In the mood for some dark magic? Join our brilliant hosts in raising (spiritual) pitchforks as they hex some no good very bad reading experiences. With HEX hosts Melody Thomas and Emily Writes.

WARNING: May contain sexual content (yay!).

Join us as we explore the powerful possibilities of poetry. From page to stage, Crip the Lit serves you sensational stanzas to delight the mind, body and senses. Featuring: Cadence Chung, Bee Trudgeon, Creatif Kate, Henrietta Bollinger, Maisie Chilton Tressler, Maytal Noy, Stella Carruthers and Trish Harris. Curated by Helen Vivienne Fletcher for Crip the Lit.

Whiti Hereaka's groundbreaking, calabash smashing novel Kurangaituku has changed the Māori literary scene forever. Rangimarie Sophie Jolley talks to Whiti about how she brought Kurangaituku into the world with elaborate costumes and visual aids. Curated by Te Hā o Ngā Pou.

Join Faisal Al-Asaad and Tze Ming Mok as they talk with Brannavan Gnanalingam about what it would take to find a common language for the experience of living in a racialized country where racism is all too often left unnamed and unchecked.

Where does one choose to begin a story and where do they choose to end it? How does a writer know when a work is now complete? Join Kirsten McDougall, Catherine Chidgey and Anthony Lapwood on the mysteries of beginnings and endings.

Every writer has some skeletons in their closet - poems and stories not fit for public consumption. Some will be dark, some will be cringe, all will be raw. Laugh, cry and heal with a selection of some of our bravest Māori writers as they share words they thought would stay hidden. Curated by Te Hā o Ngā Pou.

"How shall we save this land for our children?" So challenges the first poem in the poetry anthology No Other Place To Stand. Where artwork meets activism, poets speak to the climate crisis. Featuring: Ruby Solly, Michaela Keeble, Sara Hirsch, Ash Davida Jane, and essa may ranapiri. Curated by Rebecca Hawkes.

Join bestselling author Nicky Pellegrino as she talks to leading psychologist Dr Sarb Johal about why the phrase 'Calm Down' irks us so much, and everyday strategies that could help us calm down in our own uncertain times.

In Nostalgia Has Ruined My Life, an unnamed young woman in her late twenties navigates unemployment, boredom, chronic illness and online dating. Zarah Butcher-McGunnigle joins Rachel O’Neill for a conversation on her new novella-in-fragments.

Join Gina Cole, Maria Samuela and Colleen Maria Lenihan on the peculiarities of writing short fiction, debut journeys and the art of arranging a short story collection. [Venue is not wheelchair accessible]. 

How does writing one's own place of living, its mundanity, and its familiarity, work in practice? Rajorshi Chakraborti, Murdoch Stephens and Brannavan Gnanalingam talk about the magic and disquiet of writing what one knows so well. [Venue is not wheelchair accessible]

Join us to celebrate the Lauris Edmond Memorial Award for Poetry for 2022. We are thrilled to announce that the award is going to poet, Robert Sullivan (Ngāpuhi and Kāi Tahu) who has won awards for his poetry, editing, and writing for children. Tunui Comet is his eighth collection of poetry. His book Star Waka has been reprinted many times. Robert's an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Massey University. He is a great fan of all kinds of decolonisation.

Robert will be joined by guests, Arihia Latham and Ruby Solly.

Supported by The Lauris Edmond Literary Estate and the Friends of the Lauris Edmond Memorial Award for Poetry with sponsorship from The NZ Poetry Society, Victoria University Press and the Todd Trust.

Join poet/editor Ash Davida Jane as she chats to veteran poets Anna Jackson and Sudha Rao about what makes a poem good, how to read poetry and how poems work on the page. 

Three experts of the craft talk about how they wrangle the pacing beast to tell their tales. With Christine Leunens, Rachael Herron and Jennifer Lane.

Can a text become extinct? Is ‘natural selection’ the key to textual survival or are there other genetic processes at work? Marco Sonzogni and Sydney Shep discuss evolutionary translation and how it reconfigures our understanding of what constitutes a ‘text’.

Help us unleash the ninth issue of our hot-blooded little journal. Dress to the nines, and join editors Nikki-Lee Birdsey and Rebecca Hawkes to celebrate a surprise (but always bewitching) coven of contributors from the brand new Sweet Mammalian. Curated by Rebecca Hawkes

Join Brannavan Gnanalingam (Slow Down, You’re Here) as he talks to Kirsten McDougall (She’s A Killer), Whiti Hereaka (Kurangaituku, Legacy) and Sascha Stronach (The Dawnhounds) about the fickle nature of genre demarcations. [Venue is not wheelchair accessible].

Let Cadence Chung transport you to 600BC with her original lyre compositions inspired by Sappho’s fragments. Played on an authentic 7-string lyre and accompanied by fellow young musicians, these songs are full of ancient and modern yearning.