I went along with some friends to a great little festival in Cornwall last weekend called the Port Elliot Literature Festival. The journey took 13 hours and the Cornish drizzle was fairly persistent, but once it all got going it was brilliant.

Geoff Dyer is one of my favourites and didn't disappoint. He read a new story called 'White Sands' which is coming out in Granta later this year. Louis de Bernieres actually played a mandolin rather than getting Captain Corelli to do it for him. Toby Litt gave us a couple of bits from his next book and Hannah Pool retold the story of meeting her biological parents in Eritrea having lived all her life in the UK.

Music wise Tom Baxter was superb and Lily Fraser mesmerising. But best of the bunch and new to me were performance poets Aisle 16. If you're going to Edinburgh don't miss them do their show Boyband. Their rap off between Freud and Jung is utter genius.

One of the joys of being an editor of Pick Me Up is finding out about all these small DIY festivals. There are loads of them each weekend. I went to one in Edale called Jazz in the field at the end of June which was great as well. Glastonbury is fine but I think I've come to the realisation that when it comes to festivals, small is beautiful.

Posted by Paul Miller at August 1, 2005 01:41 PM