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heritage · Thursday 17 September 2026 · Various 
Listowel International Storytelling Festival
At Kerry Writers' Museum · 24 The Square, Listowel, Co. Kerry
At Kerry Writers' Museum · 24 The Square, Listowel, Co. Kerry
The Listowel International Storytelling Festival takes over Kerry Writers’ Museum for four days, from Thursday 17 to Sunday 20 September 2026, bringing tellers and audiences together around what the museum calls “the ancient artform of storytelling.” The festival is organised by the museum on Listowel’s town square, in a town that already trades heavily on its writers, from John B. Keane to Bryan MacMahon to Brendan Kennelly, and it treats oral storytelling as a living tradition rather than a museum piece, aiming to reach listeners of every age over the festival weekend.
Sessions run across the museum’s rooms and public spaces over the four days, mixing performances from visiting and local storytellers with workshops and informal sessions aimed at newcomers as much as seasoned tellers. The festival sits alongside the museum’s regular programming, which includes interactive writer’s rooms dedicated to John B. Keane and Brendan Kennelly, a Kerry Women in Literature strand, and the Púca Story Trail through the town. Listowel has run the festival for several years running, building it into one of the fixed points on the town’s cultural calendar alongside Listowel Writers’ Week each summer. Exact session times vary across the weekend, so checking the museum’s own programme nearer the date is worthwhile before travelling for a specific event within it.
Kerry Writers’ Museum is on The Square in the centre of Listowel, on the N69 road between Tralee and Limerick. The town is served by Bus Éireann routes, and the museum is a short walk from any parking in the town centre.
Listowel calls itself Ireland’s literary capital, and the storytelling festival is one more expression of that identity, sitting inside the same building as the town’s permanent writer’s rooms. There is more to see in Listowel and across Co. Kerry.
Heading to Kerry Writers' Museum in Listowel? Kerry has plenty more to see. Read the Listowel area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.
In town for Kerry Writers' Museum? These Kerry tours book out in summer.