A new Ukrainian-Polish literary festival has been launched in Poland

A new literary festival titled “The City with a River” is focusing on Ukrainian-Polish dialogue. The event will take place for the first time in the border city of Przemyśl from Aug. 14 to 17, 2025.

The event aims to unite Ukrainian and Polish cultures through literature, “symbolically using the San River as a bridge between people, experiences, and perspectives.”

“The central idea of the festival is the border — in every sense of the word. It’s a place of collision, transition, edge — a space of passage. The border offers us many different possibilities. So during the festival, we want to reflect on how border-related identity shapes who we are,” said festival director and board member of the Association of Ukrainians in Poland, Kateryna Komar-Macyńska.

The program includes concerts, performances, guided tours, and events featuring Ukrainian and Polish writers and cultural figures.

Participants will include Polish poet, novelist, and playwright Andrzej Stasiuk; Polish poet, photographer, and scholar Małgorzata Lebda; and Ukrainian writers Andriy Lyubka, Tamara Duda, Petro Yatsenko, and Anastasia Levkova, among others.

Highlighted events of the festival:

August 13, 2025 — “She is Crimea, She is the World” — exhibition opening and discussion on Crimea, art, and resistance

August 14, 2025 — “A View from Afar. Russia Through Western Eyes” — a conversation between Paweł Reszka and Kuba Benedyczak

August 15, 2025 — “Collision with War” — a conversation between Marichka Paplauskaite and Tomasz Szeren

August 15, 2025 — “Crimea Beyond the Edge” — a talk with Anastasia Levkova

August 16, 2025 — “Accessible Memory. War from the Rear Side” — a discussion with Andriy Lyubka

August 17, 2025 — “Stories from Our Yard” — a meeting with Olha Kupriyan

The full festival program is available via the link.

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