Few cities can boast such a distinguished literary pedigree as Edinburgh.

Burns, Scott, Conan Doyle, Buchan, Dorothy Dunnett and J.K. Rowling have all lived in the city; Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon convalesced there (inspiring Pat Barker's Booker-prize-winning Regeneration trilogy), and Dickens and Thackeray came on triumphant reading tours.

Visitors have ranged from Defoe and George Eliot to Wordsworth, Hans Christian Anderson and the hundreds of renowned authors who now appear at one of the literary world's most important annual events - The Edinburgh International Book Festival.

The Edinburgh Literary Companion traces the city's history from the Old Town, dominated by the Castle and the High Streets with its numerous wynds and closes, to the elegant and spacious New Town and its surrounding villages.