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Why literary giants like Margaret Atwood, Nobel laureate Han Kang and Amitav Ghosh wrote books that will never be read in their lifetime
23 September 2026

Why literary giants like Margaret Atwood, Nobel laureate Han Kang and Amitav Ghosh wrote books that will never be read in their lifetime

Big Ideas

About

The Future Library is filled with unpublished books written for readers yet to be born. Every year a new literary work is commissioned to be held in trust in a special room in the National Library of Norway. And in a forest just outside Oslo, 1,000 Spruce are growing - waiting until 2114 to fulfil their role: To be pulped and transform these unseen words into print. This hundred-year literary artwork by Scottish artist Katie Paterson is one of the most internationally acclaimed long-term cultural projects of our time. 

Presented at the National Library of Australia in partnership with the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Canberra.

Speakers

Anne Beate Hovind  Norwegian urban developer, curator and cultural producer of Future Library (2014–2114) by Katie Paterson

Kathryn Favelle (host)Director of Community Engagement, National Library of Australia in Canberra