Including Baillie Gifford Children’s Programme See p77—121 1 Thanks to all our Sponsors and Supporters Funders Benefactors James & Morag Anderson Jane Attias Geoff & Mary Ball The BEST Trust Lel & Robin Blair Sir Ewan & Lady Brown Richard & Catherine Burns Gavin & Kate Gemmell Lead Sponsor Major Supporter Murray & Carol Grigor Richard & Sara Kimberlin Professor Alexander & Dr Elizabeth McCall Smith Anne McFarlane Ian Rankin & Miranda Harvey Lady Susan Rice Lord Ross Fiona & Ian Russell Investment managers The Thomas Family Claire & Mark Urquhart William Zachs & Martin Adam Major Sponsors And all those who wish to remain anonymous Folio Patrons Jane & Bernard Nelson Donald & Brenda Rennie And all those who wish to remain anonymous SINCE Scottish Mortgage Trusts Investment Trust PLC The AEB Charitable Trust 909 Over 100 years of astute investing 1 The Artemis Charitable Foundation The Binks Trust The Booker Prize Foundation The Castansa Trust The Craignish Trust The John S Cohen Foundation The Crerar Hotels Trust Cruden Foundation David & June Gordon Memorial Trust Sponsors The Educational Institute of Scotland Ernest Cook Trust The Ettrick Charitable Trust The Hugh Fraser Foundation The Martin Connell Charitable Trust New Park Educational Trust The Ryvoan Trust The Turtleton Charitable Trust With thanks The Edinburgh International Book Festival is sited in Charlotte Square Gardens by kind permission of the Charlotte Square Proprietors. We would also like to thank the publishers who help to make the Festival possible, the Friends and Patrons of the Edinburgh International Book Festival and all the other individuals who have donated to the Book Festival this year. Media Sponsors Supporters Edinburgh Contents 2 – 5 Highlights and themes International 6 – 76 Events for adults 77 – 118 Events for children and teens Book Festival 119 – 121 Selected events for young adults 122 – 124 Info for your visit 12–28 August 2017 125 Booking info 126 Festival City info Entry is FREE to our tented village 127 – 129 Author index in Charlotte Square Gardens and on the west end of George Street, Edinburgh. Open 9.30am until late. What’s On? Eat and Drink Entertainment for Teens Over 1000 authors from more than 45 Three cafés, two bars and an ice-cream Inventive events for teens run throughout countries across the world gather in our trike serve hot drinks, cold beers, wines, the Baillie Gifford Children’s Programme leafy tented village to inspire, challenge light meals, snacks and treats (see page (pages 77-121). We have grouped selected and entertain you. Well-loved favourites 123 for details). events for young adults together on their to the hottest new talents appear in own pages for convenience (pages 119-121). chat-show style interviews, panel debates, workshops, storytelling, interactive crafts, Bring Your Children performances and live-draws for adults The Book Festival takes place in a great Where Are We? and children. family-friendly space, where kids can play Most Book Festival events take place in the gardens and you can relax with in Charlotte Square Gardens in central a drink or a picnic. Fun and inventive Edinburgh but we also have two new Browse Our Bookshops interactive events, workshops and free venues on George Street just near the We run our own two large bookshops and craft activities run every day and children entrance to the Gardens. Events last one a book signing tent, which are stocked also get their own bookshop. See pages hour, unless otherwise specified on the with thousands of titles; feel free to come 77-118 for the Baillie Gifford Children’s listings, and most are followed by a book in and browse. Proceeds from the books Programme and page 124 for helpful info signing with the author. go straight back into developing the Book for visiting with children. Festival. 1 Brave New Words Programme Partners Amnesty International AtoBIZ Ltd British Council The British Library Canada Council for the Arts Centre for Information on Literature Creative New Zealand Culture Ireland Dutch Foundation for Literature Edinburgh City Libraries Edinburgh Napier University Edinburgh UNESCO City of Literature Trust FILI (Finnish Literature Exchange) Flanders Literature Goethe-Institut Glasgow Icelandic Literature Society Institut Français Italian Cultural Institute, Edinburgh National Library of Scotland National Museum of Scotland NORLA (Norwegian Literature Abroad) Norwegian Consulate General Edinburgh Open Book Polish Cultural Institute Publishing Scotland The Royal Society Royal Society of Literature Scottish Chamber Orchestra Scottish Partnership for Palliative Care ‘What you have done in Edinburgh is one of the most magnificent Scottish Poetry Library experiences since the war. Here human relations have been renewed.’ Swedish Arts Council Durham University, Life of Breath project So said conductor Bruno Walter in 1947 after he was reunited with University of Edinburgh Centre for Research his Vienna Philharmonic at the first ever Edinburgh Festival. And how Collections perfectly his words capture the spirit of this unrivalled festival city. University of Glasgow Each August, Edinburgh brings people together to revel in spectacular, V&A Dundee thought-provoking, often unforgettable experiences, and the net effect is every bit as magnificent today as it was 70 years ago. For this year’s Book Festival we’ve brought some of the most electrifying voices Thank you… in world literature to a celebration of books and ideas that’s bigger than ever before, with more than 1000 writers taking part across the Putting together a Festival this big requires programme for adults and the Baillie Gifford Children’s Programme. a year-round team. This year that team was As well as hundreds of events in our Charlotte Square Gardens home, kind enough to let me take three months out of the office to be a judge of the Man Booker we’re expanding onto George Street with new theatres and new places International Prize. During that period to encounter brilliant writers. Jenny Niven, from Creative Scotland, took on my job working alongside Programme Of course, Edinburgh is not just a festival city: it’s the original City Directors Roland Gulliver and Janet Smyth of Literature too. The city of Jekyll and Hyde, of Rebus, Begbie and and their ideas and energy together played Miss Jean Brodie; the city where Harry Potter and Sherlock Holmes a vital role in shaping our programme. I and Mma Ramotswe were dreamed up. Add a touch of Enlightenment am indebted to them – and everyone in the philosophy and you have the perfect recipe for the celebration of ideas Book Festival team – for their inspired ideas and tireless work. that is the Book Festival. We are also grateful to the Sponsors, Trusts, This year’s theme, Brave New Benefactors and Patrons who have been so Words, reflects both the joy of enthusiastic in their support; in particular, new writing, but also hints at the I’d like to thank Baillie Gifford for their turbulent political times we’re continued commitment. We also receive living through. In a post-truth vital funding from Creative Scotland, the world, maybe fiction can help City of Edinburgh Council and the Scottish us work out what really matters. Government’s Edinburgh Festivals Expo Fund. Thanks to their collective support, it means we can continue to produce an Nick Barley ambitious programme. Director 2 Guest Selectors Elif Shafak Ken MacLeod The Politics of Fiction Experiments in Science Fiction The most widely-read female novelist in Turkey, Elif Shafak has Imagining how the world could be different can throw new also built a major reputation in the English-speaking world. light on how it really is. Acclaimed Scottish science fiction She has written ten acclaimed novels including The Bastard of author Ken MacLeod certainly does that, as do the writers he Istanbul, The Architect’s Apprentice and most recently, Three has chosen for this series of events. MacLeod brings leading Daughters of Eve. As our Guest Selector, Shafak looks at the SF, fantasy and horror writers to Edinburgh, with international powerful relationship between fiction and the political world in stars Nalo Hopkinson and Ada Palmer alongside brilliant British which it is written. She talks to US writer Siri Hustvedt, Scottish authors including Charles Stross, Jo Walton and Adam Roberts. First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and Scottish writer and publisher Never before has the Book Festival welcomed such a dazzling Heather McDaid about women in public and intellectual life. constellation of speculative fiction writers. Andrew O’Hagan and Richard Holloway also join her to discuss the ways that politicians often use stories as a means of gaining and maintaining power. Roxane Gay with Jackie Kay Intersections of Identity and Culture ‘The desire for authentic representations of girlhood is like David Mitchell searching for water in a desert,’ said Roxane Gay in 2012. Since Music in the Imagination then, the Nebraska-raised writer has brought issues of gender, Award-winning author of seven bestselling novels including race and identity into the American mainstream media. Gay has Cloud Atlas, The Bone Clocks and Slade House, David Mitchell worked with acclaimed Scottish poet and novelist Jackie Kay to has earned his place as one of the world’s best-loved and most create a series of events featuring writers whose work operates at versatile writers. This year he has curated and participates in the intersection of various forms of identity. Among the authors a series of events which, like his novel-in-progress, explores Kay will interview are Margo Jefferson, author of Baillie Gifford the border and interplay between music and words. Including Prize-shortlisted memoir Negroland, and iO Tillett Wright, events with novelist Hari Kunzru, percussionist Evelyn Glennie, whose Darling Days is a devastatingly powerful portrayal of composer Sally Beamish and celebrated folk duo The Unthanks. gender and identity. And, in what promises to be one of the highlights, Mitchell is joined by virtuoso pianist David Greilsammer for a UK premiere concert performance of sonatas by Scarlatti and Cage, together with texts by Mitchell, at St Mary’s Cathedral in the west end.