Explore Events

As we can't put on our usual 900+ event Festival this year in our lovely tented village in Charlotte Square Gardens, we've curated a special online edition. From 15-31 August, enjoy events for adults and children for free. Through the magic of technology, we’ll be crossing continents and time zones to beam events from more than 30 countries straight into your home. What’s more, you’ll be able chat with fellow Festival goers via digital chatrooms and take part in Q&A sessions, and you'll even be able to meet the author and get your books signed (selected events).

All events are free and available to watch here on our website. See events below. 'Save your place' on the event page and we'll email you a reminder just before it starts.

Use one or more of the search filters below to find events.

    Browse this year's themes

    Rutger Bregman: There is Hope for the Human Race

    Sunday 16 August 16:00 - 17:00

    BSL Event Rutger Bregman: There is Hope for the Human Race View event
    ‘Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.’ So said Abraham Lincoln in one of his rousing...

    The New York Times Book Review Live

    Sunday 16 August 17:30 - 18:30

    The New York Times Book Review Live View event
    There is an intimacy to reading: it’s just us and the author; our subjective response and their generous, imaginative understanding of a world that we share but may struggle to articulate. Yet for book lovers, there are moments beyond that connection,...

    Amelia Gentleman: Windrush – A Very British Betrayal

    Sunday 16 August 19:00 - 20:00

    BSL Event Amelia Gentleman: Windrush – A Very British Betrayal View event
    From the gnawing dread of the red-stamped letter to the shocking closed-door deportations of our fellow citizens, it’s hard to imagine a tragedy more of our times than the Windrush Scandal. A perfect storm of hostile policy-making and an...

    Hilary Mantel: Inside the Head of Thomas Cromwell

    Sunday 16 August 20:30 - 21:30

    Captioned Event Hilary Mantel: Inside the Head of Thomas Cromwell View event
    More than a decade in the making, Hilary Mantel’s masterpiece is now complete with the publication of the final part of her Thomas Cromwell trilogy, The Mirror and The Light. As any student of 16th century England knows, Cromwell’s life ended...

    A New Kind of Superhero with Samantha Baines

    Age 7+

    Monday 17 August 10:00 - 10:55

    Captioned Event A New Kind of Superhero with Samantha Baines View event
    Harriet Versus the Galaxy is a brilliantly funny intergalactic adventure that will have you snorting with laughter. When Harriet discovers that her hearing aid can help her understand the alien invaders, she becomes the Earth’s main source of contact...

    Stuart Cosgrove: The Soul Of Muhammad Ali

    Monday 17 August 11:30 - 12:30

    Stuart Cosgrove: The Soul Of Muhammad Ali View event
    Following on from his acclaimed trilogy about the American soul music scene in the 1960s, much-loved Scottish broadcaster and writer Stuart Cosgrove returns to the American post-war era with his highly topical new book. In Cassius X: Six Months That...

    Natalie Diaz & Ellen van Neerven: Voices of Indigenous Resistance

    Monday 17 August 13:00 - 14:00

    Natalie Diaz & Ellen van Neerven: Voices of Indigenous Resistance View event
    Mojave American and Latinx poet Natalie Diaz’s Postcolonial Love Poem has been celebrated as a song in the face of erasure and the damage to which Indigenous people are subjected. It presents desire and pleasure as a response, perhaps the only...

    Michele Hutchison & Marieke Lucas Rijneveld: Reap What You Sow

    Monday 17 August 14:30 - 15:30

    Michele Hutchison & Marieke Lucas Rijneveld: Reap What You Sow View event
    Great art doesn’t just reinforce or reassure: the authors we love challenge us; they illuminate new perspectives, make us question our certainties. They discomfort us. From its very title, Marieke Lucas Rijneveld’s International Booker shortlisted...

    Jenny Offill: Storm Warning

    Monday 17 August 16:00 - 17:00

    Jenny Offill: Storm Warning View event
    Not all big books are big. Jenny Offill’s acclaimed 2014 novel — the slim piece of autofiction Dept. of Speculation — was efficient and pared back to essentials, not even spelling out fully each word of its title. An autopsy of a marriage, the...

    Linn Ullmann: Portrait of a Family

    Monday 17 August 17:30 - 18:30

    Linn Ullmann: Portrait of a Family View event
    ‘I was his child and her child, but not their child,’ Linn Ullmann writes in Unquiet, ‘it was never us three.’ This sense of dispossession and longing haunt the pages of the Norwegian literary star’s elusive, quietly devastating novel; the...

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