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SUMMARY:Manchester Literature Festival 2026
DESCRIPTION:Manchester Literature Festival brings another blockbuster programme of events to Library Live at Central Library this October. The Festival will be showcasing over 120 authors\, poets\, and thinkers from across the globe. In this National Year of Reading\, it’s especially timely to be spreading the joy of reading and celebrating storytelling – bringing families\, friends and strangers together to listen\, learn\, reflect\, laugh\, engage and discover new ways to navigate our turbulent times. \nWe’re delighted to be hosting 17 of the 50+ events at Central Library this year. Whether you’re passionate about women’s rights or climate change\, dystopian fiction or epic poetry\, want to change the world or simply entertain the kids\, there’s something for everyone to enjoy. Here’s some of the highlights: \nFICTION: \nEmily St. John Mandel (10 Oct): Canadian author of Station Eleven discusses her electrifying new novel Exit Party – a haunting mystery set across two parallel words. \nLouise Kennedy & Wendy Erskine (15 Oct): Two of Northern Ireland’s most acclaimed contemporary writers discuss their new novels Stations and The Benefactors with BBC 6 Music’s Deb Grant. \nBrutalist Ghost Stories (17 Oct): Northern novelists Jenn Ashworth\, Nicholas Royle\, David Gaffney and Beth Barker read from an anthology turning Britain’s post-war architecture into the uncanny. \nWilly Vlautin (19 Oct): American musician and novelist Willy Vlautin discusses The Left and the Lucky\, his moving new novel of unlikely friendship and working-class life in America. \nM. John Harrison (20 Oct): One of Britain’s most influential writers and Booker Prize 2026 nominee discusses The End of Everything – a darkly funny\, unsettling novel of a fractured near future. \nHernan Diaz (22 Oct): The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Trust introduces Ply\, a wildly original thriller of technology\, capitalism and shifting identity set centuries from now. \nCULTURE: \nFrank Cottrell-Boyce (13 Oct): Beloved children’s’ author discusses A British Childhood\, his warm\, urgent reflection on books\, imagination and the realities of childhood in Britain today. \nNatasha Walter (18 Oct): The campaigner and author explores Feminism for a World on Fire\, connecting women’s rights\, social justice and climate action. \nLady Hale & Lara Feigel (21 Oct): The UK’s first female Supreme Court President and writer Lara Feigel come together to explore law\, motherhood and power; a rare\, candid look at how justice is experienced by families. \nPOETRY: \nIan McMillan (12 Oct): Host of Radio 4’s The Verb launches Red River Valley\, a funny\, poignant new collection drawn from family life and South Yorkshire. \nCarolyn Forché & Kwame Dawes (16 Oct): US ‘poet of witness’ Carolyn Forché and Jamaica’s Poet Laureate Kwame Dawes share five decades of testimony\, survival and political engagement in verse. \nSimon Armitage (18 Oct): The Poet Laureate returns with an exhilarating new verse translation of Gilgamesh\, the oldest surviving epic in world literature\, brought thrillingly to life for a modern audience. \nFAMILIES: \nLittle Reads Family Day (24 Oct): Families are invited to take part in a joyful day of stories\, theatre\, music\, dancing and crafts. Help create some magical shoes with The Elves and the Shoemaker in an interactive show from Peoplescape Theatre\, packed with music\, puppetry\, clowning and storytelling. Strut your stuff with author and West End musical theatre star Robert Tregoning in a confidence-boosting event inspired by his latest picture book Dylan\, Daisy and the Disco Ball and explore storytelling through movement with dancer Magdalen Bartlett. \nYou can check out the full programme\, download a copy of the Festival brochure and book tickets on the Manchester Literature Festival website.  \nWe advise you to book early as many events sell out in advance!
URL:https://librarylive.co.uk/event/manchester-literature-festival-2026/
CATEGORIES:Talks
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SUMMARY:Manchester Literature Festival presents Carolyn Forché & Kwame Dawes
DESCRIPTION:Don’t miss this opportunity to hear two of the world’s most visionary poets read and discuss their sublime poetry\, exploring political engagement and the interplay between survival and testimony.  \nOver five decades\, American poet Carolyn Forché has established herself as both ‘a poet of witness’ and an indefatigable human rights activist. Beautifully crafted\, her poems are testimonies\, enquiries and wonderments. Her anthology\, Against Forgetting\, has been praised by Nelson Mandela as ‘itself a blow against tyranny\, against prejudice\, against injustice.’ Otherwise: New & Selected Poems 1976-2026 brings together poems from her five award-winning collections as well as urgent new work.  \nKwame Dawes is the author of numerous books of poetry\, essays and works of fiction\, most recently the collection Sturge Town featuring poems of acute self-reflection alongside those giving voice to invented characters. He is the Poet Laureate of Jamaica\, the Artistic Director of the Calabash International Literary Festival and Professor of Literary Arts at Brown University. His poetry has been described by Martin Espada as ‘the music of survival and transcendence.’  \nA Manchester Literature Festival event co-presented with Manchester Poetry Library\, Bloodaxe Books and Renaissance One. Supported by Library Live.  \nBook tickets here or click ‘Book Now’ below
URL:https://librarylive.co.uk/event/manchester-literature-festival-presents-carolyn-forche-kwame-dawes/
LOCATION:Performance Space
CATEGORIES:Talks
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DTSTART;TZID=UTC:20261017T080000
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SUMMARY:Manchester Literature Festival presents Brutalist Ghost Stories
DESCRIPTION:An afternoon exploring the supernatural with writers Jenn Ashworth\, David Gaffney\, Beth Barker and Nicholas Royle – four contributors to Brutalist Ghost Stories\, a haunting new anthology inspired by Britain’s post-war architecture.   \nBlending literary fiction with the uncanny\, these original stories reimagine Brutalist buildings as places where history\, memory and the supernatural collide. From Preston Bus Station and the Barbican to Forton Service Station and a substation in Sheffield\, the collection offers a striking new way of seeing familiar spaces.   \nHear readings from the anthology and discover how four distinctive Northern voices have transformed these monumental settings into unforgettable ghost stories.  \nBrutalist Ghost Stories is edited by Richard V. Hirst and published by Manchester’s Cōnfingō Publishing.  \nA Manchester Literature Festival event supported by Library Live.  \nJenn Ashworth is an award-winning novelist whose books include A Kind of Intimacy\, Fell and Ghosted. Her memoir Notes Made While Falling was shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize. She lives in Lancashire.   \nDavid Gaffney is a novelist and short story writer whose books include Never Never\, Out of the Dark and Sawn-Off Tales. His work has been appeared on BBC Radio 4. He lives in Manchester.  \nBeth Barker is a writer from Blackpool. Her work has appeared in publications including Prototype 5 and A Wild and Precious Life. She is one of the emerging voices supported through the New North strand of Brutalist Ghost Stories.  \nNicholas Royle is an acclaimed novelist and short story writer whose books include First Novel\, Antwerp and Ornithology. He is the editor of Best British Short Stories and founder of Nightjar Press.  \nBook tickets here or click ‘Book Now’ below
URL:https://librarylive.co.uk/event/manchester-literature-festival-presents-brutalist-ghost-stories/
LOCATION:Performance Space
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