Author talks. Panel discussions. In-conversation sessions. Weekend format, single venue. This year, Sydney Jewish Writers Festival looked at the literary festival template and decided to do something else entirely.

What evolved was Festival of the Spoken Word — a month-long, multi-venue, multi-genre program of Jewish storytelling told live. Sixteen events, over four weeks, in multiple venues across Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs and North Shore we shared stores with over 1,300 attendees.

The spoken word offers something difficult to replicate elsewhere: a live encounter — imperfect, immediate, and profoundly human. As Hannah Saunders, Head of Program and Engagement at Shalom Collective, put it: “Long before the stories were written, published, or even posted online, they were spoken.”

The program grew from a clear need. It is a curious moment for words and for Jewish storytelling. Opportunities for Jewish creatives to share their work are increasingly limited, and Jewish artists do not have sufficient opportunities to develop and present new works. A call for works — spanning theatre, music, poetry, comedy, conversation, and staged readings — generated 45 applications. Sixteen were selected, including works awaiting their first development opportunity and adaptations of existing stories brought to the stage for the first time.

Opening Night: The Shalom Collective Australian Jewish Writer Awards 2026

The festival’s official opening on 3 August brought together two of the most compelling voices in contemporary Jewish literature. International authors Ayelet Tsabari and Yishay Ishi Ron joined Michaela Kalowski on stage at the Australian Jewish Writer Awards evening — an event that anchored the festival’s opening week.

Both authors had taken unlikely paths to their work. Ishi Ron experienced a total psychological collapse in 2022, and writing was the only thing he could still do. His debut novel Dog received two US National Jewish Book Awards and is now being adapted into a film. “Knowing that a novel I wrote has become a therapeutic tool is one of the greatest privileges I could ever imagine as a writer,” Ishi Ron said. Tsabari’s Songs for the Brokenhearted grew from growing up in Israel never seeing Yemeni characters in the books she read — the novel became her way of changing that.

Winners were announced across five categories of Australian Jewish writing. Sydney Aaranson, Australian Jewish Writer Awards program manager, said the shortlists captured a snapshot of Jewish writing in Australia, from memoir and history to fiction and poetry. “It takes courage to put work out into the world, particularly at a time when it is challenging to tell Jewish stories. But there is real value in it — seeing our own culture and our own lives reflected in a book or on a stage is deeply moving and strengthens our community.”

The Stories

The festival opened on the North Shore the night before with One of a Kind — a semi-staged musical in development following a wealthy Egyptian Jewish family forced to leave everything behind in 1957 and rebuild their lives in Sydney, blending Middle Eastern musical traditions with contemporary musical theatre. It brought to the Australian stage a story that had never been told through musical theatre. Read more.

Dear Jessy, Dear Miriam offered something more intimate — an imagined friendship between two Jewish women who might have met as 13-year-olds at Hakoah Club, tracing their connection through adolescence, identity, and the curious timing of finding each other, told through letters between Sydney and Melbourne. Read more.

The Border, directed by Galit Klas and starring Alexis Fishman and Lloyd Allison-Young, opened at JFK Airport: a routine customs interrogation that spirals into something far more dangerous when Tsippy Shulman arrives in New York following her mother’s death. What begins as a visa interview becomes a tense reckoning with migration, deferred ambition, Jewish identity, and the seductive myth of America.

And then there was You Were Great in Shule! — comedian Tami Sussman and Kate Lewis’s live recording of their comedy podcast, had a crowd of 200 in fits of laughter, exploring the funny, awkward, and very familiar world of Bar and Bat Mitzvah celebrations. SBS Hebrew spoke to Tami ahead of the show.

Across the month, audiences also encountered Simon Tedeschi AM’s Fugitive — his collision of piano and memoir — Ron Elisha’s Wake directed by Suzanne Heywood, On Having Been Here directed by Alexis Fishman, and Nadav Kahn’s Hineinu: Songs for This Time. The artists who spoke to SBS Hebrew across the festival reflected on the importance of having a space where they feel safe to express themselves and show up as they are — through song, music, theatre, and comedy. Listen here.

By the Numbers

• 1,368 people across the festival
• 16 events
• Over 50 artists and creatives supported
• 4 languages: English, Hebrew, Arabic, and Yiddish
• 45 applications received; 16 selected
• Staged across Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs and North Shore

The Coverage

Festival of the Spoken Word was covered across print, digital, and radio — by the Australian Jewish News, The Jewish Independent, J-Wire, Books+Publishing, SBS Hebrew Radio, and Eastside FM.

• SJWF goes live with month of spoken word — Australian Jewish News
• New Festival of the Spoken Word brings Jewish stories to life — The Jewish Independent
• Two girls, two cities, one imagined friendship — Australian Jewish News
• Egyptian Jewish story hits the stage in Sydney — Australian Jewish News
• Words that heal and hold — Australian Jewish News
• Jewish Writer Awards winners announced — Australian Jewish News
• The winning Jewish books by Australians in the past year — The Jewish Independent
• Australian Jewish Writer Awards celebrate literary achievement — J-Wire
• Shalom Collective Australian Jewish Writer Awards 2026 winners announced — Books+Publishing
• The Spoken Word Festival: Where Stories Take the Stage — SBS Hebrew
• Celebrating the bar and bat mitzvah year – The Australian Jewish News
• https://www.jwire.com.au/sydney-jewish-writers-festival-takes-stories-from-page-to-stage/
• https://www.sbs.com.au/language/hebrew/en/podcast-episode/spoken-word-festival-with-simon-tedeschi-am-creator-of-fugitive/477n09yee

Festival of the Spoken Word is presented by Sydney Jewish Writers Festival, created by Shalom Collective. With thanks to Waverly Council, Woollahra Council, The Australian Jewish News, Gertrude & Alice Café Bookstore, Multicultural NSW, Adina Chippendale Sydney and our funding partner JCA.

Shalom Collective creates contemporary Jewish experiences that celebrate culture, deepen identity, and build a thriving community.

Through immersive art, food, festivals and intergenerational storytelling, we bring people together in joyful, meaningful, and imaginative ways.

Photo: Loretta Godfrey Photography