Latest news with #JennyNiven
Scotsman
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
Edinburgh book festival: No Baillie Gifford funds puts community work 'at risk'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... 'Powerful' loss-making community work by the Edinburgh International Book Festival (EIBF) is at risk if a new sponsor cannot be found to replace Baillie Gifford, the director of the event has warned. Jenny Niven told The Scotsman work was ongoing to secure funding for the festival. She said work such as recorded events being beamed to libraries around Scotland - as well as the children's books programme at the festival itself - could not be funded indefinitely without more financial support. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Ms Niven also warned of a 'literacy crisis' among Scottish school children and said without more funding, some initiatives to help get children into reading could have to be halted. Last year, the festival was forced to end its partnership with Baillie Gifford, warning it was no longer able to deliver a 'safe and successful' event amid 'threats of disruption'. Climate activist Greta Thunberg had cancelled an event a year earlier over the Edinburgh-based financial firm's fossil fuel investments. Notable celebrities at the book festival Ms Niven's comments come as the EIBF launched its programme for this year's festival at its new home at the Futures Institute. Scottish authors Irvine Welsh and Maggie O'Farrell are to join Heartstopper writer Alice Oseman, as well as former first minister Nicola Sturgeon, at this year's festival. Outlander star Sam Heughan will also give a cocktail class to promote his new book of cocktail recipes, while actors Brian Cox, Viggo Mortensen and Vanessa Redgrave will take part in events. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The festival today unveils its full programme, which is based around the theme of Repair, seeking to explore things which feel broken, and looking at how they could be fixed – from the physical to the political, the emotional to the environmental, and beyond. Why community work is important Ms Niven said: 'Our community work is so powerful - the stuff we do for children and young people, but particularly those elements, they don't generate income. The community [work] runs at a high cost, and if you look at the amount of cuts going into other third-sector organisations, the operational costs are high. 'Because if organisations like the Streetreads Library [organisation to support book access for homeless people] are on their knees, then for us to just to be able to run the same same type of programme is difficult. Even to maintain a standstill - it is not a standstill when there's all so many other cuts going on, particularly in the third sector.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad When asked if that work was at risk if more funding was not found to replace the money lost from Baillie Gifford's sponsorship, Ms Niven said simply: 'Yes.' She added: 'It's a question of ambition. You can see in the programme all of the different directions that we would like to go and what we could do, and the many more people that we could reach.' Author Ian Rankin's John Rebus Ltd company is understood to be funding a small part of the Communities Programme this year in a deal which is expected to last five years. The Book Festival supports year-round access to reading through its communities programme, which connects authors and artists with places across Scotland who might not otherwise have access to cultural experiences. Meanwhile, organisers said they would this year livestream over 100 festival events to libraries across 12 Scottish local authorities. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Ms Niven pointed to the 'heavily subsidised' programme for children and young people. A typical paid-for ticket for a children's show costs just £6, while many tickets and books are given away free to school groups, after Scottish schools return in mid-August. Jenny Niven, director of the Edinburgh International Book Festival. | EIBF 'That work is really important to us, but it gets more and more expensive every day - that's not covered in our costs,' she said. 'So it depends on what type of festival people want to have. If it's only designed for people who can afford to pay top dollar, high-price tickets, then you're presenting a very different offer than if it is inclusive and reaching all these different communities. I know what sort of organisation I want to run.' A literacy crisis Ms Niven warned a crisis among young people was resulting in not only falling literacy rates, but a change in how children see the world. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad She said: 'Significantly, it is not just about literacy, but it's about empathy. It's about looking out the way. It's about engaging with people's lives who are not like your own. It's about reading books from other countries and expanding your horizons and all of that, I think, is a really important set of benefits you get from reading.' Earlier this year, US president Donald Trump criticised his State Department's 'radical' sponsorship of the book festival, attacking the event for its promotion of discussion on 'gender identity and racial equality'. Funding of $39,652 (£31,000) granted under the Joe Biden administration supported the Transatlantic Conversations programme at the 2023 festival, which featured nine American authors. No funding has been forthcoming from the US State Department this year. Ms Niven said she had been 'a bit taken aback' over the surprise the festival had received support from the US government. This year's festival features authors from Norway, Korea, France, Germany and Spain, all sponsored by their respective embassies and consulates. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad She said: 'Now, we are now no longer in receipt of US support, which makes a difference and that's to the detriment. There are amazing US artists and writers who it's vital that we hear from, and not being able to work with them directly would be a travesty. So we will, of course, look for other funding to replace that US government money, but it won't stop us.' Funding sources for the festival The People's Postcode Lottery has a long-term partnership to support elements of the festival's communities programme, which Ms Niven said 'we could not work without'. The festival was given a multi-year funding package from Creative Scotland earlier this year. However, Ms Niven said it was 'not 100 per cent of what we asked for', forcing the festival to continue to fundraise 'from a range of sources'. 'We're really pleased to have their partnership, but we need to keep looking at corporate sponsorship,' she said. 'That's obviously undergone a huge amount of change in the last ten years, specifically with us, so we've got continued work to do there. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'For funding at the moment, it's the same ones we've always looked at: philanthropic, corporate, public funding, ticketing. It's a heady mix of all those different things, and each one of them, for different reasons, are under pressure one way or another.'
