The Printers Row Lit Fest is the biggest outdoor free literary event in the Midwest. Held on Chicago’s Dearborn and Polk Street between Harrison and Polk, the two-day annual festival attracts over 125,000 book lovers every year. Originally called Printers Row Book Fair, the festival was founded in 1985 by the Near South Planning Board. Its goal was to attract visitors to the Printers Row neighborhood, which was once the hub of the city’s book printing industry. The festival quickly grew to occupy five city blocks, with more than 200 booksellers from all over the country. They were selling new, used, and antiquarian books, and had over 100 free literary programs on seven stages. The Chicago Tribune bought the book fair in 2002 and renamed it the Printers Row Lit Fest.

620 S Dearborn St (Between Congress and Polk), Chicago, Illinois

Boston Book Festival Bay Area Book Festival Summer Words Books by the Banks Cincinnati Book Festival Brooklyn Book Festival Decatur Book Festival Key West Literary Seminar Litquake Los Angeles Times Festival Of Books Louisiana Book Festival National Book Festival National Cowboy Poetry Gathering PEN World Voices Portland Book Festival Printers Row Lit Fest Saints and Sinners Literary Festival Savannah Book Festival Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival Texas Book Festival The Miami Book Fair International The Pebble Beach Authors & Ideas Festival Tucson Festival of Books Virginia Festival of the Book Wisconsin Book Festival

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