Welcome to our Party!

Thank you for joining us throughout the winter as we prepare together for Bristol BookFest 2026 featuring Virginia Woolf’s novel “Mrs. Dalloway.” It’s been a season for serious thought with some playfulness and a good bit of community conversation. We look forward to greeting you this weekend. If you have not registered, click the button below.

What To Expect

FRIDAY KEYNOTE ADDRESS & RECEPTION

April 10, 2026, at 5:30 p.m.

MERVE EMRE

“The Radical Art of Character Reading.”

This talk will trace the composition history of “Mrs. Dalloway” to show how Woolf’s philosophy and technique of creating characters anchors a supremely democratic art of the novel after World War I — this despite the fact that she could be quite undemocratic in other walks of life.

SATURDAY FULL-DAY EXPLORATION

April 11, 2026, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

ANNE E. FERNALD

“All Professions Are Open”

Woolf’s 1925 novel, “Mrs. Dalloway,” is full of clues about Woolf’s opinions on women and ambition, education, work and self-expression, which she later openly advocated in “A Room of One’s Own” and elsewhere.

SPOTLIGHT EVENT

“Intimate Portraits”

A reading of letters between Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West curated by poets who each offer their own poetic response, featuring Rhode Island Youth Poetry Ambassadors Robin Linden and Julia Yakirevich.

CAROLYN VEGA

“Can’t Scribble Fast Enough”: Virginia Woolf and “Mrs. Dalloway”

This illustrated talk will examine Virginia Woolf’s creative process through her archive, with a focus on her handwritten diaries, letters and the drafts that led to her 1925 masterpiece “Mrs. Dalloway.”