get the debate – and the wider intention behind HowTheLightGetsIn – the wrong way round. All three speakers stressed the need for global and local innovative collaboration, not tired capitalist competition or political point scoring. Here, then, was a central message for the audience to take to other tents: we are strongest and most dynamic when acknowledging and embracing the interpersonal nature of belief, thought and action. The conceptual beauty of HTLGI rests in its organisers’ commitment to and delight in exploding established hierarchies, boundaries and one-size-fits-all pop philosophies so bloated as to burst upon the first critical needling. In its programme and its event space, HTLGI tries to challenge traditional distinctions between audience and speaker, art and science, philosophy and action, disembodied minds and mindless bodies. On the festival grounds, you’re as likely to bump into a friend or colleague as you are into one of the key speakers. It’s a great way to socialise or network: everybody is happy and keen to chat, and there’s a strong sense of community.
If there’s a practical limitation to the weekend’s proceedings, and to its spirit of inclusivity and shared stakes, it is perhaps that some of the events – largely those limited to the "Inner Circle" Tent – charge an extra fee for admission. These more select, intimate events might be the organisers’ way of keeping the rest of the weekend affordable for the general audience. Yet they do introduce a subtle note of exclusion and market-making to a festival which on the whole is committed to smashing exactly such barriers and drunk-on-deals dynamics. A second reservation, for me, was that there might have been less – admittedly organic and gourmet – meat and cheese and more greens on the menu, an imbalance that was somewhat surprising given HTLGI’s clear environmental and ethical stances.
But then, the festival is here to force us to face such choices. Hilary Lawson, founder and director, is adamant that philosophy is "not a technical exercise" but rather "an urgent call to examine where we are and what we think, in order to determine how we live and how to intervene." Ultimately, HowTheLightGetsIn succeeds in its mission. "Danger and desire" are surely twin pillars of our destiny – the weekend's theme. Yet, if the festival is to offer any cautious evidence, there could be a third and fourth – mutual compassion and critical, collective reflection.
New Humanist is a media partner of HowTheLightGetsIn, the world's largest philosophy and music festival, which returns to Hay-on-Wye from 24-27 May 2024. If you missed the festival at Kenwood House, London, don't worry! All the festival content will be released gradually on the festival's online platform IAI.TV over the coming months. Keep an eye out for earlybird tickets for the next HowTheLightGetsIn, which will be released very soon.
