2025 Festival dates, opportunities and more!
Welcome to 2025! We hope you have had a restful break and the chance to enjoy the sunshine and indulge in your TBR pile. A new year means a new Sydney Writers’ Festival and we can’t wait to see you at Carriageworks and across Sydney for captivating conversations and daring discussions. Mark your diaries – this year’s Festival will take place from 19–27 May 2025.
Discover the latest Festival opportunities below, ranging from becoming a Festival Patron to working with us or joining our stellar volunteer team.
If you’re after something new to listen to, grab your headphones and explore the phenomena of fantasy, crime and ‘sad girl’ novels in our recent podcast releases of popular panels from last year’s Festival.
Podcast catch up
Sad Girl? Bad Girl? Mad Girl?
Australian novelists Nadine J. Cohen (Everyone and Everything), Madeleine Gray (Green Dot) and Jessie Stephens (Something Bad is Going to Happen) discuss making and breaking the rules of ‘sad girl’ literature, in conversation with The Guardian’s Steph Harmon.
Aussie Crime All-Stars
Grab your Akubra as Australia’s hottest crime writers Sulari Gentill (The Mystery Writer), Dinuka McKenzie (Tipping Point) and Benjamin Stevenson (Everyone on this Train is a Suspect) chat about outback noir and what makes local crime fiction unique. With host Alex Adsett.
Fantastical Worlds
Forge new frontiers in fantasy and imagine another world with popular fantasy authors Garth Nix (The Old Kingdom series), Shelley Parker-Chan (The Radiant Emperor duology) and Samantha Shannon (The Roots of Chaos series). Hosted by Aimée Lindorff.
Sydney Writers’ Festival podcasts are available on all major platforms including Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Support us
Work with us
Join the team
We are currently recruiting for a Volunteer Program Coordinator who will be responsible for providing admin, training and logistics support for 300 volunteers at the Festival. We are also on the lookout for numerous Customer Service Representatives to provide box office support to audience members and Patrons throughout the Festival.
Visit our website to find out more about these roles and how to apply.
Volunteer at the Festival
Join the Volunteer team
Each year Sydney Writers’ Festival runs smoothly with the help of our friendly, dedicated and generous volunteer team.
We are currently recruiting 300 volunteers to join us at the 2025 Festival and invite you to apply. Head to our website for more information about the various volunteer roles available.
Applications close Thursday 30 January 2025.
What we’re reading
Arrangements in Blue by Amy Key
Arrangements in Blue is an intimate and vulnerable memoir about building a full life without the cornerstone of romantic love that we’re taught to expect. Amy Key is frank in her reflections and makes incredibly moving revelations about loneliness, grief, joy and desire.
– Julia Clark, Marketing Coordinator
Special offer
Win tickets to a weekend workshop with Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love
Creative living happens when we drown out all outside opinions, noise and influences and follow our own inner guidance. Using inspirational stories from her own life, and sharing the exercises that have kept her motivated to write 10 books and helped navigate her through life’s biggest changes, Elizabeth Gilbert, will guide you in finding your own place of creative, spiritual and regenerative freedom.
To go into the running to win two tickets to the workshop on 1–2 February at Sydney Town Hall email us with the subject line ‘GILBERT’. Entries close on 23 January at 5pm. View full workshop details here.
We need your support to continue championing writers. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation and learn more about how your support will make a difference here.
From our Partners
Valiant’s sustainable event furniture for creative gatherings
Bring your literary event to life with Valiant’s eco-friendly furniture, perfect for panels, workshops and book launches. Create a thoughtful, stylish space that engages your audience and aligns with your commitment to sustainability.
New vintage Semillon Sauvignon Blanc
As a proud Major Partner of Sydney Writers’ Festival, Bunnamagoo Estate Wines is delighted to present Festival enews subscribers with an exclusive offer. Enjoy 20% off the cellar door price on a dozen bottles of our newly released 2024 Bunnamagoo Semillon Sauvignon Blanc. Plus, every purchase gives you a chance to double your order in our special prize draw!
From our friends
Win tickets to see Nucleus
Griffin Theatre Company’s Nucleus, written by Alana Valentine, interrogates the intersection of personal ambition and global responsibility. To win a double pass to see Nucleus on 17 February at 7pm, email Griffin with ‘SWF x GRIFFIN’ in the subject line. Entries close on 23 January at 5pm.
Win tickets to Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival
Fall in love with queer cinema as Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival returns this February. See The Writer, where Lithuanian-American author Kostas faces his ex-lover Dima in this beautifully crafted two-hander. To celebrate, we’ve got a double pass to give away to the 24 February screening! Enter via the button below.
Win tickets to see Babygirl
Babygirl is an explosive new film from Halina Reijn, starring Nicole Kidman as a high-powered CEO who begins an affair with her much younger intern, in cinemas from 30 January. Thanks to A24, Sydney Writers’ Festival has 10 in-season double passes to giveaway. To enter, email info@nixco.com.au with the subject line ‘SWF x BABYGIRL’.
Sydney Writers’ Festival acknowledges the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples of this nation. They are the first storytellers of our land and we honour their tradition of passing down stories. We acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the lands on which our events take place. We pay our respects to Elders past and present.
