ONE of the highlights of this year’s international book festival was its strand Trading Places, with a number of events focusing on the Middle East, Palestine and Israel in particular. 

At one, emeritus professor of international relations at Oxford University Avi Shlaim startled a packed audience for a session on the new edition of his book The Iron Wall with two suggestions for taking steps forward in the conflict. 

One was that the US should drop Israel as its strategic ally in the Middle East and start to develop a relationship with Iran. 

The other was that the best thing that people in Britain could do to help, was to elect Jeremy Corbyn prime minister. 

From a former member of the Israel Defence Forces, these were startling statements indeed but perfectly logical in the context of his major work, now updated from his original “new history” published in 1997 to the recent re-election of Benjamin Netanyahu. 

If anything, Shlaim’s view of Israeli strategy has hardened. 

He now feels that far from using overwhelming military might to enforce negotiations with Palestinians from a source of strength, might has now become an end in itself for zionists. 

Another series of talks touched on the role of public libraries today, with Spaces for Literacy providing two examples of hope from both ends of the American continent. 

Sergio Fajado, governor of Antioquia province in Colombia and former mayor of Medellin, showed how the creation of centres, first in the city and now across the province, has transformed literacy and challenged violence. 

Tony Marx, president of New York Public Libraries, outlined the centrality of the library service in the city and the importance of public support in defending it, a great contrast to the current situation in Britain.

As the complete antithesis to important and serious topics, the session on Comic Verse entertained a crowded tent. 

This hugely entertaining hour was served up by the quirky Kate Fox, the lachrymose John Osborne and the surreal Rob Auton, superbly marshalled and introduced by Elvis McGonagall. 

The idea of comic verse as the embarrassing, slightly down-at-heel relation of poetry was comprehensively demolished by all the practitioners. 

If anyone was in doubt about the ability of high culture to address contemporary issues, they should have been at the performance of Lo Real. 

Israel Galvan’s renowned dance/flamenco group’s work (pictured) employs modern dance, flamenco, percussion — on anything from a busted piano to the dancers’ own bodies — to tell the story of the persecution of the Gitanos under Franco and by the nazis. 

No dance has such potential to tell stories as flamenco and this delivered in abundance. 

Perhaps the initial scenes did take some time to establish the parameters. 

But the second half showed us the brutal treatment of the Roma in Germany in the 30s, the importance of the trains taking people to the camps — there were powerful references to Steve Reich’s musical piece Changing Trains — and, by erecting a huge metal wall across the stage, the imprisonment of the people and their eradication from memory.

CHRIS BARTTER