Katharine Halls is a Arabic-to-English translator with extensive experience in the translation of colloquial Arabic in both written and spoken forms. She has worked with Egyptian, Sudanese, Lebanese, Palestinian, Syrian, Iraqi and Algerian dialects, mainly focusing on translating literature and challenging non-fiction texts.

Patrick Hamilton was one of the twentieth century’s greatest novelists and dramatists, whose significant contribution to literature has often been overlooked. Born in Hassocks, Sussex in 1904, Hamilton spent his early years in Hove. His first novel, Monday Morning was published in 1925, quickly followed by Craven House (1926).

Among his novels are The Midnight Bell (1929), The Siege of Pleasure (1932), The Plains of Cement (1934), Hangover Square (1941), The Slaves of Solitude (1947) and The Gorse Trilogy, which is comprised of The West Pier (1952), Mr Stimpson and Mr Gorse (1953) and Unknown Assailant (1955).

Hamilton’s trilogy 20,000 Streets Under the Sky (1929–34) was adapted into a successful BBC Four series in 2005, directed by Simon Curtis.

His plays include the psychological thrillers Rope (1929) – on which Alfred Hitchcock’s 1948 film Rope was based – and Gaslight (1938), which gave rise to the term gaslighting: a form of psychological abuse in which a victim is manipulated into questioning his or her sanity.

Hamilton died in 1962 of liver and kidney failure, after a long struggle with alcohol.

Chris Hannan is a playwright and novelist.

His plays include Elizabeth Gordon Quinn (Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, 1985; revived by the National Theatre of Scotland in its inaugural season in 2006); The Evil Doers (Bush Theatre, London, 1990; Time Out Award and Charrington London Fringe Best New Play Award); Shining Souls (Traverse, 1996, revived by the Old Vic in 1997; winner of a Scotland on Sunday Critics Award and a Lloyds Bank Playwright of the Year nomination); The God of Soho (Shakespeare's Globe, 2011); The Three Musketeers and the Princess of Spain (Traverse, English Touring Theatre, Coventry Belgrade, 2011) and What Shadows (Birmingham Rep, 2016).

As well as original plays, Hannan has adapted Crime and Punishment (Glasgow Citizens' Theatre/Liverpool Playhouse/Lyceum Edinburgh, 2013) and The Iliad (Lyceum Edinburgh, 2016); and also made new versions of Ibsen's The Pretenders (RSC, 1991), Gogol's Gamblers (Tricycle 1992), and Stars in the Morning Sky (Coventry Belgrade, 2012).

His 2008 novel Missy was awarded the McKitterick Prize for a debut novel.

Neil Hannon is a singer and songwriter, the creator of pop group The Divine Comedy.

Peter Harness is a writer for television, film and theatre.

His work for TV includes the Spanish Flu drama The Forgotten Fallen, the Frankie Howerd biopic Rather You Than Me (starring David Walliams), and episodes of City of Vice, Case Histories and Doctor Who. His debut feature, Is Anybody There?, starring Michael Caine and David Morrissey, premiered in 2009. His BBC adaptation of the bestselling book Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell was broadcast in 2015. He wrote and executive produced the third and fourth seasons of the hit detective drama Wallander starring Kenneth Branagh. His adaptation of The War of the Worlds for BBC One was broadcast in 2019.