Edinburgh Bookcase

The British Council Literature Department and British Council Scotland showcase contemporary writers at the Edinburgh International Book Festival every two years, in partnership with the Scottish Arts Council. The Bookcase programme offers readings, performances and discussions from a wide range of writers involving established names and emerging authors from the UK and international writers whose work has been published in translation. 

In 2008, 73 international delegates from 34 countries (from Argentina to the Ukraine) attended the British Council Bookcase at the Edinburgh International Book Festival including collectively, and variously, literature programmers, translators, journalists, writers, teachers and others involved in the creative economy. Countries represented included, among others, Argentina, Brazil, China, Egypt, Estonia, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Sudan, USA.

In 2006 there were 67 participants from places as diverse as Estonia, India, Iraq, Russia, Sudan, Vietnam and the USA. It featured over 60 individual writers performing their work, including many names in fiction writing and poets. Special features were: a focus on new Arab literature with a team of four visiting Arab novelists and poets as the culmination of a week-long UK tour; an event featuring leading lights of the performance poetry scene: Patience Agbabi, Jean ‘Binta’ Breeze, Roger Robinson; and three afternoon sessions with writers in conversation, followed by an opportunity to meet the author over tea, featuring the poet Francesca Beard, poet and novelist John Burnside and novelist and broadcaster Kate Mosse.

2006 Fiction authors: Glen Duncan, Helen Dunmore, Janice Galloway, Kirsty Gunn, Laura Hird, Howard Jacobson, A. L. Kennedy, James Lasdun, David Lodge, Alexander McCall Smith, Bernard MacLaverty, Denise Mina, Ewan Morrison, Kate Mosse, Julie Myerson, Andrew O'Hagan, David Peace, Ian Rankin, Michael Symmons Roberts, Suhayl Saadi, Ali Smith, Alan Spence, Sarah Waters and Jeanette Winterson.

2006 Poets: John Burnside, Ciaran Carson, Menna Elfyn, Vicki Feaver, Paul Farley, David Harsent, John Hegley, Robin Robertson and Hugo Williams.

The 2006 Bookcase also featured a playwright, a biographer, new fiction authors, international fiction authors, literature in translation, the Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year award and the Scottish PEN lecture by James Meek. 

For further information about the Bookcase see the British Council Literature Department website.