Melbourne Writers Festival to return for its 40th instalment

The Melbourne Writers Festival (MWF) has announced the program for its 40th anniversary edition this year, with more than 150 local and international artists set to appear across the city from May 7 to 10.

The program, given the theme "Visions & Revisions", would see writers, thinkers and storytellers explore “the futures we imagine, the stories we carry, and the revisions – personal and collective – that define us,” organisers said.

At Trades Hall’s Fringe Common Rooms on May 9 the founder of legendary indie rock band the Go Betweens, Robert Forster, will be telling stories from his debut “rock-and-roll joyride of a novel” Songwriters on the Run with local music identity Brian Nankervis. He will also play some music.

Afternoon event Acoustic Mirrors at the Common Rooms on May 9 promises to “transform the written word into a collection of poetic performances and intimate soundscapes” when local and international musicians and poets get together.

Over at the Nova on Friday, May 8, Japanese psychological thriller Exit 8 will screen with sparkling wine for the audience and a post-film Q&A with director Genki Kawamura.

Big-name international guests at this year’s festival include former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, Canadian Life of Pi author Yann Martel, British 2025 Booker Prize winner David Szalay, feminist Irish-Indian poet Nikita Gill and best-selling North American speculative fiction novelist R. F. Kuang.

Among the many Australians appearing are Anita Heiss, Daniel James and Evelyn Araluen – who are First Nations curators of the event – along with Andy Jackson, Maxine Beneba Clarke, Toni Jordan, Alice Pung, Romy Ash, Sam Elkin, Lally Katz and First Dog on the Moon.

Novel or standout events include an assessment of the political moment hosted by former Insiders host Barrie Cassidy; Sunday walking tours “tracing the city's lost bohemian haunts and literary gathering places” with historian Robyn Annear; a meeting of Australian crime writers Dervla McTiernan and Benjamin Stevenson; a discussion by the authors of the new anthology Crip Stories about their perspectives on disability; and a song cycle by composer Sophia Brous created from the writing of poet Dorothy Porter, to be performed with composer Paul Grabowsky and introduced by Andrea Goldsmith.

There will be events focused on the rise of independent media (Osman Faruqi, Antoinette Lattouf, Amy Remeikis), artificial intelligence (Toby Walsh), sex and pleasure (Madison Griffiths and Kayla Jade), defiance and resilience (Antoinette Lattouf and Grace Tame) and a definitive cookbook (Stephanie Alexander).

Parkville local Tony Birch will deliver the closing night address on May 10 about the ethics of reading and writing, and the responsibilities of creative freedom.

For more information and bookings visit: mwf.com.au •