An excerpt in Braille from Ian Rankin’s novel, Fleshmarket Close, was attached to the walls of the street that the book is based on yesterday, as part of an appeal.

Rankin, who said that he was excited by the honour, is supporting a £2 million fundraising campaign to save the city’s Scottish Braille Press. The press, the largest of its kind in Britain and owned by the Royal Blind charity, needs to be relocated and reequipped. It produces books, magazines, newspapers and signs for the blind and visually impaired.

Rankin, whose son attends the Royal Blind School in Edinburgh, said: “The Braille Press creates stuff for the whole of the UK and it’s a hugely valuable resource. They need new premises and new equipment, so that in the 21st century Braille can continue to be as important to blind people as it is just now . . . It gives employment to a lot of disabled and visually impaired people.”

The Scottish Braille Press is printing a Braille version of the author’s book Death is Not the End. The event, which is part of National Braille Week, marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Louis Braille, who invented the system. Rankin said that Braille had created an “almost perfect system . . . It hasn’t needed much tweaking since.”

Richard Hellewell, chief executive of Royal Blind, said: “Outside our community there is little knowledge or understanding about its use.”

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