schmiggens
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Registered: Apr 2003
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Rowling backs capital's bid to be city of literature
THE woman who has made Edinburgh synonymous with witchcraft and wizardry has thrown her weight behind the city’s attempt to become a global capital of literature.
Organisers of the bid to be named UNESCO’s first "World City of Literature" had been cautious about invoking JK Rowling’s name. But yesterday she gave her unqualified and public backing for the first time. "It’s impossible to live in Edinburgh without sensing its literary heritage everywhere," she said.
"It seems eminently sensible to me to recognise this, along with the contemporary literary life here, with a permanent title that can inspire and inform other places around the world."
Three other authors who have defined literary perceptions of Edinburgh - Dame Muriel Spark, Inspector Rebus author Ian Rankin, and Alexander McCall Smith - also voiced their backing for the UNESCO bid yesterday.
Dame Muriel, who wrote The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie more than 40 years ago, said: "The Edinburgh of my youth was always, by tradition, considered the home of reason, tolerance, enlightenment and literature. This feeling persists. Edinburgh is a city of books and learning, open to all knowledge."
In October, Edinburgh is to make a formal case to UNESCO for the title, seen as an important vehicle for securing a modern literary reputation for a city that fostered the likes of Robert Louis Stevenson and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The bid has met a certain amount of carping in the London-based press, from writers or commentators arguing for Dublin, London or Oxford.
But the ringing endorsements from JK Rowling and Dame Muriel will help Edinburgh’s cause, one credited with bringing hundreds of millions of children world-wide to her books and the other a self-described exile, will surely make the case much easier to make.
Ms Rowling said: "Edinburgh has been my home since 1994. It was the place that Harry Potter took shape; as has been well-documented, I used to sit in the Old Town’s cafés scribbling as my young daughter slept in her pushchair next to me.
"And I nervously posted off the manuscript for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone from a post box in Leith.
"All the books in the series so far have been created largely in Edinburgh. My base in Scotland has given me many advantages and inspirations as the series has developed, and as I’ve found myself more and more in the public eye."
Mr Rankin, who sits on the committee leading the bid, said: "Edinburgh remains a city of the mind - a writer’s city."
Alexander McCall Smith, author of the Precious Ramotswe novels, said: "I am delighted that the literary associations of this city might be internationally recognised in this way. Outside interest in Scottish literature is at as high a level as it ever has been."
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08-25-2004 06:21 AM
