21st Annual Newburyport Literary Festival

The 21st annual Newburyport Literary Festival, a celebration of reading and the love of books featuring award-winning authors and engaging panel discussions, will take place April 24–26, 2026, in various locations in downtown Newburyport and online. There is no charge to attend. This year’s theme is Revolutionary Legacies. The opening ceremony is on Friday, April 24, at 6:00 p.m., at the Firehouse Center for the Arts. North Shore artist and designer Michael Updike, son of literary legend John Updike, will discuss Selected Letters of John Updike by James Schiff with The New York Times Book Review critic Alexandra Jacobs, a life-long Updike fan. Event sponsorships are still available.

On Saturday, April 25, festival events will begin at 8:30 a.m. with Breakfast with the Poets and continue throughout the day. A wide range of distinguished biographers, poets, novelists, and historians will read from and discuss their work. Authors and poets include Catherine Newman, Annie Hartnett, Andre Dubus III, Marianne Leone, Gish Jen, Alan Lightman, Christine Pride, and Jenna Blum. Planned panels will focus on romance novels, humor, and immigration, and Caleb Gayle (Black Moses) will speak as part of a session sponsored by the Massachusetts Center for the Book. A Melopoeia for Charles Coe will be performed by the original Diminished Prophets, and Newburyport High School’s Poetry Soup students will read original works.

Saturday evening’s event, Women’s Voices of Rebellion and Revolution, features readings of women’s writing at 7:00 p.m. at the Firehouse Center for the Arts. As the U.S. reflects on 250 years as a nation, this event celebrates voices that were largely uncelebrated at the time.

Virtual programming on Sunday, April 26, runs from 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., and will include a writing workshop with Sara Reish Desmond, a conversation with local tennis journalist Christopher Clarey (The Master; The Warrior), and panels on writing for both YA and adult audiences and the environmental mystery of Costa Rica’s golden toads, among others. Registration is required for Zoom events. Also on Sunday, at 9:00 a.m. Ghlee Woodward will lead a historical walk of downtown Newburyport meeting at the Essex Street Inn.