2015 Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF)Jan 21-25,2015

Beginning today Wednesday Jan 21,2015, lakhs will arrive in the Pink City to indulge their devotion to free thought and intellectual stimulation, led by the torchbearers of contemporary literature and art from around the world. 

Over 205 sessions spanning five days, 300 speakers from different fields will delve into pressing issues of the day, from gender equity to ‘the Seven Deadly Sins that polarise society’, at the eighth annual Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF)

Taking place from 21-25 January 2015 at the historic Diggi Palace, Jaipur, the eighth edition of the Jaipur Literature Festival will see Nobel Laureate Sir. V. S. Naipaul, 2013 Man Book Prize Winner Eleanor Catton, acclaimed novelist Hanif Kureishi and celebrated American travel writer Paul Theroux take center-stage along with some of India's leading authors, including prominent Hindi poet Kedarnath Singh, current Man Booker Prize nominee Neel Mukherjee, best-selling novelist Amish Tripathi and celebrated author and translator Arshia Sattar, as well as internationally loved German children's author Cornelia Funke.

The Jaipur Literature Festival, the world's largest free literary festival, recently announced the first line up of 77 authors set to participate in the 2015 event.

In a break with tradition, the world’s largest free literary festival will move beyond the four walls of its traditional venue, Hotel Diggi Palace, to 10 different sites, including two special sessions about heritage and culture at Amber Fort and Hawa Mahal on Wednesday and Thursday

The 2015 festival will have a number of themes running through the various sessions and panel discussions on all the five days

Major themes include the meltdown in the Middle East and Afpak, spies, historical fiction, alternative sexualities, memoir writing, cricket writing, as well as writing about politics, pirates, natural history

The first day of JLF will begin with a keynote address by three eminent poets, Arvind Krishna Mehrotra, Sahitya Akademi Award recipient Ashok Vajpayi and Pulitzer winner Vijay Seshadri, on ‘poetic imagination’.

Other speakers include Man Booker winner Eleanor Catton, renowned travel writer Paul Theroux, silver screen legends Waheeda Rehman, Naseeruddin Shah and Shabana Azmi, as well as leading novelists Sarah Waters, Kamila Shamsie, Amit Chaudhuri and Eimear McBride. 

A special tribute is reserved for the late author Khushwant Singh, the inspiration for a Kasauli-based literature festival and pioneer of Indian writing in English who passed away last year. 

The Khushwant Singh Memorial Prize for Poetry will be among three prizes to be given out at JLF this year, the others being the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature and the Ojas Art Award.