Love is all you need?

This year’s Wise Words is exploring love: whether for family, friends, lovers, for folk on the street, for your kids, for those you don’t know, for places, beliefs, and those you love grudgingly.

On the final day of the festival we bring this wide-ranging discussion under one roof for an afternoon of wise words, debate and performance. To wrangle with this eternally complex theme, we present thoughts from the worlds of science, philosophy and faith alongside those of artists. Each asking, from a compelling perspective: ‘what is love and is it really all you need?’

Professor Viren Swami

• How much does appearance matter in the formation of romantic relationships?
• Do nice guys always finish last?
• Does playing hard-to-get ever work?
• What really makes for a good chat-up line?

When it comes to relationships, there’s no shortage of advice from self-help ‘experts’, pick-up artists, and glossy magazines. But modern-day myths of attraction often have no basis in fact or – worse – are rooted in little more than misogyny. Professor Viren Swarmi is a social psychologist and author of Attraction Explained within which he debunks these myths and draws on cutting-edge research to provide a ground-breaking and evidence-based account of relationship formation.

Dr Christopher Hamilton

Christopher Hamilton is as interested in literature as he is in philosophy, and much of his research has been in the areas between these two disciplines. Roughly, his work explores themes in moral philosophy, but always with an eye on aesthetics, political philosophy and philosophy of religion. He believes that philosophy has largely lost touch with the ancient goals of seeking wisdom and exploring the meaning of life, and these topics are central in his research.

Vanessa Kisuule

Do you think you’re sexy? What does sexy mean?

As a young woman who loves poetry, smashing the patriarchy and a well timed slut drop, this has been a question that has plagued Vanessa her whole life. Vanessa is passionate about exploring the conflicted relationship we have with our bodies and sexiness.

Vanessa Kisuule is a writer and performer. She has won several slam titles including The Roundhouse Slam 2014, Hammer and Tongue National Slam 2014 and the Nuoryican Poetry Slam in New York. She has worked with the Southbank Centre, RADA, The Bristol City Council and had her work featured on BBC iPlayer, BBC Radio 1 and Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, The Guardian, Huffington Post, Blue Peter, Sky TV and TEDx in Vienna. She’s performed in Sweden and Belgium, Germany and Bangladesh and at renowned festivals Secret Garden Party and Glastonbury. Her debut poetry collection ‘Joyriding The Storm’ was published in April 2014.

Maggie Akintayo

When Wise Words first stumbled across Maggie whilst she was studying here at the University of Kent and we knew we just had to work with her. We cajoled her into joining Word Out (a group of young poets supported by Wise Words) and there, Maggie’s heartfelt and passionate performances about love, lust and heartbreak got pulses beating a little faster, tears flowing in empathy, and laughter forcing itself out from deep inside us as we recognised our own personal experiences of love and loss reflected through her stories. Maggie is now a London based poet that performs across the UK.

Tickets: £7.50

Tickets can now be bought at the on site box office. (Cash only)