SnitchSeeker.com - JK in Edinburgh bid for 'World City of Literature'

http://www.snitchseeker.com/images/news/jkr_80.jpg Authors write on for World City bid - JKR backs Edinburgh's Bid

Summary:
Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling has thrown her weight behind Edinburgh’s bid to become the first World City of Literature.

Article:

Edinburgh Evening News

Quote:

SOME of the Capital’s best-known authors have thrown their weight behind Edinburgh’s bid to become the first World City of Literature.*

Harry Potter author JK Rowling, Inspector Rebus creator Ian Rankin and Alexander McCall Smith, author of the best-selling No1 Ladies’ Detective Agency novels, have all given the proposal their backing.*

The project would see Edinburgh become the inaugural World City of Literature.*

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The Capital would act as a model for other cities around the world to celebrate their own literature and writers. The city’s bid is to be formally handed over to Unesco in October and a decision on its success or failure is expected next year.*

At its heart will be celebrated figures from Edinburgh’s literary past, including Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. And the backing of some of the best-selling contemporary authors in the world will lend further weight to the proposal.*

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JK Rowling, who has lived in Edinburgh since 1994, wrote the first of the best-selling Harry Potter novels in Old Town cafes and mailed the manuscript to publishers from a postbox in Leith.*

She said the city had provided her with inspiration and believed its literary importance deserved to be recognised.*

"All the books in the series so far have been created largely in Edinburgh," she said.*

"I have personal reasons for finding the city creatively inspirational. But it’s also impossible to live in Edinburgh without sensing its literary heritage everywhere.*

"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."

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Unesco officials have already visited the city and a dossier has been prepared outlining the city’s commitments.*

Landing the prestigious recognition from Unesco is thought to be worth about £2.2 million a year to the Capital in extra business.

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Source: Edinburgh Evening News via Wizard News.