TFFS 2026: Poetries from the Bookstores: Somewhere I Belong (2025)

As part of Taiwan Film Festival in Scotland 2026: From the Mountain, From the Sea, we are delighted to present the UK Premiere of Poetries from the Bookstores: Somewhere I Belong (書店裡的影像詩:停駐與穿越) by 侯季然 HOU Chi-jan.

From bustling city streets to remote mountain villages and coastal communities, this documentary captures the enduring charm of Taiwan’s independent bookshops and the people who sustain them. More than places that sell books, these bookshops serve as spaces for cultural exchange, community dialogue, and reflection, each shaped by the distinctive landscapes and histories that surround them.

Through a lyrical and intimate lens, the film explores the profound relationship between books, people, and place. Moving across Taiwan’s mountains, coastlines, and urban neighbourhoods, it reveals how local communities continue to imagine, preserve, and reinvent their ways of living.

Both a celebration of independent bookselling and a meditation on belonging, Poetries from the Bookstores: Somewhere I Belong is a love letter to readers, dreamers, and anyone searching for a place to call home.

UK Premiere

Age Guidance: U

*This screening features an online Q&A with director Hou Chi-Jan.

*This event is funded by the Ferguson Bequest. Professor Thomas Ferguson (1900–1977), Henry Mechan Chair of Public Health (1944–64), bequeathed his estate to the University with the instruction that it should be used to “foster the social side of University life”.