(Indonesia, 1948) is considered one of the most important Indonesian writers of today. His novels A Shooting Star at Dawn and The Dancer appeared in Dutch, German, English, Japanese and Chinese translation. The novels are part of the trilogy Ronggeng Dukuh Paruk, about an 11-year old village girl who works as a dancer and prostitute and who, in the unruly days of the 1965 coup unwillingly became the mascot of the Communist Party. Tohari grew up in the Javanese village of Tinggarjaya. He developed his own vision on Indonesian Islam, thereby honouring and preserving local Indonesian traditions. Early 1970s he moved to Jakarta where he worked for the newspaper Harian Merdeka and the magazine Amanah. He was already writing short stories, poems and essays. After having lived in Jakarta for two decades he returned to his source of inspiration, the countryside. In 2009 Tohari founded the magazine Ancas (Vision) in his region of birth to promote the local language, Banyumasan. In addition, he runs an Islamic school, promotes Javan folk art and is an advisor for the Ministry of Culture.

(The Netherlands, 1946) grew up in a family with a past in the Dutch East Indies. He draws on these experiences in several of his works such as My Father's War (1995), Repatriated (2002) and in Naar zachtheid en een warm omhelzen (2023). Van Dis became well known via his literary television programme Here is... Adriaan van Dis (1983-1992). In addition to novels he has written novellas, travelogues, essays and plays. He presented TV documentary series and his podcast Van Dis Ongefilterd. He has received the Constantijn Huygens Award for his entire body of work. Recent publications are the collection Vijf vrolijke verhalen (2021), the novel KliFi, woede in de republiek Nederland (2022) and the essay De kolonie mept terug: over witte arrogantie en voortschrijdend inzicht: een denkoefening en leesreis (2024). During the Writers Unlimited Festival 2026, Van Dis will be the main interview guest on Saturday afternoon, 24 January, following the publication of his new book Alles voor de reis (Everything for the Journey), and on Sunday morning, 25 January, he and interviewer Simon Dikker Hupkes will record a new episode of his podcast series Van Dis Ongefilterd (Van Dis Unfiltered) live with an audience.

Go to website of Adriaan van Dis

(Roermond, NL 1954) is De Volkskrant and NOS Journaal (Dutch 8 o' clock news) correspondent in southeast Asia. He studied philosophy and worked as a journalist for De Volkskrant from 1986. As a literary reporter he talked to A.F.Th. van der Heijden, W.F. Hermans, Hugo Claus among others and Nobel Prize winners Derek Walcott and Seamus Heaney. In 1994 his first novel was published, De Vleugels van Lieu Hanh (Lieu Hanh's Wings), on a journey through Vietnam in which history plays a prominent role. It won him the Geertjan Lubberhuizen Prize. In 1996 he settled as eastern Europe correspondent in Budapest and covered the war in Kosovo. His reports were collected in Kosovo: Verslag van een oorlog (Kosovo: Report of a War). It was awarded the NDP Prize for daily newspaper journalism. In 2001 he exchanged eastern Europe for southeast Asia and started working for NOS (a public network). In 2010 he himself was in the news when during a live radio broadcast of the eviction of a protest camp in Bangkok he was shot at.