jaipur literature festival second list

Jaipur Literature Festival 13th edition releases the second list of speakers

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Jaipur Literature Festival, the world’s largest free literary event, is going to host its 13th edition. It will be held from January 23 – 27, 2020 at the Diggi Palace Hotel in Jaipur. The second list of 25 speakers participating in this event was announced on Wednesday.

Over 250 authors, thinkers, politicians, and popular culture icons are expected to participate in this grand event. They will aid the event with a special focus on world literature. The second list of speakers are the popular personalities known for their distinguished work. Jaipur Literature Festival’s second list revealed the names Pulitzer winner Dexter Filkins, Elizabeth Gilbert of Eat, Pray, Love fame, and culinary expert Madhur Jaffrey to take part in the fest.

Filkins won the Pulitzer Prize for covering Afghanistan and Pakistan, Anand Gopal, Anuradha Bhagwati, and Asne Seierstad are the award-winning writers. Arvind Krishna Mehrotra is a noted Indian poet while Bruno Macaes is the former minister of European Affairs in Portugal.

jaipur literature festival 2020

The organizers of the event said that “The festival will once again be a grand marathon of ideas between idealists, realists, visionaries, intellectuals, the avant-garde, and iconoclasts, who will engage in informed discussion and be united by an abiding love for literature.

The co-director of the festival, Namita Gokhale said, “The second list we have announced for January 2020 has an intriguing mix of new and established, popular and unexpected speakers. I am excited about welcoming all these wonderful authors at the festival.

The fest will be graced by diverse journalists, activists, columnists, broadcasters and poets like Toole, author of seven books, including the bestselling A Traitor’s Kiss; Delhi-born author Keshava Guha, who writes regularly on politics, literature, and sports for a host of publications; novelist and activist Leila Slimani, winner of the prestigious French literature award Prix Goncourt for her second novel, Chanson douce; poet Lemn Sissay, who has read on stage throughout the world from the Library of Congress in the United States to the University of Addis Ababa. Sessions by columnists like Neelum Saran Gour and Parvati Sharma; Peter Frankopan, who was named one of the World’s 50 Top Thinkers by Prospect Magazine; Paul Muldoon, a former BBC radio and television producer and winner of Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (2003 ); National Book Award finalist Peter Hessler and Magsaysay Award-winning journalist Ravish Kumar.

The names revealed in the second list include some of the great masters of contemporary literature. The list also includes novelist Roshan Ali, author of Ib’s Endless Search for Satisfaction which has been shortlisted for the 2019 Shakti Bhatt First Book Prize and the 2019 JCB Prize for Literature; Indian academician Shekhar Pathak, recipient of the Padma Shri; UK poet laureate Simon Armitage and Mughal historian Supriya Gandhi.

As we gear up for the 13th edition of the Jaipur Literature Festival, we reinforce our commitment to bringing the best literary experience for our audiences through discourse and debate. This year’s program features the best writers and academics from across the world including Nobel laureates, Booker, Commonwealth, Sahitya Akademi, JCB, and Crossword prize winners, as well as a host of new voices who will disarm you with their perspective of our world,” said festival producer Sanjoy K Roy.

Moreover, the seventh edition of the Jaipur Book Mark (JBM) will also run parallel to the festival. JBM is a platform for publishers, literary agents, translation agencies and writers and encourages business conversation with major players of the industry from all over the globe.