Edinburgh Reporter
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Edinburgh Reporter
The Edinburgh International Book Festival – small changes this year
The Edinburgh International Book Festival (EIBF) 2025 will be held at the Edinburgh Futures Institute on Lauriston Place where the festival has now made its home. Jenny Niven Director and CEO said they are comfortable in the still relatively new space but are making a couple of changes to improve the event even more. The entrance will this year be placed on the corner of the site nearest to Middle Meadow Walk rather than opposite the back door. This will allow full use of the space at the back of the Institute where there will be tents and more catering outlets along with the Spiegeltent where all sorts of magical events take place. A new box office will be positioned outside the site on Middle Meadow Walk to open the festival up even more to everyone. The site is free to access but tickets will be needed for most events – with a range of offers including some £5 tickets. A great deal of the programme is as usual wide and varied and designed to stimulate conversation in the tents and the gardens. But there are a few new elements. There is a new strand for Young Adults (meaning 30 and under) with romantasy, sci-fi, horror, health, food and wellness all given room in the programme. There will be a new Kids Zone on Lauriston Place in a safe hub between two of the former hospital wards and there will be more than 100 events for children – with a retrospective featuring author Jacqueline Wilson who gave her name to the girls magazine Jackie all those years ago. Cressida Cowell of How to Train Your Dragon fame is sure to be a popular event. In the Spiegeltent there will be a wide variety of poetry, spoken word and music events all performed live. The popular Table Talk series which began last year will return with more chefs and food writers to the fore – but also events involving eating – a supper with Rosie Kellett, Have Lunch with Spaniard José Pizarro, Brazilian cuisine with Ixta Belfrage and Palestinian food writer Sami Tamimi. And if none of that grabs you, there will be a fermenting workshop… Paul French will be in Edinburgh to talk about his book on Wallis Simpson who had an 'amazingly riotous' couple of years in China in the 1920s. The programme will be online here for you to peruse before tickets go on sale- and copies will be available at many outlets in the city from 10 June. We will bring you more details when we get our hands on an actual copy rather than the pdf. © 2024 Martin McAdam Repair The theme this year is Repair with a list of international writers and performers that we have come to expect at the book festival with 700 events from 9 to 24 August. This idea will encourage audiences to explore the many things in the world which feel broken and how they might be fixed. There will be a wide range of active opportunities to rebalance and 'restore a sense of calm in the face of a world in chaos' through listening to talks and being encouraged to read the works of some of the many authors. Jenny Niven said: 'At a time when important conversations can feel impossible to have without igniting conflict and anger, we want the Edinburgh International Book Festival to provide a safe place for challenging but considered discussions. This year our programme features over 600 writers and artists from 35 countries who have a wide range of perspectives on topics of personal, social and global importance. We invite you to come and learn something new, feed your curiosity and to broaden your horizons.' She continued: 'We're hoping that we can present new writers and thinkers who are offering solutions and new ideas and great analysis that moves the conversation forward. And Repair is a very expansive idea. It's really fun when you talk to creative people about this idea, because everybody comes at it from all these different angles. So we're repairing in lots of ways. 'We're starting off with our Repair Gala, which is on Saturday the 10th, our opening day, and we've commissioned five different writers to think about the idea of Repair from whatever perspective they want. It's an amazing lineup, and as you can see, we're going for the really international sweep.' The organisers hope to provide a memorable and engaging experience for everyone and the focus will be on making the festival accessible, inclusive, and relevant to a diverse audience. The festival claims that literacy is decreasing in the UK and the Communities programme will stream more than 100 events to libraries in 12 Scottish local authority areas this year as one way of expanding the festival's reach. Big Names Irvine Welsh, Val McDermid, Nicola Sturgeon, Diane Abbott, Maggie O'Farrell, R F Kuang, Asako Yuzuki, Ash Sarkar, actor Brian Cox, Ruth Jones, Adam Buxton, Viggo Mortensen and Vanessa Redgrave are all in the programme. Joe Boyd credited with producing Dylan and