BOOK lovers can enjoy talks from hundreds of well-known authors when the 19th annual Oxford Literary Festival returns to the city.

More than 500 authors and speakers are expected to gather for the festival in March.

Preparations for the nine-day festival are now under way, with booking now open for more than 70 events.

Festival director Sally Duns-more said: “We are delighted to confirm some of the internationally acclaimed speakers for this year’s FT Weekend Oxford Literary Festival.

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“We look forward to announcing the remaining speakers and to welcoming visitors to our acclaimed programme of events in the historic buildings of Oxford.”

Award-winning authors, politicians, historians and journalists from across the world will join the festival between Saturday, March 21, and Sunday, March 29.

Events are set to take place at Christ Church, in St Aldate’s, and at the Sheldonian Theatre and Bodleian Library, as well as at Corpus Christi College in Merton Street.

And 1989 Booker Prize winner and novelist Kazuo Ishiguro will launch the 2015 literature festivities during a special preview event on Thursday, March 12.

He will talk to Financial Times books editor Lorien Kite at Oxford Town Hall in St Aldate’s, about his new novel The Buried Giant.

Nobel Prize-winning scientist Professor Eric Kandel is set to speak on the opening day of the festival, while Indian writer Amitav Ghosh and author Professor Chris Clarke will take part in a discussion about history and fiction on March 23.

Mr Kandel, who was the winner of the 2000 Nobel Prize in physiology/medicine for his work on memory storage in the brain, will talk about the human mind.

Broadcaster and author Melvyn Bragg, biographer Lady Antonia Fraser and playwright David Lodge will also appear at the festival.

Youngsters will also have the chance to join festival events, with writing, illustration and philosophy workshops on offer.

The festival will also celebrate the nation’s favourite children’s books.

It will include a special event with Oxford-based author Philip Pullman to mark the 20th anniversary of the publication of Northern Lights, the first book in his critically-acclaimed fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials.

Former Children’s Laureate Anthony Browne will also be celebrated in an event marking 30 years of his popular series of Willy the Wimp children’s books.

Judith Kerr, creator of children’s favourites Mog and The Tiger who came to Tea, will also visit the festival.

Details of other events, including comedian and author Tony Hawks, as well as actress and cookery writer Madhur Jaffrey, are expected to be announced in the next month.

The Oxford Mail’s sister paper The Oxford Times is this year’s official regional partner, with the Financial Times Weekend edition the event’s main sponsor.

For information and tickets, see oxfordliteraryfestival.org

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