Programme highlights from the 2013 Edinburgh Book festival
Edinburgh Festival Guide
16 July 2013
This article is from 2013.
Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Jonathan Coe and Alexander McCall Smith among guests at EIBF
Salman Rushdie One of the original Best of Young British Novelists reflects on a golden career marred by that fatwa. 10 Aug.
Margaret Atwood We're spoilt for choice by the Canadian this year as she chats variously about The Blind Assassin, Scottish horror and storytelling while she also shares a stage with Neil Gaiman. 24–26 Aug.
Alexander McCall Smith The hugely popular author is in town for various matters, including a Precious Ramotswe kids book and an event marking 15 years of his Botswana detective. 10, 13 & 14, 16 Aug.
Roddy Doyle Over a quarter of a century on from The Commitments, the Irish author returns to those characters once again with The Guts. 10 Aug.
The world’s largest public celebration of the written word takes place in the first UNESCO City of Literature in the beautiful Charlotte Square Gardens. As well as leading Scottish and international authors, the varied programme always manages to cover poets, politicians, historians, journalists and children's authors…
Witty, warm and irrepressibly charming, Alexander McCall Smith weaves stories that give pleasure to countless thousands of readers. From his Mma Ramotswe stories set in Botswana to his much-loved Scotland Street tales, via a heart-warming new set of tales based on a train journey and a sideways look at The Great Tapestry…
In 1983, Salman Rushdie was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for his novel Shame and named among Granta’s inuagural Best of Young British Novelists. Only a few years later, he was forced into hiding by an Iranian fatwa after the publication of The Satanic Verses. Rushdie survived, became a passionate champion of free…
The Man Booker prize-winning Canadian author Margaret Atwood launched The Year of the Flood with a bravura performance at the Book Festival four years ago. Now she returns, having completed the trilogy she started with Oryx & Crake. In the near-future world of the much-anticipated MaddAddam, a man-made plague has…
Storytelling changes with the times. Today, great stories can reach us via novels, but equally through film, television or computer games. Guest selector Margaret Atwood shares the joy of playing with literary forms with Naomi Alderman, author of the successful Zombies Run! app and whose work is inspired by Game of…
Well before Precious Ramotswe founded her Number One Ladies’ Detective Agency, she was already solving mysteries from the age of eight. Here, in this new enchanting tale for children, Precious and the Mystery of Meerkat Hill, we see how the young Precious became the crafty and intuitive private investigator we all know…
Join award-winning novelist Jonathan Coe as he launches his book, Expo 58. Coe describes it as a ‘John le Carré meets Evelyn Waugh’ comic novel, set at the Brussels World Fair in 1958. There, a civil servant looking after the British pavilion realises that Brussels, with its glamorous new Atomium, represents a new…
Witty, warm and irrepressibly charming, Alexander McCall Smith weaves stories that give pleasure to countless thousands of readers. From his Mma Ramotswe stories set in Botswana to his much-loved Scotland Street tales, via a heart-warming new set of tales based on a train journey in which he struck up conversation with…
Launched in 1998, The Number 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency has grown to become one of the most important Scottish literary creations of our times, turning its author Alexander McCall Smith into one of the best-known Scots in the world. Today we celebrate 15 wonderful years of Mma Ramotswe and her friends, with a rambunctious…
Time magazine named it best novel of 2000 and it scampered off with the Man Booker Prize. What were the qualities that made The Blind Assassin so successful? It interweaves various prose forms including newspaper articles and pulp fiction but what purpose does each thread serve? Atwood joins the Guardian’s Book Club…
Margaret Atwood and Neil Gaiman each have legions of readers across the world. They are both on a fearless mission to cross traditional literary boundaries, producing sci-fi, graphic novels, literature and children’s books without hesitation. In this unique and unmissable event, Queen Margaret and King Neil share stories…
Roddy Doyle, author of the likes of The Commitments, The Van, The Barrytown Trilogy and most recently Smile, talks about his life and work.
Roddy Doyle (born 8 May 1958) is an Irish novelist, dramatist and screenwriter. Several of his books have been made into films, beginning with The Commitments in 1991. Doyle's work…
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