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  5. The FIVE LEAF FESTIVAL
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The FIVE LEAF FESTIVAL

This Autumn, 3 November 2026, we will be celebrating legal scholarship and writing all day at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies with a FIVE LEAF legal literary festival.
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Details

  • When: 10:00-20:00, 3 November 2026.
  • Where: Centre for Commercial Law Studies at 67-69 Lincoln’s Inn Fields WC2A 3JB.

Enjoy author talks, signings, writing workshops, book proposal workshops, project pitches, industry stands, panels on getting published, publisher exhibits, industry stands, PhD workshops, the Festival Market, a charity book drive, and so much more! There will be 5 floors of events all day! And so many things to see and do throughout the Festival. There is something for everyone!

The FIVE LEAF Festival charity book drive will also be collecting books for Oxfam Bloomsbury. If you have some books to donate, please bring them along on the day! All genres welcome!

So, join us for the first FIVE LEAF Festival and celebrate authorship! It promises to be a very busy and very literary day!

Festival programme

Main stage (ground floor lecture theatre)

10.15 EU Anti-Money Laundering, Digital Currencies and Privacy (Bloomsbury, 2026) – Andreas Karapatakis (Author, University of Liverpool) in conversation with Rosa Lastra (CCLS, Queen Mary).

11:00 Photographs and Copyright Law Reproduction, Permissions, and Scholarship (Routledge, 2026) – Oğulcan Ekiz (Author, Cardiff University) in conversation with Isabelle Doran (CEO, Association of Photographers).

11:45 The Parthenon Marbles Dispute (Bloomsbury, Audiobook, 2026) – Alexander Herman (Author, Institute of Art and the Law), Dugald Bruce Lockhart (Narrator, stage and screen actor, director and writer), in conversation with Anna Ganley (CEO, Society of Authors).

12.30 Governing Digital Immortality: Artificial Intelligence, Deadbots and the Law (Elgar, 2026) – Edina Harbinja (Author, University of Birmingham) in conversation with Christy Chiang (Deputy Representative, Taipei Representative Office in the UK).

13.15 A Feminist Reconstruction of Intellectual Property Laws in Music (Elgar, 2025) – Metka Potočnik (Author, Wolverhampton) in conversation with Dennis Collopy (Menace Music).

14.00 PhD Sprints and Awards Ceremony:

  • Jasmine Hannah (CCLS, Queen Mary) – Painting the Narrative: An Exploration of Makeup Artistry as a Dramatic Work.
  • Harsimran Kaur (National Law University, Delhi) - Copyright Law vis-à-vis Hindustani Classical Music: Authorship, Originality and Performative Inheritance.
  • Panagiotis Lampropoulos (University of Glasgow/CREATe) – AI upscaling of films and the right of integrity: Securing autonomy for directors?
  • Bao Khanh Le (CCLS, Queen Mary) – Intellectual Property Finance in the Film Industry: A Case Study of the Sinosphere.

14.45 IP Before IP: Exercising and Protecting Creations and Inventions before the Modern IP Regime (Elgar, 2026) – Neil Wilkof (Author, Bressler Group) in conversation with Phillip Johnson (King’s College London).

15.30 Coming Clean: The Rise of Critical Theory and the Future of the Left (MIT Press, 2025) – Eric Heinze (Author, Queen Mary) in conversation with Milica Pešić (Media Diversity Institute) and Ed Bracho-Polanco (University of Westminster).

16.15 Internet Memes and Copyright Law: Diving into the Meme Pool (Routledge, 2026) – Brian Leung (Author, University of Leicester) in conversation with Jon Sharples (Howard Kennedy LLP).

17.00 Appearance, Disability and the Law (Cambridge University Press, 2025) – Hannah Saunders (Author, Queen Mary and Face Equality International) in conversation with Florian Koempel (IUSARTIUM Public Affairs Consultancy).

17.45 Elgar Encyclopedia of European Law (Elgar, 2027) – Oana Stefan (Editor, King’s College London) in conversation with Marilyn Clarke (Institute of Advanced Legal Studies).

18.30 Mobile Heritage: Practices, Interventions, Politics (Routledge, 2025) – Ana-Maria Herman (Editor, Cambridge), Johanna Gibson (Contributor, CCLS Queen Mary) and Alexander Herman (Contributor, Institute of Art and the Law) in conversation with Carey Young (Artist, Slade School of Fine Art).

19.15 Closing ceremony.

Backstage (behind the main stage)

Visit “backstage” to meet the authors, signings, and find out more about the soon-to-be famous FIVE LEAF Bookswap! Read a book, review a book, swap a book! Visit the Bookswap team to join the fun!

Downstage (lower ground floor)

Dedicated chill-out space and writing nook. Escape to read, review, and renew!

The PhD Stage (First floor, Rooms 1.1 and 1.2)

Room 1.1 – PhD posters and poster reel:

  • Jasmine Hannah (CCLS, Queen Mary) – Painting the Narrative: An Exploration of Makeup Artistry as a Dramatic Work.
  • Bao Khanh Le (CCLS, Queen Mary) – Intellectual Property Finance in the Film Industry: A Case Study of the Sinosphere.
  • Nichola McNulty (Queen’s University, Belfast) - Examining Femicide in Post-Conflict Northern Ireland Through the Lens of Feminist Jurisprudence: Advocating for Effective and Impactful Legislative Reform.

Room 1.2 – PhD workshops (one hour) with Apostolos Chronopoulos

  • 12.00 – PhD Information Session.
  • 15.00 – PhD Proposal Workshop.

The Publishing Stage (Second floor, Rooms 2.1 and 2.2)

Room 2.1 – Publishing workshops (one hour):

  • 11.00 – Book proposals and publishing (Roberta Bassi, Bloomsbury/Hart Publishing; Johanna Gibson, Queen Mary).
  • 13.00 – Journal publishing (Phillip Johnson, Editor Intellectual Property Quarterly).
  • 16.00 – Blogging workshop (Neil Wilkof, IPKat emeritus).

Room 2.2 – Meeting/break-out room.

The Market Stage (Third floor, Room 3.1 and adjacent networking space)

Visit the Festival Market for publisher stands, trade stands and more!

For more information, email us on: ccls-fiveleaf@qmul.ac.uk.

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