Never Again is Now
In 2025, it is impossible to organise a literary festival without acknowledging one of the greatest humanitarian and moral crises of our time. As the world watches, a horrifying tragedy unfolds in Gaza. Writers, readers, thinkers – in other words, all of us – cannot and will not look away.
Under the banner Never Again is Now, the Exploring Stories programme delves into how Dutch and international writers and thinkers grapple with the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people. Themes such as memory, responsibility, and resistance are central to this series. What does it mean to say “never again” while witnessing history repeat itself in real time? How do we write about trauma when the trauma hasn’t ended? What does it mean to commemorate if we shut our eyes to the present? Whose voices are we hearing – and whose are being systematically ignored or demonised? Why do so many people avert their gaze from violence that happens “elsewhere”?
Through essays, novels, pamphlets and personal testimonies, writers such as Isabella Hammad, Maurits de Bruijn, Omar El Akkad and Sinan Çankaya explore what literature can – and crucially, cannot – do in times of humanitarian crisis. They remind us that literature is not innocent. They search for language to name the unbearable, pose questions where politics remains silent, and confront us with uncomfortable truths about identity, history, and complicity.
With Never Again is Now, we create space for urgent conversations about what we remember, what we choose not to see, and what meaning, if any, “never again” still has in a time when history’s darkest patterns are once again unfolding.