Trade steps out for women's march

Authors, publishers and booksellers were among the huge crowds participating in the international anti-Trump Women’s Marches on Saturday (21st January).

The march came as US political site The Hill reported that Trump plans major cuts to US arts funding.

Writers including Stella Duffy in London and Margaret Atwood [pictured] in Toronto, publishers including Canongate and Nosy Crow in London and Edinburgh, as well as the Gutter Bookshop in Dublin, were among those tweeting their attendance at Saturday’s marches.

"We marched for equality, anti-racism, anti-ableism, anti-misogyny, anti-homophobia, anti-xenophobia. If that's 'virtue-signalling’, LET IT SHINE,” tweeted Duffy.

Author Michael Moore told social media he was “honored and humbled to be asked to speak @womensmarch. The organizers - all women- pulled off the biggest protest ever.”

Canongate Books tweeted: "Canongate are marching in Edinburgh and London today. See you there!”

Many of the placards on display during the march took books as their inspiration, such as "When Voldemort is president we need a nation of Hermiones!", "Cersei would be better" and numerous references to Atwood's classic The Handmaid's Tale.

Meanwhile The Hill said that president Trump intends to eliminate the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) , both independent federal agencies dating back to 1965, as part of “dramatic cuts” to government spending.

The NEH announced more than $4m in grants for book-related projects in 2016, while the NEA has named 37 writers to fellowships for the fiscal year 2017, Publishers Weekly noted.

Both the NEH and NEA each put in a request for a budget just shy of $150m for the fiscal year 2017.

A spokesperson for the NEA said the agency is “not speculating on what policies the new administration may or may not choose to prioritise or pursue”.