After a five-year hiatus, the Calabash International Literacy Festival returns to Treasure Beach in St Elizabeth between May 26-28 with a slew of renowned poets and authors.

Justine Henzell, director of the festival, explained that the writers were intricately chosen.

“We get big pieces and we put them [together] and then we move other pieces around to make the whole picture, because we want to make sure that we have all different age groups, genders, nationalities, and orientations.

“Kwame Dawes [co-founder] is a brilliant puzzle maker and he put together these puzzle pieces to have a full picture in the programme,” she told the Jamaica Observer at the launch of the event held at 10A West King’s House Road in St Andrew on Tuesday.

This year’s theme is ‘Onward Upward…For Word’, and the line-up will feature the likes of Xavier Navarro Aquino, Yvonne Bailey-Smith, Margaret Busby, Maisy Card, David Chariandy, Staceyann Chin, Natalie Diaz, Jonathan Escoffery, Curdella Forbes, Yona Harvey, Cathy Park Hong, Kevin Jared Hosein, Linton Kwesi Johnson, Sadie Jones, Nicole Krauss, Padma Lakshmi, Alecia McKenzie, Kei Miller, Andrew Motion, Joyce Carol Oates, Ingrid Persaud, Jeremy Poynting, Roger Robinson, Taiye Selasi, Olive Senior, Namwali Serpell, and Tom Zoellner.

There will also be a tribute to Michael Thelwell’s novel The Harder They Come 50 years after the film of the same name was released.

The Calabash International Literary Festival was founded in 2001 by novelist Colin Channer, poet Kwame Dawes, and Henzell. Over the years, an impressive raft of literary greats has presented at the festival.

Tuesday’s launch also saw author Mateo Askaripour reading an excerpt from his novel Black Buck. According to Henzell, the versatility that comes with the mixture of creatives at this year’s festival will make it memorable.

“It’s hard to say that Calabash is going to be different because it’s a three day weekend in Treasure Beach. We are going to have an amazing array of authors and poets from all around the world; so those things remain constant. But, what also remains constant is that we’re diverse, so it’s going to be different at the same time, as well as the same — if that makes sense. When we have those 30 people on stage, they’re bringing all different points of view; they’re bringing all different voices. The reading that we heard tonight, none of us have heard that particular voice before. We’re excited for all the things that remain the same, but we’re excited for all the changes,” she said.

In the past, Calabash has drawn attention to the work of Caribbean writers such as Kamau Braithwaite, Erna Brodber, John Hearne, Roger Mais, Jean Rhys, Neville Dawes, V S Naipaul, Claude McKay and Orlando Patterson, all of whom have been celebrated at the festival.