The UK has an awful lot of municipal literary festivals. None of them are at all welcoming to speculative literature, unless they are specifically aimed at children. I have thought for a long time that there was a huge gap in the market here, and that some enterprising city ought to step up and found a new event that would cater to what is, after all, a huge market. Unfortunately this is one project that I haven’t had time to pursue, but I’m pleased to say that it has almost happened anyway. Almost.
Yes, the UK is still wallowing in prejudice, but the Irish have taken the lead. Take a look at WexWorlds. This is just the sort of thing that our genre needs – a full-blown literary festival being organized with the full cooperation of the local authorities. Entrance to most events is free. This has the potential to be as big as Imaginales and Finncon. Sadly the inaugural event conflicts with an event I’m supposed to attend in California after World Fantasy, but I’m hoping it goes well because I’m going to plan on being there next year.
And guess which hard-working fellow told me all about this, because he’s involved in organizing it? Hat tip: James Bacon.
Derby’s literary festival has been very pro genre for the past three years.
Farah:
Thanks, that’s good to know. Though the only web site I could find for it says it is only every 2 years and the next one will be in 2007. Do I have the right thing?
Yes you do.
But also: the Edinburgh book festival has been featuring genre writers for some years now. Ken MacLeod, and Iain Banks, and Niall Gaiman, and Ian Rankin spoke there last week.
The more I think about it, the more I think that your statement is probably out of date. The Cheltenham literary festival is run by (among others) Sarah LeFanu.
In which case Derby needs better web presence.
Agreed about Edinburgh. Also the thing on the South Bank earlier this year was quite promising.
This year’s Cheltenham program has a lot of S&SF, but it is almost all aimed at kids or in graphic novels. The closest they come to an adult session is Eoin Colfer’s new Hitchhiker book. Banks is there, but without his M.
Hay, Brighton, Bath? Bath has actually gone backwards. It used to have some SF&F stuff but now refuses to do so.
So sure, there’s a small amount of progress, but nothing compared to what Wexford has done.
Sarah LeFanu was involved in running Bath, but last year was her final year. Curious about them ‘refusing’ – who did they turn down?
Will email privately.
Perhaps those of us who go to someof these Lit. festivals need to start writing in afterwards with ‘loved the festival but was disappointed to see no speculative fiction, Sci Fi or Fantasy, will there be any next year?’ type comments.
I know at the Bath Festival earlier this year they did have questionaires to complete but they were more about advertising, booking and what we liked aboutthe specific events we attended – I don’t recall any question about what wasn’t there but should have been.
Marjorie:
It is worth a try, but I know from bitter experience elsewhere that changing attitudes in existing organizations is hard. There are plenty of cities around the UK. Sure there is one (perhaps once the recession is over) that would be willing to try what Wexford has done. If an all-spec-fic event proved to be a big success you can be sure that existing festivals would change their attitudes very quickly.