By Saket Suman
— JAIPUR
Angelina Jolie had once
expressed her disagree-
ment over the age-old
saying: "What doesnt
kill you makes you
stronger", and had then quipped
that "our experiences, good and
bad, make us who we are. By
overcoming difficulties, we gain
strength and maturity". The
same stands true
for the just-con-
cluded Jaipur
Literature Festival
(JLF). An 11-year-
old cultural gather-
ing, the festival has
now come of age
and its impact is
fast seeping into
India's cultural
ethos.
If there is one
thing that has been
a constant companion of this annual
gathering of writers
and bibliophiles, it
is its unpredictability. No matter how
many editions of this festival one
has attended, it is near to impossible to anticipate what waits the
visitors. JLF never ceases to surprise and this "wow factor" is
perhaps what keeps the interest
of even the oldest of its visitors
alive in the literary extravaganza.
But the journey has not been
easy and, therefore, the conse-
quential responsibility that lies
on the shoulders of its organizers
— Sanjoy Roy, Namita Gokhale
and William Dalrymple — is
equally noteworthy.
In a saga of difficult times
when attacks on free speech are
constant and the space for rea-
sonable debate is fast shrinking,
JLF stands out as an oasis of bliss
amid a dreary desert where the
public discourse has gone horri-
bly wrong. Over the years, it has
stood as a champion of free
speech and has featured authors
with death threats and bounties
on their heads. With placards
bearing false identities at air-
ports, hotel book-
ings made under
different names for
"controversial"
speakers often featuring in surprise
sessions, the festival has stood true
to its core values —
and has even risked
numerous arrest
warrants and FIRs
against its organizers.
On their part, the
organizers have
never demurred
and this will be for-
ever recorded in the
pages of India's
recent cultural history.
This 11th edition of JLF was
no different as it featured sessions on wide-ranging topics and
themes over the course of five
days. Whether it was the creative
genius of Amy Tan or the journalistic experience of Charlie
English, all came to the fore during the event.
The festival, as Dalrymple
described it, set up a "mini uni-
versity" for thousands of its visi-
tors and it can be aptly said that
every one of them learnt some-
thing new. This year the organiz-
ers had booked 4,000-plus hotel
nights to host over 500-plus
speakers and over 178 musicians
who participated in 205 sessions
and 19 concerts of infectious
music played morning and night.
And still, managing to have the
festival free for all visitors, solely
funded by corporate sponsor-ships, is also commendable.
On the flip side, it cannot be
denied that the festival has
turned repetitive in some ways.
Behind all glitz and euphoria
associated with the event, the
primary reason JLF is so successful is its brilliant content,
brought together by Gokhale and
Dalrymple. And therefore when
the "social media's absolute dar-lings" — the likes of Shashi
Tharoor, Amish Tripathi and
Ashwin Sanghi — wax eloquently
on what they do at dozens of
similar events, it is but yesterday
once more for most visitors -
mundane, humdrum and a repetition of what they hear so often.
This disappointment was heard
clearly not only inside the premises of Diggi Palace but also on
Twitter and other social media
platforms this year.
Tharoor is undoubtedly a bril-
liant orator but what is his bril-
liance worth to the festival when
he is going to sound the same
bugle that he does at every sin-
gle event? Sanghi's new book
will surely be a bestseller again
but what else but disappoint-
ment can his session offer when
he is going to chart the same
anecdotes and analogies — "99
per cent luck and 1 per cent
bloody good luck" and the likes
— once again? And as if to sug-
gest that hundreds of interviews
and reviews of Tripathi's last
book weren’t enough, the festi-
val hosted a session with him
again — and for what purpose?
The launch of a new cover of his
last book! It would be just fine
had Tripathi shared anything
new, but none-at-all, whatsoev-
er. A quick search on You Tube
will reflect this monotonous saga
more appropriately, for those
with doubts.
It cannot be denied that
celebrity speakers are huge
crowd pullers and this may be
the festival's own way of first
attracting new visitors by showing such celebrities and then
keeping them engrossed in other
sessions that take place simultaneously, but there is no greater
disappointment than the
moments when one sees his
expectations shatter before his
eyes. The so-called bestselling
Indian writers at this year's edition did just that.
Mystery of Novel
The festival may also recon-
sider some of its regular modera-
tors who, mildly put, deviate
from the given theme, even to
the disgust of noted speakers at
many occasions. JLF should also
understand that with success
comes equal responsibility and
even as one salutes their com-
mitment to free speech, it may
seem a little too absurd for a
writer to plainly boast that "the
mystery of my novel is a result of
whisky pegs" —with the presence
of hundreds of young school
children with their impression-
able and vulnerable minds. But if
one is going to prevent a writer
from talking of liquor on stage,
you may well one day demand
that they do not write anything
as such in their novels too.
There is no "Right-Wrong"
answer to this, both assertions
have their own merits and find-
ing a balance between the two,
in a way that both the writer and
the visitor have their liberties as
well as pride of place, is an area
that organizers may wish to
dwell in as they begin preparing
for the next edition.
Jeet Thayil showed the way
when he was asked to read a passage from his book, based on suicide. "I am not sure I should do
this, there are many school kids
here," he said before giving out a
spontaneous disclaimer on the
act. The point is simply that
most books cater to a certain
demographic audience based on
age. We have children's novels,
adult novels and so on but a festival like this breaks all such barriers, where a 7-year-old is seen
sitting opposite his teenage sister, and just around the corner
may be an elderly man, somewhere in his eighties.
These aside, JLF's impact on
India's cultural ethos is clearly
visible; culture and literature are
fast seeping into both the habits
and practises of the new India -
and this annual gathering certainly has had a great role to play
in bringing these aspects into the
public discourse. — IANS
H
Jaipur Literary Festival organizer William Darymple says
the annual event is a ‘mini university’ for visitors
JLF stands
out as an
oasis of bliss
amid a dreary
desert where
the public
discourse has
gone horribly
wrong
Above, director Anurag Kashyap.
Right, former Delhi chief minister Sheila
Dikshit at the festival, Jan. 27.
Actors Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Nandita Das during a session at the Jaipur
Literature Festival at Diggi Palace, Jan 26. The 11th edition of the annual festival
featured sessions on wide-ranging topics and themes over five days.
R
a
v
i
S
h
a
n
k
a
r
V
y
a
s
/
I
A
N
S
INDIA ABROAD February 9, 2018 27 INDIA
INDIAABROAD.COM
R
a
v
i
S
h
a
n
k
a
r
V
y
a
s
/
I
A
N
S
