Book Festival begins a new chapter with change of chairman

VETERAN broadcaster Allan Little is to become the new chairman of the Edinburgh International Book Festival.

Little, who left the BBC last year after four decades as a foreign correspondent, will replace banker Susan Rice in October.

The Dumfriesshire-born journalist, who has been one of Scotland’s best-known broadcasting figures, has been a regular host of talks at the Book Festival in the past.

He said he was privileged and daunted to be joining the festival at a time when it is “scaling new heights in its ambition and reach”.

Ms Rice, former managing director of Lloyds Banking Group Scotland, has been chairwoman of the festival since 2001 and was one of the city’s most long-serving cultural figures.

She has also chaired the Edinterrogates inburgh Festivals Forum, which oversees the capital’s flagship cultural events, for the last seven years and launched the crucial Thundering Hooves 2.0 report, into the long-term future of the festivals, last month.

Mr Little said: “It is a privilege, if a daunting one, to follow Susan Rice as chair of this most cherished and globally-respected of festivals.

“It is through literature that human society confronts itself, itself know itself.

“I’m very proud to be associated with a festival that does so much to celebrate and explore the value and sheer joy of the written word.”

Book Festival director Nick Barley said: “Under Susan Rice’s exemplary guidance, the festival has enjoyed more than a decade of sustained achievement.”

This year’s event opens in Charlotte Square on 15 August.

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to Broadcaster Allan Little said the role would be a privilege