Kolkata’s International Poetry Festival, Chair Poetry Evenings, returns to the city with its sixth edition from November 24–26, 2023, at the Bharatiya Bhasha Parishad Auditorium, along with several simultaneous events at the Alliance Française du Bengale, Samilton Hotel Could Tavern, and will culminate with the Poetry on the Cruise on the Hooghly. It will bring together a diverse group of poets, thinkers, and writers from eight countries around the globe.
Hosted by the Chair Literary Trust, the festival this year will have participants like Guy Helminger, Sabine Venaruzzo, Amir Or, Annie Finch, Diti Ronen, Dominique De Groen, Iduna Paalman, Marwan Makhoul, Mary Jean Chan and Jen Campbell from various countries. Along with them, it will also feature Indian poets like Mani Rao, Robin Ngangom, Sarabjeet Garcha, Dipika Mukherjee, Mandakranta Sen, Udayan Vajpeyi, Shubhabrata Banerjee, and Swami Antar Nirav.
A folk and sufi musical rendition of Urmi Choudhury, Soumya Shankar Roy, and Prajna Dutta called ‘Multiverse’ will be the opening act of the festival. Sonnet Mondal, festival director and eminent poet comment, “Our mission is to infuse poetry's significance and flavor into the many literary and artistic events that Kolkata, India's cultural capital, has been regularly organizing. Through this festival, we hope to present voices that are resolute in the face of anything that threatens humanity.”
Tushar Dhawal, festival co-director and Hindi poet adds, “Poetry tends to instill in its readers' minds more fertile notions of living and expressing because of its central concern with the idea of becoming more and more human. The Chair Poetry Evenings honours all the hues and diversity of life, creation, and humanity.”