It has already seen the end of lucrative sponsorship deals with two of Britain’s biggest book festivals amid threats of protests and writer boycotts.
Now the Edinburgh investment house Baillie Gifford is in crisis talks over its relationship with a third prominent literary event.
The director of the Wigtown Book Festival, Scotland’s second largest, has confirmed he is in “dialogue” with the company over their relationship.
Baillie Gifford has been under fire over its ongoing funding of the fossil fuel industries, its links with Israel and its history of investing in Russian state mining and banking institutions right up until President Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Sally Magnusson, author of The Sealwoman’s Gift, spoke at Wigtown Book Festival last year
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Some writers and artists have said they do not want to be used by the Edinburgh fund