Japan foundation-supported Filipino guest writer Kristian Sendon Cordero to participate in the Ubud Writers & Readers Festival 2026

Filipino poet, fictionist, translator, and filmmaker Kristian Sendon Cordero will participate as a Filipino guest writer at the Ubud Writers & Readers Festival (UWRF) 2026 in Bali, Indonesia, with his travel and participation supported by the Japan Foundation.

One of Southeast Asia’s most established international literary gatherings, the Ubud Writers & Readers Festival brings together writers, poets, translators, artists, thinkers, and readers from Indonesia and around the world. Held annually in Ubud, Bali, the Festival has become an important meeting place for literature, translation, cultural exchange, and conversations across languages and borders.

Cordero’s participation will feature two major engagements: a panel on translation and a World Poetry Reading in which he will present his poetry in three Philippine languages—Bikol, Rinconada, and Filipino.

The translation panel will draw on Cordero’s long-standing work as a writer and translator moving between Philippine languages and world literature. His practice has included translating major international writers into Bikol and Filipino while also bringing Philippine literature into English, Spanish, and other languages. For Cordero, translation is not simply a linguistic exercise but a way of creating encounters between different literary traditions, histories, and cultural imaginations.

His World Poetry Reading will foreground the multilingual character of Philippine literature. By presenting works in Bikol, Rinconada, and Filipino, Cordero brings to the international festival not one singular Philippine literary voice, but three linguistic and cultural traditions that form part of the country’s complex literary landscape.

Cordero’s participation continues his advocacy for Philippine literature and translation in international literary spaces. He was among the writers and cultural workers involved in the Philippines’ international literary engagements surrounding the country’s Guest of Honour programme at the Frankfurt Book Fair, where he served as co-head of the Translation Committee. His work has likewise taken him to literary festivals, universities, and cultural institutions in Asia, Europe, and the Americas.

The support of the Japan Foundation for his travel and participation further underscores the importance of regional literary exchange and the movement of writers across Asian cultural and linguistic borders. His appearance in Ubud offers another opportunity to place Philippine languages and literature in conversation with the broader Asian literary community.