Planning next year’s holiday is an excellent way to banish the winter blues.
But if you’ve got a penchant for the written word, the chances are that a generic package trip simply won’t float your particular boat.
So your best bet for a sojourn that provocatively pushes your intellectual buttons is a cultural holiday in domestic or foreign climes.
With that in mind, we’ve flagged up three literary trips for 2020 which you can launch from practically any UK airport – buckle up for a few flights of fancy.
- Edinburgh
Despite its diminutive size in comparison to London, some Edinburgh denizens claim that their city is actually Britain’s true cultural capital.
The Edinburgh Festival and Fringe are complemented by The Edinburgh International Book Festival each August and this year’s gathering attracted renowned wordsmiths like Malorie Blackman and David Keenan.
But visit this UNESCO City of Literature at any time of year and you’ll always find something satisfying to slake your thirst – from the Leith haunts that inspired Irvine Welsh’s tough Trainspotting universe to Nicholson’s Café where JK Rowling scribbled the early chapters of the first Harry Potter novel.
- Dublin
Dublin is a stone’s throw from most UK locations and if you love literary conversations, the Irish capital offers some of the best craic anywhere on earth.
A stroll through these streets immediately evokes images of James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake, the poetry of Seamus Heaney and William Butler Yeats and the dramatic works of George Bernard Shaw and Samuel Beckett.
Legendary libraries, literary tours and pub crawls await – just ration your pints of the black stuff to ensure you don’t waste too much time nursing a hangover. Check out dublincityofliterature.ie for sagacious guidance.
- Prague
Prague is the home of pilsner (which makes it a creative hub for any fan of beer) and also boasts some of Europe’s most beautiful architecture – showcasing thousands of years of distinct styles.
But this tourist hotspot was also home to fine writers like Jan Neruda, Milan Kundera and Franz Kafka. Meanwhile, more recently, Prague’s wartime Nazi occupation and the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich inspired Laurent Binet to craft the gripping historical thriller HHhH.
An international book fair, poetry festival and writer’s festival are held each year, so there’s plenty to do in 2020 – browse prahamestoliteratury.cz to plan your trip around the latest happenings.
Getting There
You’ll find affordable flights to any of our locations on kayak.co.uk and don’t forget that you can book airport parking at Looking4.com for East Midlands, Edinburgh and more.
Hopefully our hattrick of literary holidays will warm your cultural cockles during the cold months ahead and provide some motivation to make it through the chilly season intact and inspired.
So ends our list of literary breaks. But what do you think? Share your thoughts on cultural holidays in the comments section.
