Lousie Walsh, John Burnside, Richard Holloway and Kevin MacNeill

Presented in association with Dublin UNESCO City of Literature, supported by Department of Arts, Heritage and Gaeltacht

Chairperson: Mia Gallagher

For this one-off event, a select group of writers and musicians have been invited to respond to Stevenson’s concept of our ‘dual nature’, rendered so vividly in the Edinburgh-born author’s 1886 novella. Are we all touched by the benign and the base, the sacred and profane? If so how aware are we of our essential flaws and potentialities? And what are the religious, moral and societal consequences of our Jekyll and Hyde inheritance?

Reading their own short responses to the subject (commissioned exclusively for Dublin Writers Festival) are four writers. Bestselling novelist Louise Welsh is the creator of the chilling contemporary crime classics The Cutting Room and Naming the Bones. John Burnside is a Whitbread-winning poet and novelist whose haunting work in both forms casts dark shadows. Broadcaster, writer and former Bishop of Edinburgh, Richard Holloway has tackled complex issues in his writing, from faith in a post-Christian age to morality in the current recession. Kevin MacNeil — author of A Method Actor’s Guide to Jekyll and Hyde — is a prolific Scottish novelist, poet and playwright. To complement the readings, poet, broadcaster and music journalist Donny O’Rourke and guitarist/singer-songwriter Dave Whyte perform a selection of songs inspired by and reflecting upon the evening’s themes.

In association with the Edinburgh International Book Festival and Edinburgh: UNESCO City of Literature.