The Bangalore Literature Festival is one of the most anticipated events of the year and the upcoming 11th edition promises to be a treat with some notable names being part of the fest. Actor Farhan Akhtar and footballer Sunil Chhetri apart from celebrated authors such as Pico Iyer, Geetanjali Shree, William Dalrymple and Snehan Karuna-tilaka are some of the prominent names set to grace the occasion.
The festival will feature LitMart, where aspiring writers can pitch their book ideas to publishers and literary agents. For the first time, there will also be something called ScreenLit — a platform where budding screenwriters can pitch their scripts to producers, directors, writers, and film reviewers. Shinie Antony, one of the co-founders and the director of the festival, talks about what one can expect from this upcoming event. “Every year new books are reviewed, therefore authors also change from year to year. Apart from the sessions on food, fiction, and travel, we are back with LitMart, where first-time authors can pitch their manu-scripts to editors and publishers. Also, this year, for the very first time we start ScreenLit, a platform for scriptwriters to pitch their ideas to filmmakers.”
The literature festival does not have a theme, rather the issues that will be talked about depend on the books and sessions that will be covered at the event. “We go where the books take us. We cover new books, and the topics of those decide the issues we discuss,” Shinie shares, adding, “This city is very open to new experiences, to creativity from outside as well as inside. It is a city of serious readers, who are not pretentious about their literary knowledge.”
Some of the interesting sessions one can look forward to are Awakening the Blue Tigers (Sunil Chhetri, Gaurav Gala, Kunal Majgaonkar, Neel Shah and Shantanu Ray Chaudhari), Why We Travel (Pico Iyer), The Magic of The Lost Story (Sudha Murty and Manu Pillai) and Bringing Alive Kannada Epics (Gangamma Keshavamurthy and Shantha Nagamangala). There will also be a performance by the renowned Rajasthani Sufi singer Mir Mukhtiar Ali. “I am most looking forward to the intellectual fireworks on the stage, the performance by Mir Mukhtiar Ali and of course, Pico Iyer,” she says signing off.
Entry free. December 3 and 4. At The LaLit Ashok Bangalore, Kumarakrupa Road
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