Harrogate International Festivals has issued an apology for not including any female writers of colour in its 2021 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival.
The prestigious four-day festival takes place this month at the Old Swan in Harrogate.
Many leading crime writers, including Pointless star turned best seller Richard Osman, Mick Herron, Elly Griffiths and Ann Cleeves are due to attend and events take place across the four days.
But the lack of diversity among the line-up attracted criticism, which prompted Harrogate International Festivals’ programming committee to post on Twitter:
“It has been brought to our attention that our 2021 crime writing festival programme contains no female writers of colour. It should not have been necessary for this to be pointed out to us.
“We work hard on diversity at the crime writing festival but, although there have been many unique challenges this year, we got this wrong, and we apologise.
“We will be examining our planning processes, changing our practices — including expanding our programming committee — and working hard to make sure it never happens again in future years.”
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The apology prompted writers A A Dhand and Abir Mukherjee, who were invited to this year’s festival, to release a joint statement, which said:
“We are pleased that the concerns raised over this year’s Harrogate festival programme containing no female writers of colour have been recognised and that constructive conversations have taken place resulting in a welcome change in policy for future literary festivals.”
Their statement added that “Harrogate has always been at the forefront of championing new voices, so the commitment to changing practices and widening the diversity of the planning committee is a very welcome step.”
They added they recognised diversity and inclusion were tricky subjects and that problems were not specific just to the Harrogate festival.
The festival’s crime novel of the year award carries a £3,000 prize.