Óbidos literary festival to mark 500 years since Machiavelli's death

The 2027 edition of the Fólio – International Literary Festival of Óbidos will commemorate the 500th anniversary of the death of Niccolò Machiavelli. Under the theme “Who tells the World?”, the festival aims to explore the relationship between reality, appearances, and the power of words.

Filipe Daniel, president of the Óbidos Municipality, highlighted the festival's goal of democratizing access to literature. The municipality invests approximately 500,000 euros into the event, which features free admission. To encourage reading, the local government provides 20-euro book vouchers to over 1,600 municipal students and maintains reading spaces in former churches and markets to ensure culture is not restricted to an elite audience.