Louise Adler and Randa Abdel-Fattah headline rebel Adelaide literary festival

February 4, 2026 — 1:56pm

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A rebel literary festival created in direct response to the cancellation of Adelaide Writers’ Week will feature the two women at the centre of the major event’s implosion.

At the one-off new festival, cheekily titled Constellations: Not Writers’ Week, Palestinian-Australian writer Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah – whose removal from AWW sparked the events that last month led to its cancellation – will speak with former Writers’ Week director Louise Adler, who resigned after writers withdrew from the line-up.

Several writers from the original AWW line-up are on the bill, including former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, writer and academic Professor Clare Wright, former Australian Greens leader Bob Brown and Miles Franklin Award winner Melissa Lucashenko.

Nobel Prize winning author J.M. Coetzee will also read his work in a poetry event at Constellations, which will be held in various locations across Adelaide from February 28 to March 5 – when AWW was meant to be staged.

In January, the Adelaide Festival board made a statement uninviting Abdel-Fattah from Adelaide Writers’ Week, a move which set off a boycott of the event by 180 writers, led Adler to resign, and to the 2026 event being cancelled.

All bar one member of the Adelaide Festival board – which oversaw Adelaide Writers’ Week – then resigned and a new board was appointed, quickly apologising to Abdel-Fattah and inviting her to AWW next year.

Britpop legends Pulp, who will headline the opening of Adelaide Festival on February 27, said they had thought about boycotting but would not do so, given the festival board’s apology and backflip.

The one-off festival will be held at Adelaide Town Hall and other venues, with the majority of events free or by donation. The program is expected to expand.

In January, Adelaide City Council voted to provide venues for Constellations but not financial support. The council has traditionally provided some funds to Adelaide Writers’ Week.

Constellations is organised by local representatives including booksellers, publishers and authors, and not-for-profit industry body Writers South Australia.

Author Jennifer Mills, the head of Writers SA, told this masthead: “Constellations has come together in direct response to the cancellation of Writers’ Week 2026. We’re very happy that audiences will get to hear from Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah directly.

“This is an extraordinary community effort, and we’re really excited to see it come together. The response from readers, writers, venues and volunteers has been truly heartening,” she said.

The festival opens on February 28 with a day pitched at young readers. “Children need to see their own worlds and lives reflected in the stories and books they read,” said author and organiser Bethany Clark.

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