In a moment of increasing global polarisation, the 2026 Festival – with a hero theme of Changing Your Mind – brings together almost 600 writers from 41 countries for 16 days of ideas, literature, conversation, and performance. The Festival is where books and words spark new thinking, forge connections across borders, and generate conversations that matter. The 2026 programme spans the full breadth of contemporary writing - world-class fiction and nonfiction, a rich programme for children and young people, food, poetry, and live performance - with a special focus on how we engage with the world’s biggest questions: from geopolitics and the flow of global power, to the nature of consciousness, the reliability of information, and how we live well together. The theme, Changing Your Mind, runs through the programme as an invitation to listen, reconsider, and discover something new, unfolding across strands exploring public debate, new thinking in science and consciousness, and the role of stories and art in reshaping how we understand one another. The Edinburgh International Book Festival is a charity which has been bringing outstanding writers and thinkers from around the world together with curious audiences for over forty years. We celebrate the power of words, examine pressing issues, shift perspectives, and create joyful experiences for those of all ages. Our programme sparks essential conversations about the world around us, our place in it, and how we can improve it, together. Making these discussions accessible to anyone is at the heart of everything we do, in August and beyond. Image Credit: Chris Scott

Description supplied by the event organiser.