They don’t seem to be making much of a fuss about it, but this year is in fact the 30th anniversary of the Edinburgh International Book Festival. That’s 30 years of bringing some of the world’s best writers to Scotland’s capital, a city awash with festivities during the summer months. Though they don’t shout as loudly as the Fringe or the International Festival, the Book Festival’s organisers have once again put together an exciting and varied programme for this year’s event, one which will feature over 800 authors across two weeks of fascinating talk and debate.
Building on the success of several comics-related events last year, the 2013 festival sees the inclusion of a special theme dedicated to comic books, called Stripped. Under this banner, writers and artists as varied as Grant Morrison, Melinda Gebbie, Dan Abnett, Chris Ware and Joe Sacco will be discussing their work over the next fortnight, and there’s even a special event with Neil Gaiman (one of the four that he’s doing this year) where he’ll look back at his graphic masterpiece, The Sandman. For those of a geeky inclination there’s also plenty of other stuff to enjoy, such as events with Ben Aaronovitch, Paul Cornell, Neil Gaiman (in his non-comics guise) and Margaret Atwood. Last but certainly far from least is Geekzine editor Andrew Jamieson’s appearance at the festival on Wednesday 14th August, when he’ll be talking about his steampunk-fantasy epic The Vengeance Path, as well as the future of digital publishing. It’s a veritable cornucopia of geeky delights!
Your humble Geekzine correspondent will be in attendance, of course (the free coffee and occasional morning pastries will see to that), bringing you coverage from the heart of one of the UK’s premier literary festivals. Hope to see you down there!
The 2013 Edinburgh International Book Festival will be running in Charlotte Square until Monday 26th August.
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