THE Edinburgh Fringe Festival is widely acknowledged to be the biggest arts festival in the world. It takes place every August in Scotland’s capital city, lasting three weeks.

    The festival caters for everyone and includes theater, comedy, dance, physical theater, musicals, operas, music, exhibitions and events. Its story dates back to 1947, when eight theater groups turned up uninvited to perform at the then newly formed Edinburgh International Festival, an initiative created to celebrate and enrich European cultural life after the Second World War. Not being part of the official program of the international festival didn’t stop the performers — they just went ahead and staged their shows anyway. Year on year more and more performers followed their example and in 1959 the Fringe Festival Society was created in response to the success of this growing trend.

    The society formalized the existence of this collective of performances, provided information to artists, published the Fringe program and created a central box office.

    (Li Dan)