LEEDS LIT FEST 2023: 25 FEB – 5 MARCH
Leeds Lit Fest is back! Returning for its fifth year, the city’s award-winning festival of words and thought will take place across a diverse range of the city’s spaces and aims to bring together, and help develop, the city’s literary scene, with writers, poets and performers from the UK and beyond. This year’s festival will tie in with Leeds 2023, the citywide celebration of culture and will interweave themes of untold stories, radical acts, playful adventures and future generations.
From Lemn Sissay to Football Cliches to a day of Contemporary Gothic writers as well as loads of free children’s book events, Leeds Lit Fest 2023 is back and tickets are selling fast. Some events have already sold out!
Running for more than a week, the Festival kicks off on 25th Feb with a day of Contemporary Gothic featuring writers such as Catriona Ward, Mark Morris, Lucie McKnight Hardy, Dan Coxon and Alison Littlewood. There’s an overnight Readathon taking place at Chapel FM. Have you got the stamina?
This is bookended by a full day of events and activities for children and families at Leeds Central Library on Saturday 4th March. Our day will have a science,technology, engineering and mathematics theme with exciting hands on workshops, storytelling and book events for all ages. Join us for the day and meet authors such as Vashti Hardy sharing her latest book in the Harley Hitch series, Alex Falase-Koya with his latest Marv book and Sharon Rentta introducing her Animal Explorers.
Further highlights include poetry and spoken words events with Leeds Poetry Festival at the Hyde Park Book Club, and a special edition of Chemistry at The Chemic hosted by Joe Williams with headliners multi-award-winning performance poet Dominic Berry and rising local star Kayleigh Campbell. The Northern Fiction Alliance will roll into the city with publishers such as Peepal Tree Press, Comma Press and Bluemoose Books showcasing their finest writers at the Hyde Park Book Club. Leeds Lit Fest has been a long time champion of supporting Northern independent presses and their writers.
And let’s not forget the legendary Lemn Sissay OBE! My Name is Why, his life story is infused with all the lyricism and power you would expect from one of the nation’s best-loved poets, this moving, frank and timely performance is the result of a life spent asking questions, and the redemptive power of creativity. Photo credit – Paul Crowther.
There’s all of this and so much more. For full details and how to book visit Leeds Lit Fest
