Bestselling author added to line-up for travel writing festival

Bestselling author Simon Winchester has been added to the burgeoning line-up for this year’s Immrama Festival of Travel Writing, taking place in Lismore later this month.

The author of the hit The Professor and the Madman and other best-selling works of popular history, he has been turning out books since 1975 and will speak in the Co Waterford town about his work and travel experiences.

The 11th annual Immrama festival takes place from Jun 13-16 and also includes the likes of Paul Theroux, one of the world’s most popular travel writers, and Charlie Connelly, whose works include the likes of Attention All Shipping and Our Man in Hibernia.

Organisers have just confirmed the addition of Mr Winchester, whose first book was In Holy Terror, which was followed by nearly 20 original volumes of non-fiction.

Before turning his attention to books, Mr Winchester was a reporter, covering Belfast in the early 1970s for The Guardian and then being dispatched to Washington to write about the last days of the Richard Nixon White House.

Less than a decade later, while reporting from the field in Patagonia, he was captured by the Argentine regime and imprisoned, along with two other British journalists, for three months on charges of spying. He used the experience to produce a book published in 1983, Prison Diary: Argentina. Two years later, he was back out in the field, sending dispatches from China.

In the years since his first great success in 1998, with The Professor and the Madman, Mr Winchester has had four titles on the New York Times bestseller list.

This year’s festival programme features some of the world’s most highly-regarded travel writers including Theroux, who will take to the stage at Immrama on Jun 15 at 3pm. He is perhaps best known for Ghost Train to the Eastern Star and The Great Railway Bazaar. Charlie Connelly will host the literary breakfast at Immrama.

* Full details of the schedule and Saturday Special tickets for the Immrama Lismore Festival of Travel Writing 2013 are available online at www.lismoreimmrama.com or by calling 058 53803.