who 'electrified' him at the Newport Folk Festival will tell some tales of the people he has worked with. Local names Music from Edinburgh's own Hamish Hawk will reinterpret the work of Ivor Cutler. Devi Sridhar from the University of Edinburgh who became such a well-known voice during the pandemic will talk about Health for All and explain the key to a longer, healthier life based on her book How Not To Die (Too Soon). Rock the Boat is the monthly stand up night from Push the Boat Out Festival and Loud Poets, the nationwide programme bringing together younger poets competing in poetry slams are also listed. Credit Thomas Heatherwick The Front List and tickets The Festival Front List has been on sale for some time with all events taking place at the nearby McEwan Hall in a collaboration with Underbelly. Tickets for those events have sold well and now the main events will go on sale to members of the public on 21 June. If you become a Friend of the Festival then there are advance booking privileges and a Festival coffee gathering as well as a Christmas event. Details here. There are specially priced tickets for the Under 30s and other events priced at £5 for those on low-income benefits. FUNDING The question of funding the book festival still looms large even a year after the EIBF ended their 20 year partnership with Bailie Gifford which funded much of the programme and particularly the schools events. In 2024 Ms Niven said that the goal of the board and management was to deliver an event which was safe and successful for audiences, authors and staff. Some authors had threatened to withdraw if the relationship with the Edinburgh based investment fund did not end. Despite the fact that Bailie Gifford explained their investment in large companies such as Amazon, NVIDIA and Meta, fossil fuels or The Occupied Palestinian Territories had been misrepresented. Nick Thomas, partner, Baillie Gifford, said in May 2024: 'Our collaboration with the Edinburgh International Book Festival, spanning decades, was rooted in our shared interest in making Edinburgh a thriving and culturally vibrant place to live and work. In recent years we have been proud to support the Schools' and Children's programmes, providing free books and creating opportunities for young readers to meet authors. 'The activists' anonymous campaign of coercion and misinformation has put intolerable pressure on authors and the festival community. We step back with the hope that the festival will thrive this year and into the future. We hold the activists squarely responsible for the inhibiting effect their action will have on funding for the arts in this country. This year the festival is dependent on many different sources including the sponsorship from the People's Postcode Lottery which has an HQ in Charlotte Square. Tickets go on sale to the general public on 21 June. © 2024 Martin McAdam Like this: Like Related
Scotsman
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
Edinburgh book festival: No Baillie Gifford funds puts community work 'at risk'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... 'Powerful' loss-making community work by the Edinburgh International Book Festival (EIBF) is at risk if a new sponsor cannot be found to replace Baillie Gifford, the director of the event has warned. Jenny Niven told The Scotsman work was ongoing to secure funding for the festival. She said work such as recorded events being beamed to libraries around Scotland - as well as the children's books programme at the festival itself - could not be funded indefinitely without more financial support. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Ms Niven also warned of a 'literacy crisis' among Scottish school children and said without more funding, some initiatives to help get children into reading could have to be halted. Last year, the festival was forced to end its partnership with Baillie Gifford, warning it was no longer able to deliver a 'safe and successful' event amid 'threats of disruption'. Climate activist Greta Thunberg had cancelled an event a year earlier over the Edinburgh-based financial firm's fossil fuel investments. Notable celebrities at the book festival Ms Niven's comments come as the EIBF launched its programme for this year's festival at its new home at the Futures Institute. Scottish authors Irvine Welsh and Maggie O'Farrell are to join Heartstopper writer Alice Oseman, as well as former first minister Nicola Sturgeon, at this year's festival. Outlander star Sam Heughan will also give a cocktail class to promote his new book of cocktail recipes, while actors Brian Cox, Viggo Mortensen and Vanessa Redgrave will take part in events. