In 2026, the increasingly popular Ljubljana UNESCO City of Literature Writer in the Park residency program received an exceptional number of applications from all over the world. One hundred writers from 30 Cities of Literature applied to spend a month in Ljubljana. The residency program offers space in a creative environment for uninterrupted work at any stage of the writing process and provides opportunities for insight into the local literary scene. For 2026, the selection committee has invited Mariken Heitman from the Netherlands and Tim Craven from the UK as guests of the international Writer in the Park residency in Ljubljana.
Mariken Heitman (1983) studied biology in Utrecht and for several years worked in organic agriculture. She has published three award-winning novels and also writes essays, short stories, columns, and book reviews. The committee particularly praised Heitman’s clear style and command of challenging topics, as well as her exploration of the multilayered relationship between the individual, society, and nature. Specifically, Mariken Heitman is exploring themes related to humanity’s place in nature in the context of agriculture and religion.
“I am currently working on a novel in which I combine an autofictional storyline with a fictional narrative, set in the late Iron Age. I am deeply fascinated by the disturbed relationship between humans and nature. This relationship can best be explored where humans and nature most emphatically meet: agriculture. As a biologist and gardener, I am struck by how much nature is seen as a backdrop these days. Yet we, as human organisms, are completely dependent on nature. Even now that everything is under pressure due to the climate crisis, nature remains at a distance: it must be saved, conquered, or exploited.”
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Tim Craven is an award-winning poet (Scottish National Book Award, Forward Prize) exploring class, masculinity, and mental health. He has a background in neuroscience. In his work, he uses scientific observation to investigate interior experience. The committee was impressed by Tim Craven’s precise poetic language, as unassuming as it is impactful, which quietly deconstructs cultural expectations and internalized behaviours.
“My current creative focus is the development of a poetry collection that examines modern masculinity and the ways inherited ideas about strength, restraint, and emotional control continue to shape contemporary life. The poems will explore the tension between older models of composure and toughness and the contemporary language of openness and vulnerability, focusing on moments where those frameworks come into conflict. Rather than arguing a position, the work attends closely to everyday situations – habits of speech, omissions, and small acts of control – where these pressures quietly surface.”
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The cities with the most applications were Kraków, followed by Barcelona and Edinburgh. The majority of applicants were aged 40–49, with the youngest in the 20–29 age group and the oldest in the 70–79 age group. Because the program’s call for applications allows applicants to describe their relationship to the chosen City of Literature, more than 40 nationalities were represented.
This year, several applicants explicitly mentioned interests in topics such as displacement, migration, and identity, critically engaging with histories of oppression and climate change. Regarding the importance of artist-in-residence programs, many applicants emphasized the need to escape daily routines that often interfere with their creative process.