Edinburgh International Book Festival 2019 Highlights 13–16 August

Olivia Laing: Your Body is a Battleground Olivia Laing had the idea for her new book Everybody in the summer of 2015 at the height of the refugee crisis in Europe. The chaotic times that followed – including Britain’s vote for Brexit and Trump’s victory in the US elections – only served to… Who’s Afraid of the Working Class? In 2018, The Panic! Arts report found that working-class people are dramatically under-represented in the arts, and it is – as many have long-known – a culture dominated by the white middle class. So how do you make your own way, and bring people along… The Edwin Morgan Poetry Award James McGonigal, Edwin Morgan’s friend and biographer notes that the man ‘was a poet of inventive forms and many voices – a writer of the unexpected. Here are two more surprises. Firstly, he actually made money from poetry. This took much effort and… Mexican Writing, An Insider's View with Gabriel Orozco - Essays (2015 Event) Artist Gabriel Orozco brings us two of Mexico's most highly-respected and best-known authors. Sergio González Rodríguez is a novelist and essayist famous for his groundbreaking writing about the serial murders of young women in the… Kerri ní Dochartaigh & Katherine May: Wildest Dreams From the depths of winter sprout the seeds of new growth and the promise of wonders. In Enchantment, Katherine May unravels the threads of a tightly-wound life and finds a more meaningful and grounded way to be. In Cacophony of Bone, Kerri ní Dochartaigh… Aravind Adiga (2017 event) The last debut novelist to win the Man Booker Prize (in 2008 with White Tiger), Aravind Adiga now brings us Selection Day, widely held to be even better. In this event filmed live at the 2017 Edinburgh International Book Festival, he tells us about his… Scottish Spoken Word Showcase Spoken word is an increasingly visible and important part of Scotland’s cultural life. Discover its strength, diversity and creativity in this celebratory showcase, where artists shed light on their inspirations, celebrate the scene’s lineage and… Minouche Shafik: Recipe for a Better Society We live in a world of discontent: four out of every five people in China, Europe, India, and the United States feel that the system is not working for them. This is a time of polarized politics, culture wars, conflicts over inequality and race, tensions… This Separated Isle: State of the Union Before the pandemic made a seismic impact across the world, things were already shifting here in the UK: the divide exposed by Brexit, the Hostile Environment policy and rising levels of hate crimes revealed bitter divisions in British society and… Wayétu Moore & Nadia Owusu: On Belonging Meet two women who combine breathtaking life stories with an uncommon ability to write about them. Wayétu Moore joined us last year with her fictional reimagining of Liberia’s history, She Would Be King. Now she returns to tell her true life story and…