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The festival today unveils its full programme, which is based around the theme of Repair, seeking to explore things which feel broken, and looking at how they could be fixed – from the physical to the political, the emotional to the environmental, and beyond. Why community work is important Ms Niven said: 'Our community work is so powerful - the stuff we do for children and young people, but particularly those elements, they don't generate income. The community [work] runs at a high cost, and if you look at the amount of cuts going into other third-sector organisations, the operational costs are high. 'Because if organisations like the Streetreads Library [organisation to support book access for homeless people] are on their knees, then for us to just to be able to run the same same type of programme is difficult. Even to maintain a standstill - it is not a standstill when there's all so many other cuts going on, particularly in the third sector.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad When asked if that work was at risk if more funding was not found to replace the money lost from Baillie Gifford's sponsorship, Ms Niven said simply: 'Yes.' She added: 'It's a question of ambition. You can see in the programme all of the different directions that we would like to go and what we could do, and the many more people that we could reach.' The Book Festival supports year-round access to reading through its communities programme, which connects authors and artists with places across Scotland who might not otherwise have access to cultural experiences. Meanwhile, organisers said they would this year livestream over 100 festival events to libraries across 12 Scottish local authorities. Ms Niven pointed to the 'heavily subsidised' programme for children and young people. A typical paid-for ticket for a children's show costs just £6, while many tickets and books are given away free to school groups, after Scottish schools return in mid-August. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Jenny Niven, director of the Edinburgh International Book Festival. | EIBF 'That work is really important to us, but it gets more and more expensive every day - that's not covered in our costs,' she said. 'So it depends on what type of festival people want to have. If it's only designed for people who can afford to pay top dollar, high-price tickets, then you're presenting a very different offer than if it is inclusive and reaching all these different communities. I know what sort of organisation I want to run.' A literacy crisis Ms Niven warned a crisis among young people was resulting in not only falling literacy rates, but a change in how children see the world. She said: 'Significantly, it is not just about literacy, but it's about empathy. It's about looking out the way. It's about engaging with people's lives who are not like your own. It's about reading books from other countries and expanding your horizons and all of that, I think, is a really important set of benefits you get from reading.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Earlier this year, US president Donald Trump criticised his State Department's 'radical' sponsorship of the book festival, attacking the event for its promotion of discussion on 'gender identity and racial equality'. Funding of $39,652 (£31,000) granted under the Joe Biden administration supported the Transatlantic Conversations programme at the 2023 festival, which featured nine American authors. No funding has been forthcoming from the US State Department this year. Ms Niven said she had been 'a bit taken aback' over the surprise the festival had received support from the US government. This year's festival features authors from Norway, Korea, France, Germany and Spain, all sponsored by their respective embassies and consulates. She said: 'Now, we are now no longer in receipt of US support, which makes a difference and that's to the detriment. There are amazing US artists and writers who it's vital that we hear from, and not being able to work with them directly would be a travesty. So we will, of course, look for other funding to replace that US government money, but it won't stop us.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Funding sources for the festival The People's Postcode Lottery has a long-term partnership to support elements of the festival's communities programme, which Ms Niven said 'we could not work without'. The festival was given a multi-year funding package from Creative Scotland earlier this year. However, Ms Niven said it was 'not 100 per cent of what we asked for', forcing the festival to continue to fundraise 'from a range of sources'. 'We're really pleased to have their partnership, but we need to keep looking at corporate sponsorship,' she said. 'That's obviously undergone a huge amount of change in the last ten years, specifically with us, so we've got continued work to do there. 'For funding at the moment, it's the same ones we've always looked at: philanthropic, corporate, public funding, ticketing. It's a heady mix of all those different things, and each one of them, for different reasons, are under pressure one way or another.'
