Melbourne Rare Book Week (MRBW) will return from 24 July – 2 August with a program of events, exhibitions and lectures that celebrate the world of rare and collectible books.
Established in 2012 as the world’s first rare book week, MRBW has become an annual festival. The 2025 program features 43 free events, delivered across Melbourne in collaboration with Victoria’s leading cultural institutions. Talks and lectures cover a diverse range of topics including significant women in the natural sciences, the English Civil War and history of free speech, balladeers singing the news in premodern times, the evolution of medicine from witchcraft to science, and Australia’s first woman crime writer.
