Introduction
Sometimes people ask us why we started the West Port Book Festival. The short answer is because it seemed like such an obvious idea. West Port has some great bookshops, a sense of community (and shared adversity thanks to collapsing buildings, dug up pavements, roving Neanderthals etc. etc.) and an amusing community of bibliophiles. The stage was set.
I’d also misspent many hours of my youth working in Shakespeare and Company in Paris and Atlantis Books on the Island of Santorini and had become used to equating bookshops with events that ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous, or perhaps merely the inept. Just after I left, S&C had also started their own Literary Festival and I’d watched in admiration as Sylvia had made this into something vibrant, innovative – and free.
Perhaps we – that is West Port – should run our own Book Festival. Why not? (a deadly question if approached rhetorically). I asked around at the bookshops and received a cautiously optimistic assent and then asked Peggy, who’d been thinking about starting her own Poetry Festival in any case. I imagine we were at a pub at the time for where else can you discuss improbable, if compelling ideas? Peggy was enthusiastic in a way that only Peggy can be, and that was it. The beginning.
It got a bit tougher after that.
Hannah Adcock
Director
N.B. Although we do exist, we don't have an office so you are best tracking us down online. We'll do our best to keep our website current and post news on Twitter and Facebook. Or simply email us at: info@westportbookfestival.org. The West Port booksellers are gracious, but not a font of all WPBF knowledge. Please contact us instead!
Us
Will Brady: design
Will is a freelance graphic designer, photographer and writer. It is thanks to him that people pick up our programmes and say, ‘Ooohh, these are lovely,’ their eyes lingering on the delicate use of white space, off-beat ink splot and seductively graceful design. Sometimes we think we should just frame a few programmes and be done with it. Will is currently available for art direction, design, typesetting and photography commissions.
willbrady.net
Andrew Neil: web developer
During the day Andrew is a mild-manned software engineer; at night, and sometimes at weekends, he masquerades as @nelstrom and plunges himself into the world of open-source innovation and social media technology. He straddles the art/geek divide, equally at home with creative flair and ruthless logic. Lately, he has been collecting Collective Nouns on Twitter, and encouraging people to Pass the Plot. He is also the best-dressed Edinburgh twit 09 and is the proud owner of a parrot (not alive).
drewneil.com
Colin Fraser: social media
Editor of Anon, the anonymous submissions poetry magazine, and co-founder of constrained fiction website confiction.org, Colin is a freelance writer, tutor and social media fellow, and is especially interested in the potential of Twitter for creative pursuits. As well as being the recent New Media Scotland twitterer-in-residence, he produces podcasts for various literary organisations - including StAnza, the Scottish Poetry Library and the Ullapool Book Festival. Some call him 'Beard'.
Kayleigh Bohan: general manager
A graduate of Edinburgh University, Kayleigh spent much of her time at university pottering around second-hand bookshops and being breathtakingly efficient on behalf of the West Port Book Festival. By day, Kayleigh works in church and bookings administration at the City of Edinburgh Methodist Church and reviews books for the Skinny; she is attempting to learn more about event organising, copywriting and all things bookish in capacities both paid and unpaid. Soon she might not get asked for ID in pubs.
Peggy Hughes: programme director
Peggy uses her communication powers and events muscles at the Scottish Poetry Library by day (and sometimes by evening and weekend too). When she's not there, she moonlights in many other masked guises: freelance reviewer for Scotland on Sunday and The List; literary blogger; co-editor of Anon poetry magazine; commissioning editor of The Poetry Paper; and PR operative to A L Kennedy. Peggy's spiritual home is second hand bookshops, and she's not as old as her name suggests.
Hannah Adcock: director
Hannah is a freelance journalist, author, copywriter, editor, events’ organiser and jack-of-all-trades bookish. She has written for a wide range of publications ranging from The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Herald to Practical Caravan (without owning a caravan) and The Oldie (without being old). She has also trained horses, published a survival guide for 20somethings and become irretrievably entangled in the booktrade. hannahadcock.co.uk
Agnieszka Gryczkowska: assistant manager
Agnieszka is a third year journalism student who spends far too much time being absorbed in surrealistic literature and art. She believes that since she left her home town-Krakow she has suffered from multiply personalities. The first Agnieszka is still 18, nonchalant and utterly hopeless if it comes to cleaning her room, because granny Alojza does it for her. Oh, wait a moment, granny’s not here… so she sits in her palace of chaos surrounded by notebooks, cups, ashtrays, and broken type-writers. The second Agnieszka is slightly older, slightly more mature and tries her hand at writing, music PR, photography, filmmaking and… night sewing, When the first personality decides to leave the Neverland she may become an art journalist.
Elizabeth Anderson: intern
With roots in at least six places in the United States, Elizabeth now finds herself at home in Edinburgh, far more conveniently located to continue her itinerant wanderings this side of the Atlantic. She has so far learned to speak Yorkshire, braved a flooded Danube on the dampest cycling tour of the decade and fallen ill in four countries. A penultimate year linguistics student, Elizabeth can usually be found wearing stylish headphones in the name of science, dodging buses in evening traffic and taking meticulous care of her new fringe. Elizabeth co-founded the Poetry and Cake Society in St Andrews and copyedits for the Virginia Tea Society. She is currently reading Milan Kundera and is feeling particularly weightless.
Nicola Hopper: intern
Nicola is a third year film, media and marketing student and when she’s not at university she spends too much time in the cinema and writing to-do lists. She was attracted to Edinburgh by all things Sean Connery and will only leave when an official bus tour and/or tourist attraction is set up in his honour. By the time she was 18 she had been to 15 countries in 4 continents. Not through lack of trying she’s never finished Ulysses or mastered the ukulele. Previous occupations include clown, puppeteer and the better half of a pantomime horse. At the moment she’s getting involved in as many of the festivities that Edinburgh offers as she can. In the future she’d like to work in the hard-hitting PR world in order to fund her addiction to Heinz tomato soup.
Michelle McCracken
Michelle graduated from the University of Glasgow in English Literature. She is currently in the fitting room of life trying on careers for size and looking to build a media wardrobe of PR, marketing, cultural festival and journalistic experience. As a life choice, she adheres strictly to Oscar Wilde's School of Bunburying by living two quite different lives in two quite different cities. She is so in love with Edinburgh of late, she feels she may be cheating on Glasgow. Michelle stimulates her bank account selling handbags at Radley and in her free time, immerses herself in The Day Life Movement (self-penned). Her text messages invariably reflect the writing style of her current read which is why she is steering clear of Frankie Boyle. Her greatest achievement to date is receiving a badge from The Stand for making a good joke.