Welcome to
our Festival
Save the Date
16-24 October 2026
Set up in 1992 to celebrate the written word
Wells Festival of Literature
Celebrating its 34th Year in 2026
Wells Festival of Literature is a registered charity entirely run by a committee of volunteers, funded by ticket sales, competition entries and generous local sponsors and Friends.
IN 2025
VISITORS A YEAR
Education projects
Fleur Hitchcock visits Longvernal Primary
Dicheat School Book Club meet to discuss The Somerset Tsunami by Emma Carroll
St John’s enjoy a visit from Tracey Corderoy
Wookey Sch reading their new books
Waterstones visit by Bishop Henderson Sch
Emily Lloyd-Gale at St John’s
Following a visit from A.F. Harrold:
“It was an enriching session that enhanced our pupils’ appreciation and understanding of poetry. Huge thanks to the Education Team at The Wells Festival of Literature for organising and funding this visit!”
Fairlands Middle School – Cheddar
News
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Palestine Revisited
A new edition of The Palestinians, by journalist and filmmaker Jonathan Dimbleby, with photographs by the internationally-acclaimed photojournalist Don McCullin, is an update on the book that was published in 1980. Illustrated by photographs of the current devastation, Dimbleby argues that the issue of the Palestinian people and their quest for a homeland is even…
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BBC’s Ed pulls out
Edward Stourton, a regular presenter on the BBC’s Radio 4 World at One programme, has pulled out of this year’s Festival because of an ongoing health issue. He was due to appear to discuss his new book Made in America, which offers a fascinating and dark retelling of US history with lessons for the present.…
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Lady Hale on the Law
Lady Hale, also known as Spider Woman thanks both to her iconic brooch and to her acclaimed memoir of the same name, returns to the Festival with a new book, With the Law on Our Side. She was last here in 2024 in conversation with solicitor Harriet Wistrich, and is now back in her own…
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Portrait of a traveller
A dazzling new biography of George Forster, the 18th-century naturalist, philosopher and revolutionary, is due to be published this week (2 June). In The Traveller, Andrea Wulf, author of the best-selling The Invention of Nature, brings to life a major European figure who straddled the boundary between the Enlightenment and Romanticism, and was celebrated across…
