Make time for exploring ideas, AI, storytelling and civic debate
The third annual Manly Writers’ Festival will roll into town from 19 to 22 March, and will be officially opened by renowned writer and Beaches resident Thomas Keneally. The festival has grown and evolved over the last few years and the line-up this year is impressive, with over 2,500 attendees expected.
Festival founder and director Bonita Mersiades said the 2026 program was designed with a commitment to open inquiry and careful conversation. “The Manly Writers’ Festival is independent and shaped by our community and the world around us,” Bonita says. “We value rigorous discussion without rancour, and we believe stories matter, especially when ideas are complex, contested or unresolved.”
The festival will feature up to 90 writers, journalists, historians, thinkers and musicians at venues around Manly, all within walking distance.
“The idea was to involve more of the Manly community in the festival,” Bonita says.
“And also, to be part of other venues rather than just a single venue conference – more a community led festival, which is what we are.”
The festival program is organised into ‘pathways.’ The Power, Truth and Accountability pathway examines how power operates inside institutions and public life. In Australia in the world, former diplomats, journalists, scholars and writers examine conflict, diplomacy, capture and global disorder.
The Country and Who We Are pathway focuses on land, belonging, inheritance and identity, with writers exploring how place, history and migration shape Australian stories across generations. Conversations examine sovereignty, memory and responsibility, asking how stories hold, and sometimes challenge, the ways Australians understand themselves and their past.
The Living Today and Personal Reckonings pathways turn attention to contemporary life and private experience, with sessions on money, housing, masculinity, faith, sport, grief and resilience.
Stories and Storytellers and So, You Want to Be a Writer? will explore how stories are made, shaped and received across different genres, alongside practical workshops on editing, publishing, theatre and professional life.
There’s a free schools program for Year 9 and 10 students, focused on truth, voice and storytelling in a noisy information environment. Special events include a live exploration of human creativity in the age of artificial intelligence (AI) that combines writers and musicians in an experimental, performance-driven format.
“We’re looking at human creativity versus AI,” explains Bonita. “It’s a big issue in literature and in the arts and culture industry. We’re making it a bit of fun by having an AI versus five writers, and AI versus musicians just to see what the difference is.”
The Festival Hub for help and guidance and a bookshop run by Gleebooks will be set up in Manly Library and for a break, you can pop into the Belgrave Cartel for a festival-themed coffee and a peaceful read in their readers room.
There are three open book sessions where authors will read from their work. “It gives them an opportunity to talk about why they wrote it that way or what motivated them,” says Bonita. “They’ll be choosing passages from their books to read and to talk about really openly. It’s a very lightly curated session.”
Bonita says the Manly Writers’ Festival is a place for respectful conversation.
“There’ll be some conversations that some people don’t agree with,” she tells PL. “But the idea of a festival is that we listen to those conversations and perhaps take something new out of it. We will not be cancelling anyone, unlike other writers’ festivals,” she says.
“We have two Palestinian writers and four Jewish women writers and it’s important to hear from all of them.”
Manly Writers’ Festival
19 to 22 March
Venues across Manly
$25+ (and some free events)
