Word Power Books
   HOME





Word Power Books
Word Power Books is an independent radical bookshop and publisher based in Edinburgh, Scotland. They have published works by both established and lesser known writers in Scotland including James Kelman, Tom Leonard and National Collective. They also organise a regular Book Fringe festival during August and the annual Edinburgh Independent Radical Book Fair. History Word Power Books first opened in 1994 by Elaine Henry. in the 1980s Henry had worked in a feminist bookshop in Edinburgh named 'Womanzone'. After Womanzone closed in 1986 Henry felt there was still a need for a radical bookshop in Edinburgh and so began working towards establishing Word Power. The shop opened in November 1994, with a formal opening in December by Booker Prize winning novelist James Kelman. Since opening it has gained a reputation for supporting non-mainstream writers and ideas. In February 2017 Henry announced that she was stepping down "for personal reasons rather than the market" and was looking to s ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh had a population of in , making it the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, second-most populous city in Scotland and the List of cities in the United Kingdom, seventh-most populous in the United Kingdom. The Functional urban area, wider metropolitan area had a population of 912,490 in the same year. Recognised as the capital of Scotland since at least the 15th century, Edinburgh is the seat of the Scottish Government, the Scottish Parliament, the Courts of Scotland, highest courts in Scotland, and the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the official residence of the Monarchy of the United Kingdom, British monarch in Scotland. It is also the annual venue of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. The city has long been a cent ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Scotland
Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjacent Islands of Scotland, islands, principally in the archipelagos of the Hebrides and the Northern Isles. To the south-east, Scotland has its Anglo-Scottish border, only land border, which is long and shared with England; the country is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, the North Sea to the north-east and east, and the Irish Sea to the south. The population in 2022 was 5,439,842. Edinburgh is the capital and Glasgow is the most populous of the cities of Scotland. The Kingdom of Scotland emerged as an independent sovereign state in the 9th century. In 1603, James VI succeeded to the thrones of Kingdom of England, England and Kingdom of Ireland, Ireland, forming a personal union of the Union of the Crowns, three kingdo ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


James Kelman
James Kelman (born 9 June 1946) is a Scottish novelist, short story writer, playwright and essayist. His fiction and short stories feature accounts of internal mental processes of usually, but not exclusively, working class narrators and their labyrinthine struggles with authority or social interactions, mostly set in his home city of Glasgow. Frequently employing stream of consciousness experimentation, Kelman's stories typically feature "an atmosphere of gnarling paranoia, imprisoned minimalism, the boredom of survival." His novel '' A Disaffection'' was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction in 1989. Kelman won the 1994 Booker Prize with '' How Late It Was, How Late''. In 1998, Kelman was awarded the Glenfiddich Spirit of Scotland Award. His 2008 novel '' Kieron Smith, Boy'' won both of Scotland's principal literary awards: the Saltire Society's Book of the Year and the Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year. In 2024, Ke ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Tom Leonard (poet)
Thomas Anthony Leonard (22 August 1944 – 21 December 2018) was a Scottish poet, writer and critic. He was best known for his poems written in Glaswegian dialect, particularly his ''Six Glasgow Poems'' and ''The Six O'Clock News''. His work frequently dealt with the relationship between language, class and culture. Biography Leonard was born in Glasgow in 1944. His father was a train-driver who had moved to Scotland from Dublin in 1916. His mother, also of Irish descent, came from Saltcoats and had previously worked at the Nobel dynamite factory in Ardeer. Tom was the youngest of four children - he had two brothers and one sister. He commenced study on a degree at the University of Glasgow in 1967, but left after two years. While there, he encountered poets including Tom McGrath, Alan Spence, Aonghas MacNeacail and Philip Hobsbaum, and also acted as editor of the university magazine.
[...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




National Collective
National Collective was a political organisation self-described as an "open and non-party ..group of artists and creatives" who support Scottish independence active from 2011 to 2015. The organisation was founded in late 2011 by Ross Colquhoun, Andrew Redmond Barr and Rory Scothorne with the goal of " elping toshape the vision of a new society and nation". The group argued that independence for Scotland could achieve both a realisation of self-determination and a "cultural dawn" for the nation. The organisation was supported by independence-minded artists, including Liz Lochhead, Alasdair Gray, Elaine C. Smith and Karine Polwart. Andrew Whittaker, political correspondent at ''The Scotsman'' described the group as "the most significant cultural voice to emerge in the referendum debate so far". History National Collective supporters participated in the March and Rally for Scottish Independence in September 2013. Amy Shipway represented the Collective in a debate about culture an ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Leith
Leith (; ) is a port area in the north of Edinburgh, Scotland, founded at the mouth of the Water of Leith and is home to the Port of Leith. The earliest surviving historical references are in the royal charter authorising the construction of Holyrood Abbey in 1128 in which it is termed ''Inverlet'' (Inverleith). After centuries of control by Edinburgh, Leith was made a separate burgh in 1833 only to be merged into Edinburgh in 1920. Leith is located on the southern coast of the Firth of Forth and lies within the City of Edinburgh council area; since 2007 Leith (Edinburgh ward), it has formed one of 17 multi-member Wards of the United Kingdom, wards of the city. History As the major port serving Edinburgh, Leith has seen many significant events in Scottish history. First settlement The earliest evidence of settlement in Leith comes from several archaeological digs undertaken in The Shore, Leith, The Shore area in the late 20th century. Amongst the finds were medieval wharf ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Independent Bookshops Of The United Kingdom
Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist group Music Groups, labels, and genres * Independent music, a number of genres associated with independent labels * Independent record label, a record label not associated with a major label * Independent Albums, American albums chart Albums * ''Independent'' (Ai album), 2012 * ''Independent'' (Faze album), 2006 * ''Independent'' (Sacred Reich album), 1993 Songs * "Independent" (song), a 2007 song by Webbie * "Independent", a 2002 song by Ayumi Hamasaki from '' H'' News media organizations * Independent Media Center (also known as Indymedia or IMC), an open publishing network of journalist collectives that report on political and social issues, e.g., in ''The Indypendent'' newspaper of NYC * ITV (TV network) (Independent Television) ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]