Now the Edinburgh International Book Festival has ended its partnership with investment bank Baillie Gifford, following a similar decision taken by the Hay Book Festival. EIBF cited “intolerable pressure on the team and Baillie Gifford blamed a “campaign of coercion and misinformation” conducted by campaign group Fossil Free Books.
The EIBF said: “The board and management of Edinburgh International Book Festival believe their ability to deliver an event this August that is safe and successful for audiences, authors and staff has been severely compromised, following the withdrawal of several authors and threats of disruption from activists.”
Jenny Niven, CEO of Edinburgh International Book Festival, said: “It is with great regret that our board of trustees and Baillie Gifford have collectively agreed to end our partnership. We are hugely grateful to the firm for its considerable support over two decades, including through some challenging times for the festival, and we are proud of what we’ve achieved together during that time.
“The pressure on our team has simply become intolerable. We have a major global festival starting in 10 weeks’ time and we need to focus all of our efforts and energy on delivering a safe and successful event for our audiences.”
She told the Bookseller: “Undermining the long-term future of charitable organisations such as book festivals is not the right way to bring about change. It diminishes the voices of those who feel strongly about these complex issues, and it will be infinitely harder to build and sustain well-funded cultural institutions in the future than it is to put them out of business today.”