Mon 20 August
Paul Durcan, 10:15
ANOBII FIRST BOOK AWARD NOMINEE 11:00- Writing Workshop 12:30 Writing for Different Formats
10:00- Paterson Arran 10:10 Ten at Ten
Writers’ Retreat, Free: Book in Advance
A delicious morning reading from one of our Festival authors to set you up for the day. Check the screen in the Entrance Tent to see who’s reading each day. 10:15 Paul Durcan
‘He Was a Private Man in a Public Place’ The Guardian Spiegeltent, £10 [£8]
‘If there were a prize for best reader of one’s own poems, Paul Durcan would probably win it hands down,’ proclaimed the Guardian’s reviewer of Durcan’s latest poetry collection, Praise in Which I Live and Move and Have My Being. We are thrilled the popular Dublinborn writer is back with us for the first time since 1995 to perform his quirky, jaunty, insightful new poems. Free coffee, courtesy of Heritage Portfolio. 11:00 Frank Westerman
with Alistair Moffat
The Horses That Witnessed War Peppers Theatre, £10 [£8]
The Dutch journalist Frank Westerman grew up around horses. Now he has written an intriguing history of the Lippizaner steed. Originally bred for the Emperor of AustriaHungary, Lippizaners were later the subject of experiments conducted under Hitler and Stalin. Westerman asks what this breed’s story can tell us about human genetic experiments, with another horse lover and genetic historian Alistair Moffat.
Writers’ Retreat, £15 [£12]
Fancy reaching readers beyond the pages of a book and to see your writing being widely downloaded or handwritten in a limited edition? Or what about the challenge of writing to a brief that defines your subject matter? Poet and wordsmith Elspeth Murray shares her wide experience of writing for digital and tangible formats from tweets to words on paving slabs and poems on whisky labels. In association with the Society of Authors.
Lucy Wood
Distinct Voices in Short Form RBS Corner Theatre, £7 [£5]
Lucy Wood’s debut short story collection Diving Belles takes us along Cornwall’s ancient coast, featuring straying husbands, lonely drivers, a wishing tree, an old white door and sentient houses. Over in Glasgow, Allan Wilson’s Wasted in Love charts the relationships of several couples in all their humour, tragedy and joy, as they fall in and out with each other and fight against their everyday problems.
11:30 Joyce Carol Oates
14:30 Duncan Campbell-Smith
The celebrated US novelist Joyce Carol Oates joins us to discuss her new novel Mudwoman, the intensely powerful story of a young Ivy League academic whose enormous success conceals personal traumas, including her mother’s attempt to submerge her as a toddler. Each year Oates’ name is high on the list of people tipped for a Nobel Prize: this remarkable novel may well tip the balance.Supported by the American Patrons of the National Library and Galleries of Scotland.
Former financial journalist and all-round money man Duncan Campbell-Smith introduces us to the origins of the Post Office in Masters of the Post: The Authorized History of the Royal Mail. In charting an extraordinary story from the Tudors to today, he recounts a series of tales, including the Bletchley Park code-breakers, the Great Train Robbery and the influence of trade unionism during the 1970s.
Rising Out of the Mud RBS Main Theatre, £10 [£8]
The Solid Stamp of Authority Peppers Theatre, £10 [£8]
WE ARE THE WAR
EDINBURGH WORLD WRITERS’ CONFERENCE
14:00 Paul Preston
15:00- Censorship Today 17:00 Should Freedom of Speech Ever
Spain’s Own Bloody Holocaust ScottishPower Studio Theatre, £10 [£8]
A fascinating new study by the historian Paul Preston exposes the realities of the Spanish Civil War. Preston has produced the most comprehensive account yet of the ruthless dictatorship of General Franco, and the brutality of his Republican opponents. As Spain today faces its toughest period since the Franco era, this is a timely analysis of the poverty and prejudice that led to bloodshed.
Like history? Love…
Maggie Craig (13 Aug, p14)
Book now: www.edbookfest.co.uk 0845 373 5888 See page 83 for booking details
14:00 Allan Wilson &
Have Limits? RBS Main Theatre, £10 [£8]
Freedom of speech is not only under threat in undemocratic countries: the American Library Association received challenges to ban no fewer than 326 book titles in 2010, including And Tango Makes Three, which attracted complaints because its young penguin hero has two fathers. In this session, Carnegie Medal-winning writer of novels for adults and children, Patrick Ness, addresses the Conference about censorship and freedom of speech, chaired by Belgian-Nigerian author Chika Unigwe. Presented in partnership with the British Council. This event will be filmed and broadcast live online at www.edinburghworldwritersconference.org
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