ONCE UPON A TIME THERE WAS A CITY RENOWNED FOR ITS LITERARY HERITAGE. BUT OVER THE YEARS IT WAS LEFT ON THE SHELF, ITS BOOK SCENE STARVED OF CASH. THEN ALONG CAME A CHANCE TO BE GREAT AGAIN …
Alan Taylor Ponders Edinburgh’s Claim To Being World City Of Literature
WHEN I think of a place, I think first of its writers. What is Trieste but the city of Joyce and Svevo and Claudio Magris, nursing espressos in the cavernous Caffe degli Specchi while the icy bora whistles in from the Adriatic? In Prague, one senses the presence of Kafka, even now amidst the stuporous stag parties.“Prague,” wrote Kafka at his most bilious, “doesn’t let go. This old crone has claws.” Like a lot of writers, his relationship with the city which nurtured him was ambivalent.
Nobody to my mind has caught the anarchic tumultuousness of New York better than EB White. It is a city, he said, “peculiarly constructed to absorb almost anything that comes along.” White loved it and loathed it and eventually left it. Edinburgh, too, has its fair share of writers who have written its epitaph.
After weather like last week’s, Robert Louis Stevenson’s remark about it having “one of the vilest climates under heaven” seems particularly near the knuckle. Crossing the Meadows en route for the Grassmarket, I am following in the purposeful footsteps of Jean Brodie and her cultish crème de la crème chanting “Edinburgh, Leith, Portobello, Musselburgh and Dalkeith.”
In Milne’s and The Abbotsford and other fuggy Rose Street howffs there is the shade of Norman MacCaig, fag in one hand, large malt in the other. By the time I found Edinburgh, its trams had gone but a line in a MacCaig poem about them lowering themselves down the elbow of the Mound “like bugs on a branch” means they will run forever in my mind.
Edinburgh: A Literary Haven
As those who are proposing that Unesco makes Edinburgh the first World City of Literature point out, no other city is quite so conspicuously literary. Where else is there a main railway station named after a novel? What other capital city boasts a memorial to a writer as vertiginous as the Scott Monument? None is the answer.
In his heyday, Scott bestrode Europe like a Napoleon of letters. His novels, initially written anonymously in a house overlooking Charlotte Square, now the official residence of the Edinburgh International Book Festival, enjoyed both critical and commercial success. Everybody loved Scott, from illiterate shepherds to obese kings. Byron acknowledged his genius, as did Goethe, Wordsworth, Balzac and Jane Austen. Single-handedly, he made Scotland hip. No self-respecting 19th-century backpacker would be without their copy of Heart Of Midlothian or The Bride Of Lammermoor. But that is history.
The document which will be sent to Unesco in October making Edinburgh's case for World City of Literature status will accentuate the positives of the present. And in many respects, it is compelling. For the first time in many decades, the capital has a literary community the like of which it has not seen since Victorian times. Ian Rankin, Alexander McCall Smith and JK Rowling may be the most obvious names, but there are many others.
Publishing, which for so long has been in the doldrums, is showing signs of revival, particularly at Canongate, which won the Booker Prize with Yann Martel’s Life Of Pi, and Birlinn, whose faith in McCall Smith has been amply rewarded. Recently, Penguin and Hodder Headline opened offices in Edinburgh. This year the Edinburgh International Book Festival is celebrating its 21st anniversary with over 500 authors in 650 events shoe-horned into two frantic weeks. So successful has it become that there is now a fringe book festival, expressly featuring writers not on the main program. Its inspiration, Tessa Ransford, who also founded the Scottish Poetry Library, was amazed by the deluge of requests to appear.
Halfway up the Royal Mile, at Sandeman House, is the Scottish Book Trust, next door to the Netherbow which will soon metamorphose into the Scottish Storytelling Centre. On the surface, then, it is all very encouraging. But it would be wrong to assume that everything is hunky-dory. Indeed one of the key motives behind the Edinburgh bid to become a World City of Literature was the widely perceived mistreatment of literature by the Scottish Executive, which in 2000 omitted any mention of books and literature from its cultural review Creating Our Future – Minding Our Past.
The Challenges Faced
Moreover, literature is by far the poorest funded of all the art forms by the Scottish Arts Council. Out of a total budget of £60 million, it receives just £2m, of which, for example, a "client" such as the Edinburgh International Book Festival gets £132,000.
This does not suggest, even in an organization charged with nurturing it like the SAC, one of the many sponsors of the Edinburgh bid, literature is high on the agenda of national cultural priorities, let alone an indication that it is cherished as one of our stellar achievements. The scale of the difficulty in redressing the balance may be gauged by the fact that James Boyle, formerly chairman of the SAC, is fronting the Edinburgh bid with Jenny Brown, formerly literature director of the SAC, its project manager.
There is no hint of this, of course, in the brochure that outlines why Edinburgh should be the inaugural World City of Literature. With the Scottish capital as a model, "the idea is to create an inspirational, non-competitive title to be endowed by Unesco on those cities that aspire to celebrate and extend their literary culture. A 'world city of literature' is one that has a significant and influential literary history, a contemporary literary culture of international renown and whose agencies pledge to create literary legacies for the future. In creating, by example, this new cultural title in Unesco, Edinburgh would be the first recipient, representing Scotland as a whole."
All of which is doubtless well-meaning, even noble, especially the altruistic use of the indefinite article, but one wonders how such a pledge will be delivered when many of the agencies who have signed it, including the Scottish Arts Council, the Scottish Executive, and the City of Edinburgh Council, have in the past hardly been champions of literature. Edinburgh – "a city of stories" – is also a city whose recent history of neglect of books and literature has been painful to observe.
Hotels in Edinburgh: A Perfect Retreat for Booklovers
While the literary scene in Edinburgh continues to grow and strive for recognition as a World City of Literature, visitors to the city can immerse themselves in its rich literary heritage by staying at one of the many book-themed hotels scattered throughout the city.
1. The Printing Press
The Printing Press is a boutique hotel located in the heart of Edinburgh's literary district. The hotel is housed in a historic building that once served as the home of a renowned publishing house. Each room is elegantly decorated, with bookshelves filled with classic works of literature. Guests can enjoy afternoon tea in the hotel's library, surrounded by floor-to-ceiling bookcases and cozy reading nooks.
2. The Balmoral
The Balmoral is a luxury hotel that pays homage to Edinburgh's literary greats. The hotel's J.K. Rowling Suite is named after the famous author who wrote parts of the Harry Potter series in the hotel's elegant surroundings. The suite is adorned with artwork and memorabilia inspired by the books, providing a magical experience for Potter fans.
3. The Radisson Collection Hotel, Royal Mile Edinburgh
The Radisson Collection Hotel on the Royal Mile embraces the city's literary heritage with its Writer's Museum Suite. The suite is dedicated to Scotland's literary figures, featuring quotes and artwork from renowned authors. Guests can feel inspired as they relax in the sophisticated surroundings of the suite.
These are just a few examples of the hotels in Edinburgh that offer a literary experience to visitors. As the city continues to establish itself as a World City of Literature, these hotels provide a perfect retreat for book lovers seeking to immerse themselves in Edinburgh's rich literary history.