MAIN SPONSORS: from left, Kitson & Trotman’s Richard King and Jason Hodnett, Bridport Waterstones manager Mike Paine, BridLit director Tanya Bruce-Lockhart, Jack Wightman from Waterstones and Tracy Scammell from Kitson & Trotman.

 

West Dorset law firm Kitson & Trotman called into booksellers Waterstones this week to check out some of the authors speaking at this year’s Bridport Literary Festival.

Both companies are the main sponsors of the 15th annual festival, which runs from Sunday 3 November to Saturday 9 November.

BridLit director Tanya Bruce-Lockhart thanked Kitson & Trotman, which has offices in Beaminster, Bridport, Lyme Regis and Weymouth, and Waterstones for their continued support of the prestigious event.

“The week is shaping up to this year’s festival being better than ever before,” she said.

“Two thirds of our events have already sold out and we’re looking forward to welcoming audiences of all ages and tastes.

“We’re thrilled that Poet Laureate Simon Armitage has agree to be with us on Sunday 3 November, along with David Nicholls, author of One Day, Us and Sweet Sorrow, on Saturday 9 November, and writer and broadcaster Melvyn Bragg on Friday 8 November.”

Speakers include Philip Marsden, who sailed single-handed in a wooden boat from his home in Cornwall, up the west coast of Ireland, through the Hebrides to the Summer Isles, a small group of islands off Scotland’s north west coast. He’ll be speaking at the Electric Palace on Friday 8 November.

Travel writer Nicholas Jubber gives an illustrated talk at the Bull Hotel Ballroom on Monday 4 November about his journeys across Europe exploring the continent’s epic poems from The Odyssey and Beowulf to The Song of Roland and The Nibelungenlied.

There are still tickets available to see Eleanor Fitzsimons on Tuesday 5 November at The Bull Ballroom at 11.30am to hear her talk about the extraordinary life and loves of E Nesbitt, best known for The Railway Children and Five Children and It. A feminist with a complicated love life, Edith Nesbitt incorporated her avant garde ideas into her writing. She was a close friend of HG Wells. George Bernard Shaw was one of her many lovers.

Among the bestselling authors, esteemed nature writers and political hard hitters, including Steve Richards on Saturday 9 November talking about his book The Prime Ministers: Reflections on Leadership, there is a great line up of local writers at this year’s festival.

West Dorset’s Olivia Glazebrook will be talking to Sally Laverack about The Frank Business, her latest novel telling the story of the chaotic nature of relationships when pasts are unmasked. The event is at The Bull Ballroom on Wednesday 6 November.