What Works: Success in Stressful Times

The story, though, offers a lesson for anyone wanting to run an arts event.

There is a television festival.8 In 2003, a video games festival joined the clutch;9 Scotland is one of the key world centres for creating new video games.10 There is the Mela,11 a celebration of life in the Indian sub-continent, run by Edinburgh’s Asian community. In 2004 the city added a visual art festival for the first time,12

There is the original arts festival,3 organized like so many others by the city authorities. There is a jazz and blues festival,4 Europe’s largest, bringing in groups from all over the world. There is the book fair,5 the largest of its kind on the planet. There is a film festival,6 the longest continually running one in the world,

There are more shows, more world premieres, more tickets, more new talent, more critics, more media moguls, more authors and playwrights-in short more talent on display-than at any other arts festival anywhere. What have Rupert Murdoch, Billy Connolly and J. K. Rowling got in common? They have all, in one way or another, appeared on a stage in Edinburgh in August.1

What have Rupert Murdoch, Billy Connolly and J. K. Rowling got in common? They have all, in one way or another, appeared on a stage in Edinburgh in August.1

As the International Festival guide puts it: ‘There is no place on earth like Edinburgh in August.’

There are more shows, more world premieres, more tickets, more new talent, more critics, more media moguls, more authors and playwrights-in short more talent on display-than at any other arts festival anywhere.

Nothing, but nothing, prepares the first-time visitor for the scale of what is on offer.

The UK and Ireland

While every single example here is one of something that has been successful, every single story in some way encompasses threats that must be overcome or flaws that must be fixed.