Record tickets sales with £20,000 in revenue and 13 events sold out at Literary Festival

The Gibunco Gibraltar Literary Festival will feature 45 events and more than 40 authors this week, with Gibraltar Cultural Services’ Chief Cultural Officer Seamus Byrne describing how the event has already surpassed its previous ticket sales record and must continue to grow while reflecting the Rock’s cultural identity.

The Gibunco Gibraltar Literary Festival has grown year on year, with sales breaking records and events selling out. 

Gibraltar Cultural Services’ Chief Cultural Officer Seamus Byrne said the festival had grown from around 30 events last year to 45 this year, with more than 40 authors taking part. 

The festival will run this week from Monday, November 9 to Sunday, November 15, with a programme combining international authors, local writers, educational activities, performances and discussions covering a range of subjects.  

Mr Byrne, who was appointed Festival Director by the Minister for Culture, Christian Santos, a year and a half ago, said the ambition was to make the festival “bigger and better” while ensuring it remained distinct from other international literary events. 

This year’s event has already surpassed the previous record for ticket sales, with over 80% sold, and more than £20,000 generated in ticket revenue. 

Mr Byrne said Gibraltar needs to remain ahead of other festivals because of its location and the competition for international authors and visitors. 

The festival is promoted as a tourism-led event, with Mr Byrne describing how more than 10,000 cruise passengers are expected to be in Gibraltar during the festival week. 

The Tourist Board has been supporting efforts to attract visitors, while ticket sales had also indicated interest from the United Kingdom and the United States. 

Mr Byrne added that GCS plans to produce a report after the festival to assess its economic and tourism impact, including visitor numbers and marketing performance, and highlighted that this is not a taxpayer-funded event. 

The festival, he said, is possible due to the sponsors of the event and he hopes for further involvement from the business community, both financially and through practical assistance such as shops opening during the festival. 

“I think the business community should be more engaged as well in supporting us,” he said. 

“This is a flagship event of Gibraltar, as is the Gibraltar Music Festival. There are two major international events every year in Gibraltar.” 

The festival programme has been developed in response to community interests, while introducing new elements. 

Among the additions are events involving Gibraltar’s religious denominations, with Archbishop, Alfred Xuereb, who was the private secretary to the late Pope Benedict XVI presenting his book and, for Gibraltar’s Moroccan community, Dr Ali Bahijoub will be talking about the conflicts of the Western Sahara. 

The programme will also include a Spanish language event. 

“I think it's important not only with the work that we are doing with the Llanito language, but also it's important that we have Spanish language as part of our offering, even if it's one talk, because it's part of our cultural fabric,” he said. 

Other additions include the launch of Alice Mascarenhas’s eighth Alice’s Table in collaboration with this newspaper, a library tour led by Manolo Galliano and a candlelight event featuring John Suchet and the Straits Orchestra. 

The festival will also feature a semi-dramatisation of Margaret Thatcher’s final days in office, presented by Lord Charles Moore and Kate Ehrman, and musician Phil Manzanera will perform live at the Sunborn on Thursday, November 12. 

The festival includes Projecto Slam, a new initiative led by Jonathan Teuma and Davina Barbara in collaboration with educational establishments. 

The project involves secondary school students from Bayside, Westside and Prior Park, with its grand final scheduled for December 14. 

Mr Byrne said the festival was intended to become a year-round programme rather than an event limited to one week in November, adding that preparations for the following year have begun well in advance, with 28 authors already confirmed for the 2027 festival. 

He added that the festival’s ambitions extended beyond its November programme, with the intention of organising events throughout the year and encouraging wider participation from Gibraltar’s cultural community. 

His long-term aim is to establish the festival among the leading literary events in the United Kingdom. 

“I've always said that we need to try and aim to be the best festival in the United Kingdom,” he said. 

This year’s marketing campaign through the Government’s London office had reached 7.3 million people in the United Kingdom through BBC radio channels. 

The Gibraltar festival is also affiliated with the Oxford Literary Festival, and the Minister for Culture and Tourism, Christian Santos, introduced the Gibraltar Talk in Oxford.  

“I think it was important for us to introduce it, because there needs to be that promotion of Gibraltar in Oxford and it's important that we carry on this amazing working relationship that we've always had for the last 12 years,” Mr Byrne said. 

This year marks the National Year of Reading in the UK, marking a national effort to address the decline of reading for pleasure and Mr Byrne highlighted the importance of the Literary Festival’s schools programme. 

“I think the school's programme needs to be central to the work that we do,” he said. 

“It needs to be central so that we can carry on encouraging young people to pursue literature and to pursue performing arts.” 

The festival also continues to support local authors through writing workshops, poetry and short story competitions, book grants and book launches. 

Mr Byrne said the aim was to help local writers move beyond self-publishing and establish links with publishing houses. 

He also highlighted the potential for Gibraltar’s books to be translated into other languages, including Llanito and Spanish. 

Mr Byrne would continue to set ambitious targets, including increasing visitor numbers, ticket sales and business support, adding that the aim is to ensure the festival continued to grow while supporting reading, writing, publishing and the wider arts in Gibraltar.