Thousands enjoy leading literary talent virtually with Budleigh Salterton Literary Festival

Budleigh Salterton Literary Festival is celebrating the success of its first ever hybrid virtual and physical festival with more than 11,000 unique pages views of the 31 events since they went online from September 16.

Viewers tuned in from as far away as the USA, Canada and Australia, as well as plenty from closer to home in East Devon, to enjoy this year's line-up, with headliners including writer, comedian, presenter of QI Sandi Toksvig OBE; former British Ambassador to the United States Sir Kim Darroch; behavioural scientist and activist Dr Pragya Agarwal; former Chief Prosecutor Nazir Afzal; and bestselling author and creator of Midsomer Murders Anthony Horowitz.

Festival President and twice Man Booker Prize Winner Dame Hilary Mantel, and veteran BBC broadcaster James Naughtie held their events in front of a socially-distanced live audience on Monday, September 14, with the events recorded and later shared online for all to see. Tickets to both live events sold out in less than an hour.

The 2019 Budleigh Salterton Literary Festival saw ticket sales of over 8,000 for its 50 events, proving the huge success of the online events.

Annie Ashworth, the Festival's Artistic Director, explained: "Budleigh Salterton Literary Festival is such a valued and well supported event, so it was unthinkable not to do something this year. Taking the events online was a challenge, but has been so worth it. We've reached audiences we might never normally and have given people lots to enjoy and to get them thinking, which is much needed at the moment.

"Such was their success that we're considering some virtual events for future Festival's too! But of course, we can't wait to be back in Budleigh live as usual next year, if we can."

For anyone who missed out, almost all events will be available to view online until September 30 at marquee.budlitfest.org.uk and are free to access.

"We thought it important to bring the Festival to people's homes free of charge to make it as accessible as possible," Annie added. "But not being able to hold this year's Festival live has had an enormous impact on our revenue and our ability to deliver our outreach work. So, if you enjoy the Virtual Festival this year, we would be enormously grateful if you would consider making a donation, which can be done securely via our website.

"This will help to support our education outreach work and we will be making a donation to the Society of Authors' Emergency Fund to support writers whose income has been severely impacted upon."

Younger viewers were entertained by a whole host of talent as part of the Festival's education outreach programme. Normally, the Festival organises visits from authors and illustrators for schools in East Devon, but this year put on a range of virtual events to be enjoyed at home or in the classroom.

As well as hosting each event, the 'Virtual Marquee' kept the spirit of the Festival alive, bringing many of the delights of the Festival's usual Marquee on the Green, including a virtual bookshop, signed books to buy and 'My Budleigh' featuring events from local authors Graham Hurley and Mark Diacono.

To watch the events online or to make a donation, visit marquee.budlitfest.org.uk.