Hairdresser Vidal Sassoon, Nobel Laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz, poet Seamus Heaney, and Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau are among a varied and exciting line-up of authors coming to this August's Edinburgh International Book Festival (EIBF).
Debut director Nick Barley's first programme re-affirms the Book Festival's position as the intellectual heavyweight among Edinburgh's Festivals. The programme, which was revealed yesterday with a breakfast of bucks fizz and bacon butties at the Signet Library, is also brimming with events for kids.
As in previous years, the 2010 festival programme includes an array of politicians, journalists, and social commentators who will tackle burning issues of the day in meet-the-author events and through a main debate event each evening.
Many guest authors are returning to the tented village in Charlotte Square Gardens with their latest work, a fair indication of the kind of regard that the festival is held in. Barley said he will be looking to maintain and build on the festival's international stature, as well as innovate to stay ahead of the growing number of similar festivals.
Among the innovations, this year sees an inaugural Readers’ First Book Award. All 47 authors bringing their first UK published novel or short story collection are eligible.
Festival debates
This year the festival is introducing four guest selectors - Scottish poet Don Paterson, great-great granddaughter of Charles Darwin Ruth Padel, Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell, and Scotland on Sunday literary editor Stuart Kelly will be selecting and chairing their personal book festival events each day.
New daily debates will be chaired by BBC Correspondent Allan Little in the first week and journalist Ruth Wishart in the second week. Week one will include weighty issues like the credit crunch, while the second will focus on social issues such as online identity and privacy.
“I believe that writers are fundamental to our understanding of the world; away from the barrage of instant news, writers give a more subtle perspective on everything from complex economic problems to personal issues in our day to day lives. The Book Festival gives us a wonderful opportunity to bring these perspectives into focus as we look at the world we live in today," said Barley.
The festival offers a chance to join recent headline-makers such as local MP and former Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, who will deliver the National Library of Scotland Donald Dewar Memorial Lecture writer and activist Heather Brooke, who broke the parliamentary expenses scandal.
This year's book fest includes Douglas Hurd (in conversation with First Minister Alex Salmond), historian Niall Ferguson (on money), Ahmed Rashid (on Islamic extremism), historian Tom Devine (on pre-union Scotland), Gwyne Dyer (with his book Climate Wars), Globe and Mail journalist Doug Saunders (on urban growth), BBC correspondent Fergal Keane (on the Siege of Kohima), Gary Yonge (on identity), Ian Blair (on policing), Polly Toynbee (on New Labour's legacy), Turner Prize winning artist Martin Creed (on his career), and Norman Foster, the architect behind the new Wembley Stadium.
Former BP CEO John Browne will give an inside view of his time at the oil giant, and how he re-established his reputation after his perjurious attempt to conceal a gay relationship. Public meets private when Fatima Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto's niece, talks about the sudden and violent loss of her father and her aunt.
Fiction writers
Fiction writers range from Al Kennedy to Fay Weldon, from Iain Banks to Alan Warner with a strong U.S. contingent. Novelists Joyce Carol Oates, Lionel Shriver, and Amy Bloom, are among 45 American authors. “This year we will be looking at the new world order and particularly at the USA’s place in this world with an ambitious survey of American contemporary writing," said Barley.
Christos Tsiolkas, Australian author of The Slap and the inaugural Edinburgh UNESCO City of Literature Author in Residence, will be speaking on the opening day. His bestselling novel The Slap tells the story, from multiple viewpoints, of what happens when a man strikes someone else's child.
Candia McWilliam regains her sight and rediscovers her voice as she launches her first book for ten years.
Actor David Rintoul will give a "dramatised reading" from A J Cronin’s Dr Finlay’s Casebook and discuss one of his best loved roles.
Leading South African authors coming to Edinburgh include South African Poet Laureate Keorapetse ‘Willie’ Kgositsile, Mandla Langa, and Kopano Matlwa who recently won the Wole Soyinka Prize for African Literature.
And something different
Meanwhile, the "iniquitous depths" of rock music will be plunged by industry insider Barry Miles, journalists John Harris and Nick Kent and musician Jah Wobble, and Willy Vlautin, lead singer of Richmond Fontaine, will discuss his novel, Lean on Pete.
Scottish cyclist Mark Beaumont will share some of the adventure of his recordbreaking bike around the world, and a recent cycle from Alaska to Patagonia along the length of the Pan American Highway.
Two literary prizes will also be announced at the Book Festival – the Edwin Morgan International Poetry Prize on Wednesday 18 August and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize on Friday 20 August.
Short stories go online
This year's festival will see the launch of Elsewhere, a series of specially commissioned, international short stories supported by the Scottish Government’s Edinburgh Festivals Expo Fund.
The first works, from Louise Welsh, Michel Faber, Eleanor Thom, A L Kennedy and Allan Radcliffe are on the book festival web site with new work, from an additional 45 authors, being released at regular intervals up until March 2011.
Unbound
The Book Festival is also introducing a free, unticketed "minifestival" Unbound which will involve a mix of readings, music, performance and, says Barley, "a healthy dose of the unexpected". Full details of the Unbound programme, taking place every evening in the Highland Park Spiegeltent, will be announced in July.
Previous EIBF director Catherine Lockerbie often emphasised the interactive spirit of the Edinburgh Book Festival - both technical and non-technical - and clearly this is the direction that Nick Barley is going to continue.
Watch video of Nick Barley on innovations in 2010 Edinburgh Book Festival programme
Kids Events
Even kids will be weighing in on more grandiose subjects, with events and workshops that, says Children's Programme director Sarah Grady, "ask questions about where we are going as a society" and investigate the nature of the solar system and universe. Kids will even be reading dictionaries (Grady promises her dictionary strand of events will be more fun than it sounds).
The packed daily programme will see the return of old favourites such as Tove Jansson’s niece, Sophia, celebrating 65 years of the Moomins while David Benedictus brings back some much loved characters in his collection of stories from Return to the Hundred Acre Wood. Meanwhile, illustrator, David McKee, will be drawing Elmer the Patchwork Elephant, Judith Kerr’s Mog the Cat turns 40 and Thomas the Tank Engine celebrates his 65th birthday.
Australian Garth Nix will be giving a sneak preview of his new book and a brand new collaboration. He will be joined by fellow Australians Simmone Howell and Isobelle Carmody together with the Book Festival’s 2010 Illustrator in Residence, Tohby Riddle.
This year also sees the Festival’s first e-book launch, and events on robots, social networking, vampires, and the Alaskan wilderness.
Young adult fiction is a focal point this year, with international stars John Green, Michael Grant, Meg Rosoff and Patrick Ness joined by best seller Robert Muchamore for the launch of the last instalment in his CHERUB series.
Louise Rennison will be bringing Withering Tights, the first in her new series, to Edinburgh and John Boyne previews his new novel Noah Barleywater Runs Away.
The Edinburgh International Book Festival opens on Saturday 14 August and the public programme runs until Monday 30 August, with the RBS Schools Gala day closing the Festival on Tuesday 31 August. Tickets for the Edinburgh International Book Festival go on sale at 8.30am on 26 June