Salman Rushdie, Anthony Gormley and the Wombles are preparing to descend on Wimbledon for the town’s annual literary festival.
Wimbledon Bookfest kicks off on Saturday, and has attracted its biggest names yet for a week of readings, discussions, performances and activities.
The author of Midnight’s Children and the Satanic Verses will be grilled by journalist James Naughtie in one of the festival highlights - while Gormley, the artist behind the Angel of the North and Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth project, will appear at the Wimbledon College of Art.
Other writers set to appear include Lynda La Plante, Will Hutton, Tracy Chevalier, Penny Vincenzi, Tony Parsons and local author Clive Whichelow - alongside dozens more.
Television presenters and food experts Olly Smith and Jay Rayner will present a wine and cheese tasting event for budding gourmets, and historian Peter Snow will tell the story of the battle of Waterloo.
Children’s writer Michael Morpurgo will discuss his new book The Butterfly Lion, in a special event at St Mark’s Church to raise cash for wildlife charity the Born Free Foundation.
A tent will be put up on Wimbledon Common’s war memorial for the last three days of the festival to host an appearance by children’s author Michelle Magorian and Wimbledon’s own Wombles.
It will also host the Rushdie event and the festival’s first comedy night, to be headlined by stand-up Milton Jones.
The festival will launch on Saturday with live music in Wimbledon town centre. Later that day New Wimbledon Theatre’s youth group will perform the winning entry from the festival’s script writing programme.
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