In January 2022, a time that feels a lifetime ago, we were wondering what this year was going to look like. The last two years had turned us around, but standing at the very beginning of 2022, there was a definite sense of possibility. Granted, our world would be going through seismic shifts, but that is also where radical change happens. Inspired by stubborn hope, and shaped by what has been quite an eventful, fast-paced year, full of more twists and turns than our favourite thrillers –– we bring you this year’s Verb Readers & Writers Festival: Radical Possibility.

We wanted to connect with the world. We wanted, as always, to bring authors together, and soak in the magic. Our digital series of conversations on literature, craft, practice and artistic obsessions is titled Rūbarū ––  a Persian-origin word, now in Urdu and occasionally Hindi usage, it means coming face-to-face, to meet and be near, to be present and to present. We’ve brought together writers from faraway shores in a conversation with Aotearoa artists, so they may sit together in digital proximity and share the magic of making art with us. 

When imagining a festival, one doesn’t know what patterns it will reveal. Perhaps it is a little like those magic colouring books –– we swipe water on its pages, and a colour emerges. This year’s Verb is an occasion to celebrate our literary icons; we sit down with Jenny Pattrick, Dame Fiona Kidman, Sir Vincent O’Sullivan, Coco Solid aka Jessica Hansell, Christine Leunens, Kate De Goldi and Catherine Chidgey to talk about the latest additions to their bibliographies.  We discuss domestic metamorphosis, motherhood and memoirs with Kate Mildenhall, Noelle McCarthy, Louise Wallace, Anna Perry and Kate Camp. We join Colleen Maria Lenihan, Maria Samuela, Brad Smeele and a host of brilliant debut authors who share their journeys with us. This year, we seek and celebrate the radical possibilities of the future, of ignoring genre, of pacing, of loitering and above all, of craft. 

This year, we will share a joke with Pip Adam, bring our own writing practices into workshops, read poems of flood and fire, and of breaking moulds. This year, like others, we will Hex and Feminist Rage, we will make sweet music at Alistair’s, read from Bad Diaries, answer literary questions, and ultimately, party in the moonlight with radical possibility.

Thank you to our brilliant partners and funders who make this festival, and all of our mahi, possible:
Creative New Zealand, Wellington City Council, Wellington Community Fund, Vic Books, Naumi Hotels Wellington, HUIA Publishers, Allen & Unwin NZ, Penguin Random House NZ, Bowen Galleries, Toi Māori, BlueStar, Pub Charity, Goethe Institut, Read NZ.