M A I N   N E W S

JAIPUR LIT FEST BEGINS TODAY
Pink City set to welcome bibliophiles
Vandana Shukla/TNS

BOOKs & more A friendly cricket match was organised between the authors here to attend the lit fest and Royals XI on Wednesday The festival will open on Thursday morning with “O! to live again” keynote address by eminent author Mahashweta Devi 17 Indian languages will feature at the festival Four sessions will be held to exclusively cover all aspects of publishing

Jaipur, January 23
Jaipur is at its quintessential colourful best: The Pink City in a pink winter garb. True to its legacy, this year, too, DSC Jaipur Literature Festival-2013, in its sixth edition, promises more than lovers of the printed word can absorb in five days (January 24 to 28). Thirty-five sessions a day, with five stimulating sessions going on simultaneously, make the choice hard for the geeks thronging Jaipur from far-off places.

Hotels are booked to capacity and the city is abuzz with more than literature is capable of evoking: controversies. While saffron groups are threatening not to let the Pakistani authors participate in the fest, some Islamic clerics and scholars from groups like Azmat-E-Namoos-E-Rasool, who did not allow Salman Rushdie to enter Jaipur lit fest last year, are demanding that the four authors who read excerpts from The Satanic Verses last year (Jeet Thayil, Ruchir Joshi, Amitva Kumar and Hari Kunzru) should be banned from participating in the fest. Ironically, today Jeet Thayil’s debut novel “Narcopolis” featured among five novels showcasing the diversity and depth of writing from Istanbul to Tokyo in the shortlist for the 2012 Man Asian Literary Prize.

Fortunately, for the masses who come to get a feel of the new trends in literature as well as to expand their mental horizon, these protests remain on the fringe. They never become part of the main orchestra that offers an amazing ensemble of book reading sessions, poetry recitations, discussions, debates and above all, an opportunity to meet their favourite authors. To accommodate growing footfalls, a new venue named Charbagh has been added this year.

This year, the festival is almost free of “star writers”. It has been done deliberately, after last year’s experience of Oprah Winfrey and Salman Rushdie controversy, that, in away paled other important deliberations. The focus this year will be on serious issues confronting the word of writing. Three Samuel Johnson Prize winners-historian Orlando Figes, Frank Dikotter and Wade Davis-are going to be there from Harvard University. Michael Sandel, a political philosopher, Homi K Bhabha, professor and Padma Bhushan recipient, and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak from Columbia will speak on post-colonial literature. Christopher Ricks from Oxford will address a session on “The Global Shakespeare”.

William Dalrymple, JLF co-director, says “non-fiction list is especially strong this year”. Namita Gokhale adds, “Every single voice is important to us. They might not be a household name like Oprah Winfrey, but they are all highly famous and eminent in their field of work.”

With 42 women writers voicing different feminist concerns, women issues will remain at the centre stage. Commonwealth Prize winner Aminatta Forna from Sierra Leone, Booker Prize winner Howard Jacobson and Orange Prize winners Linda Grant and Madeline Miller, promise to keep the literary discourse engaging and hot in Jaipur.