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The 25th Wigtown Book Festival takes place in late September 2023 and we are looking for a Guest Festival Programmer to design and deliver an outstanding 10-day event to mark the occasion.

Apply now to join the team and add your name to one of the UK's most vibrant and prestigious book festivals.

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Featured content

The Big DoG Schools' Tour

7 Oct 2022
This November, Big DoG will be hitting the road for the first time, bringing authors and storytellers to schools across the region.
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Reading Teachers = Reading Pupils 2022-23

14 Jul 2022
Wigtown Festival Company is delighted to be working with Cheltenham Festivals in delivering the Festivals’ network of teacher book groups in Dumfries & Galloway.
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Compass 2022: Mentoring for writers in Dumfries & Galloway

10 Oct 2022
Develop your work with the help of professional advice and support through Wigtown Festival Company’s mentoring programme for D&G writers
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Anne Brown Essay Prize

27 Sep 2022
Today sees the launch of the 2022 Anne Brown Essay Prize for Scotland, run by Wigtown Book Festival in partnership with The Herald.
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The Bequest

Dani Garavelli

27 Sep 2021
In 2021, we launched the Anne Brown Essay Prize for Scotland. Dani Garavelli's beautiful reflection on her Italian-Scottish childhood was a worthy winner.
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The James Mirrlees Lecture

Lord Martin Rees

26 Sep 2022
Described as one of Scotland’s greatest minds of the past century, Sir James Mirrlees was the son of a bank teller from the Galloway village of Minnigaff. He went on to win the 1996 Nobel Prize for economics.
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A Dairy Story

Wilma and Dave Finlay

22 Sep 2022
Wilma and David Finlay are remarkable – creating the famous Cream o’ Galloway ice cream brand and pioneering a new, kinder approach to dairy farming which avoids calves being separated from their mothers shortly after birth. Their campaign to improve animal welfare has reached a new urgency after Wilma was diagnosed with lung cancer. They will launch a book about their lives, A Dairy Story, at Wigtown Book Festival.
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True Heretic

Willie Neill

5 Sep 2022
Willie Neill is widely thought of as southern Scotland’s most outstanding poet since Burns. To mark his centenary two of the region’s poets, Hugh McMillan and Stuart Paterson, edited The Leaves of the Years – an anthology of writing inspired by Neill’s words.
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Taking a Bow with the Scottish Fiddle Orchestra

1 Sep 2022
For the first time in a decade the fabulous players of the Scottish Fiddle Orchestra (SFO) will be back in Wigtown. It’s a place that has considerable significance in the origins of what has become an important and much-loved musical institution.
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The Horizontal Oak

Polly Pullar

24 Aug 2022
Polly Pullar is a much-loved and respected author and journalist, with a deep love for the wildlife and countryside of Scotland. Her latest book, The Horizontal Oak, follows a different path to her previous nine nature journals and tales of the Scottish countryside.
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The Passengers

Will Ashon

24 Aug 2022
Will Ashon’s book The Passengers offers a glimpse into the hearts and minds of people across the British Isles (including Dumfries and Galloway!). From October 2018 to March 2021 he spoke to more than 100 people by phone, in person or online.
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Truth Be Told

Sue Divin

5 Sep 2022
Joining the Wigtown Book Festival’s YA programme, Derry-based writer Sue Divin tells us about her fast-paced novel Truth Be Told.
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Browse Our 2022 Festival Titles

Looking for your next read? Our online bookshop stocks all the titles from our 2022 festival, including bestsellers and local authors, memoirs, poetry collections and history books, among many more.

We can also order any new title we don't stock to have delivered to your door. Each sale helps support the work of Wigtown Book Festival.

Browse our 2022 Titles
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Wigtown: Scotland's National Book Town. Road signage on a grassy verge
Scotland's Book Town

A community regenerated by books

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A browser outside The Bookshop on Wigtown's main street
Wigtown's bookshops

More than a dozen to explore

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A panel event during Wigtown Book Festival
History of the festival

Two decades of literary celebration

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