From Palestinian testimony to Indonesian forests, the third day of Ubud Writers & Readers Festival’s main programme explored how stories could challenge silence and deepen understanding. On Saturday, October 24, international authors and Indonesian voices shared a programme connecting personal experience with questions about justice, belonging and environmental responsibility.
Across the Agung, Indus and Valley stages, the published schedule offered 21 main sessions, complemented by book launches, workshops, films and performances. The day gave the festival’s theme, “Samarasā: Awareness. Empathy. Action.”, a practical focus: how to turn attention into meaningful engagement.
Listening Across Borders
The morning programme placed three distinct perspectives alongside one another. Francesca Albanese’s When the World Sleeps, moderated by Todung Mulya Lubis, centred Palestinian experiences, human rights and dignity under occupation. At Indus, Malaysian novelist Tash Aw discussed The South with Janet Steele, while filmmaker and journalist Dandhy Laksono’s “Reset Indonesia” brought investigative storytelling and civic responsibility to the Valley Stage.
Together, these sessions connected international concerns with questions familiar to Indonesian audiences: how power shapes everyday life, how people preserve their identities and who gets to describe their experiences.
Readers had already expressed an appetite for such encounters. Speaking to detikBali on October 22 about Palestinian author Adania Shibli, Seminyak visitor Ardy Rinaldy described the appeal of hearing directly from a writer.
“Hearing directly from the author how to raise awareness, inspire empathy and concrete action,” he said, translated from Indonesian. His comment captured an expectation that continued to resonate with Saturday’s programme.
Later, Randa Abdel-Fattah’s session on Discipline extended the discussion towards censorship, institutional complicity and the consequences of speaking publicly.
Finding Home in More Than One Place
Questions of belonging ran through several conversations. “Third-Culturism in the Literary World” brought together Anitha Devi Pillai, Uttama Kirti Patel and Xu Xi, with Santilla Chingaipe moderating. Its focus on writing between cultures and languages connected migration with the characters and narratives authors create.
“Redefining Home” approached those questions through contemporary Indonesia, featuring Carisya Nuramadea, Royyan Julian and Satyaning Pradnya Paramita. The programme linked changing ideas of home with memory, technology and social transformation.
For fashion designer and memoirist Prabal Gurung, Walk Like a Girl offered another route into identity. His conversation with Bandana Tewari connected a childhood in Kathmandu with an international creative career, examining the vulnerability and choices behind a public life.
Bali also became a subject of scrutiny. “Bali, Then and Now,” featuring Adrian Vickers, Anne-Lot Hoek and I Nyoman Darma Putra, moderated by Marlowe Bandem, examined how colonial histories and tourism had shaped the island’s identity. The discussion placed the festival’s host community within the wider questions being asked on its stages.
Keeping Memory Open to New Readers
Saturday’s programme made space for histories that demanded sustained attention. “Honouring Aprila Wayar’s Voice from Papua” recognised the writer and journalist’s contribution to Indonesian literature and her commitment to documenting Papuan experiences. The session featured Gispa Ferdinanda Warijo, Maria Guriti Amote and Olin Monteiro, with Rebecca Young moderating.
At Oaken Lab, Tari Lang’s scheduled conversation with Georgina Godwin returned to My Neighbour, the Dictator, her account of adolescence during Indonesia’s upheaval in 1965.
“It is a story that must be written,” Lang had said at the festival’s October 21 press conference, in Magdalene’s reporting. She stressed the continuing gaps in public knowledge about that period and the importance of bringing personal experience into historical discussion.
Memory also appeared in less familiar forms. At Bar Luna, Hermawan Tanzil and John H. McGlynn’s session on Indonesian visual culture examined a collection of 502 artefacts from the 1920s to the 1960s. Product labels, advertisements and letterheads became evidence of how people expressed identity through everyday objects.
Giving the Living World a Voice
Environmental storytelling was one of Saturday’s strongest connections between Indonesian and international experience.
“The Forest’s Fury” paired Indonesian conservationist Agung Wardana with David Lindenmayer and novelist Inga Simpson, moderated by Suzy Hutomo. The programme connected forests’ ecological functions with ancestral knowledge and the losses that followed their destruction.
“How to Speak Planet Earth,” featuring Kynan Tegar, Rebecca Higgie and Sekar Bestari, moderated by Dian Purnomo, approached the communication challenge directly: how could journalism, fiction and art make environmental change understandable without losing its complexity?
Book launches offered examples for different generations. “Our Home Is Not an Empty Wasteland” introduced three children’s books from Greenpeace Indonesia addressing threatened landscapes, plastic pollution and forest protection. Another session, “Stories and Images of a Changing Climate,” presented a collection described in the programme as bringing together more than 250 contributors through art, poetry, photography and personal narratives.
The evening film programme continued that focus with three works centred on environmental defenders and Indigenous communities in Borneo, followed by Ocean with David Attenborough. These screenings connected the day’s discussions with visual accounts of ecosystems and the people protecting them.
Building the Next Literary Connections
Alongside established names, Saturday offered practical opportunities for writers developing their work. “Pitch to Penguin” gave participants ten minutes to present a manuscript or book idea to Penguin Random House SEA representative Nora Nazerene Abu Bakar and receive feedback.
Reda Gaudiamo’s translation masterclass focused on fiction and children’s literature, while “Big Worlds for Little Readers” explored the craft of writing for young audiences. A free batik and storytelling workshop welcomed adults and children aged six and above with a parent or caregiver.
These activities reflected the wider purpose of the festival’s 23rd edition, whose organisers announced more than 150 authors, thinkers, journalists and poets and over 100 main-programme conversations across October 21–25.
As the day moved towards evening, Dee Lestari’s Mata Badai programme brought storytelling, poetry and song together at Titik Dua. “Poetry of the World” and “In the Shadow of Shiva” extended the exchange across languages and musical traditions.
Saturday’s programme connected the act of telling a story with the responsibility of hearing one. Across its literary, environmental and cultural encounters, Ubud made room for voices that could change how readers understood places—and people—beyond their own experience.
