West Port Book Festival

[1] Initially it took place in August during the busy Edinburgh Festival season, but later it was held at different times in the year.

Although the West Port Book Festival received some coverage claiming it was a formal rival to the much larger Edinburgh International Book Festival, the organisers stated that it was designed to complement rather than to challenge its much more famous cousin.

[5] The first festival included some well known Scottish writers, as well as up and coming authors from around the world, including Ali Smith, Ian Rankin, Douglas Dunn, A. L. Kennedy, Kapka Kassabova, Ronan Sheehan, Rajorshi Chakraborti, Dilys Rose, Dean Parkin, Robert Alan Jamieson, Owen Dudley Edwards, and many others.

[6] As well as featuring poets John Hegley, Tim Turnbull, Jack Underwood, Douglas Dunn and 2009 Forward Poetry Prize nominee J. O. Morgan, novelists Alan Bissett, Eleanor Thom, Elaine di Rollo, Mike Stocks and Gregory Norminton, the 2009 festival also featured a Celtic contingent in the form of Gaelic novelist, poet and actor Angus Peter Campbell and a group of celebrated Irish writers with translations of bawdy poet Catullus, events highlighting unusual non-fiction and magic, and played host to the world's first literary twestival.

[7][8][9] In this edition two Spanish poets, Jesús Ge and Rocío Ovalle, also participated, with their event "The Word Whirling".