Thank you so much for joining us at this years festival. Join us for the Merritt Dialogues on the 8 July. 

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VOLUNTEER

Maya Cinnamongirl

Fourteen-year-old author Maya is a Berkeley/Oakland native whose writing is deeply shaped by the vibrant culture and diversity of her hometown. A student at a French immersion school and a competitive swimmer, Maya balances her athletic drive with a passion for storytelling. Through her work with Cinnamongirl, she discovered a powerful platform to find her voice and express herself more freely.

Where to find me at the festival
May 30, 2026 - I Am the Moment: Voices of a New Generation

VIEW ALL OUR 2026 SPEAKERS

Dan Alter

Dan Alter’s poems, reviews and translations have been published in journals including Field, Fourteen Hills, and Zyzzyva; his first collection My Little Book of Exiles won the 2022 Cowan Poetry Prize. A volume of translations Take a Breath, You’re Getting Excited, from the Hebrew of Yakir Ben-Moshe, was published by Ben Yehuda Press in September 2024, and Hills Full of Holes, a second collection of poems, by Fernwood Press in March 2025. He lives with his wife and daughter in Berkeley. He works at the Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at UC Berkeley.

2025 Writers’ Workshops

Speaker – A Compass in the Wilderness: Poetry in the Age of Environmental Crisis