Book Festival turns a new page

Published on Thursday 12 March 2009 20:56

LAST year was the 25th anniversary year of the Edinburgh International Book Festival, which has grown from small beginnings to become one of the most pre-eminent literary events in the world. Such is the Festival's pulling power that the 2008 event was opened by the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, and closed by Sir Sean Connery, who used the occasion to launch his new book, Being a Scot.

Between these two bookends, 800 authors, from 45 different countries, spoke at 750 popular events. And despite one of the wettest Augusts on record, which turned the Festival's habitual location in Charlotte Square gardens into a sea of mud, 200,000 people visited the Book Festival to listen, read, argue and buy books.

Much of the success of the festival is due to its director (and former literary editor of The Scotsman) Catherine Lockerbie. She is on sick leave and Richard Holloway – author of a dozen books, iconoclast and former Bishop of Edinburgh – will stand in as guest director this year. He is no stranger to the festival – his annual appearances are always a crowd-pleaser. And as chair of the Scottish Arts Council and the new Creative Scotland agency, he has a grasp of the potential for the Book Festival to continue to expand and to influence. Even when there are ducks wading in Charlotte Square gardens.