Jaipur Literature Festival 2023 To Host Top Literary Personalities

The Jaipur Literature Festival is one of the biggest literary festivals that allows you to interact with a diverse mix of renowned writers, thinkers, leaders, entertainers and all the eminent personalities from around the world. This prominent literary festival is held in January every year in the pink city of India-Jaipur. in January every year in the pink city of India-Jaipur. With a modest beginning in 2006, JLF as it is proudly called, today witnesses around 1 lakh attendees annually in its five days event.

Jaipur Literature Festival 2023

2023 Jaipur Literature Festival will begin on Thursday, January 19th and ends on Monday, January 23rd.

Jaipur Literature Festival - Registration and Entry Fee

The entry to this festival is free if you have pre-registered your seat, but you have to pay around INR 300 for on the spot registration. For that, all you need to do is to log on to the official website of the festival and get yourself registered. After registration, you will get an email or a message that you will have to show at the registration desk at the entrance.

For entry into the musical night, separate passes are available that you need to get from the website. Remember, the tickets are sold on a first-come-first-serve basis.

Festival Preview 

As part of the preview session, Namita Gokhale discussed how Jaipur Literature Festival’s International editions served as a national platform for a wide range of writers – from grassroots talent to strong and popular writers.

According to Gokhale, JLF’s international editions allowed JLF to “feel the throbbing pulse of the literary imagination around our planet and to share them across continents and cultures”. She also added in humour that, “it may be said that the sun never sets on the Jaipur Literature Festival anymore”.

Stats & Facts

The hosts addressed that nearly 80% of the audience is below 30 years, which composes of over four to five thousand people. According to William, Jaipur Literature Festival is “as large as Glastonbury and Woodstock combined”, and that the event's scale is unlike any other.

He also said that the JLF platform provides the opportunity to witness some of the biggest winners of international and national awards such as the Pulitzer Prize, Booker Prize, Noble Prize and Sahitya Akademi. “Whether you’re a rickshaw driver or the CEO of a major company, you can just walk in and have your life enhanced by this extraordinary phenomenon", he added.

About JLF - History of the World’s Largest Free Literary Festival

Starting in 2006 with only a limited number of authors including Namita Gokhale, Shobha de, William Dalrymple and 15 others, JLF was attended by only 100 participants. Over the years, the literary extravaganza grew in significance and fame with many prestigious names from various fields participating in the festival adding to its huge success.

However, this journey is not without difficulties. In 2012, The Jaipur Literature Festival entered in controversy when Salman Rushdie cancelled his all India tour over threats of assassination with the release of Satanic Verses among the others that have created problems for the festival. Yet, the festival stood in its glory and entered a new path in 2015 with organising the fest in Colorado, USA, and Southbank, London.

In the present times, this once small festival has spread its wings into many different locations and made its mark as “The world’s largest free literary festival” as The Mail calls it.

Happenings At JLF 2023

• Sanskrit as a living language
• Sonali Bendre’s Book Club
• Rajasthani folklorist Vijayan Detha
• Beethoven’s music and variations to mark his 250th birth anniversary
• The Japanese concept of Ikigai
• Darjeeling Express run by Chef Asma Khan’s all-women kitchen
• Munshi Premchand’s “Premchand ke phate joote”
• The Kathasaritsagara
• Future and paradoxes of artificial intelligence and creativity
• Climate emergency
• The rage of the rivers which are devastating urban landscapes
• A special session focusing on Northeast Indian women writers
• Global Poetry 

The event details of 2023 are yet to be announced.                              

Who Else Will Be There

Namita Gokhale also confirmed that JLF 2023 will host sessions from renowned speakers like Abdulrazak Gurnah, a 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature winner and Bernardine Evaristo. Other speakers include Deepti Naval, Jerry Pinto, Merve Emre, Rana Safvi, NoViolet Bulawayo, Tanuj Solanki, and Vincent Brown, among others.

With so many interesting sessions planned by some of the renowned personalities from the world of literature, art and technology, what are your plans to visit Jaipur around the Literature Festival dates? Don’t forget to share your experiences of attending JLF in the comments below!