The Queen has officially opened the 2025 Cliveden Literary Festival today.

Queen Camilla hosted a reception for authors, festival supporters, charity partners, and students from the London Academy of Excellence.

 

Established in 2017, Cliveden Literary Festival draws on Cliveden House’s unique history as a literary salon frequented by writers and thinkers, including Alexander Pope, Alfred Lord Tennyson, George Bernard Shaw, Jonathan Swift and Sir Winston Churchill.

Today’s event was the eighth Cliveden Literary Festival and Queen Camilla delivered a speech to mark the occasion.Queen Camilla

The Queen has officially opened the 2025 Cliveden Literary Festival today.

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GETTY

The Queen also met the festival’s founders — Simon Sebag Montefiore, Natalie Livingstone, Lord Roberts of Belgravia, and Catherine Ostler.

Following this, panel members participating in a session on the importance of reading and studying literature held a discussion with the Queen, including Sir Salman Rushdie, Sir Jonathan Bate and Dame Marina Warner.

Queen Camilla then visited the Clock Tower Stage, where Simon Sebag Montefiore invited her to officially open the festival.

The Queen’s speech highlighted the importance of reading and studying literature.

Queen Camilla

Queen Camilla hosted a reception for authors, festival supporters, charity partners, and students from the London Academy of Excellence.

 | GETTY

The royal’s engagement concluded with her hosting a reception in the French Dining Room at Cliveden House.

The reception was attended by festival speakers, supporters, students from the London Academy of Excellence, with whom the festival enjoys a successful partnership, and a representative of Book Aid International, one of the festival’s charity partners.

Last month, Queen Camilla attended The Queen’s Reading Room Festival at Chatsworth House.

The royal met with people participating in one of the charity’s grassroots outreach programmes, watched a performance of Jane Austen’s work and met members of the public attending a showing of Pride and Prejudice on the lawns of the house.