Sanjoy K. Roy Deliberates Over JLF’s Evolution And Experiences
The highly anticipated 17th edition of the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) is scheduled to take place from 1 to 5 February at Hotel Clarks Amer, Jaipur. As in previous years, the festival promises to bring together a diverse array of writers, speakers, thinkers, sports personalities, journalists, policy-makers, and social activists.
This literary extravaganza will showcase a rich linguistic diversity, featuring sessions on 16 Indian languages and 8 international languages. Among the Indian languages are Assamese, Awadhi, Banjara Language (Lamani), Bengali, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Kurukh, Malayalam, Oriya, Punjabi, Rajasthani, Sanskrit, Tamil, Toda, and Urdu.
The 2024 edition of the festival is set to host approximately 550 speakers and artists from various nationalities. The line-up includes recipients of prestigious awards such as the Booker, the International Booker, the Pulitzer, the Sahitya Akademi, Dada Saheb Phalke Award, the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, the JCB Prize for Literature, and many others. This diverse gathering promises an inspiring and intellectually stimulating experience for all attendees.
In an exclusive tete-a-tete with Everything Experiential (EE), Sanjoy K. Roy, Managing Director of Teamwork Arts, who are the producers of the Jaipur Literature Festival, spoke about the evolution of JLF over the last 17 years, how the festival plans to enhance the attendee experience this time, amping up the event from the experiential front, and more.
Edited excerpts:
The theme for the Jaipur Literature Festival 2024 -'Stories Unite Us’, how does it aim to celebrate the power of literature and help in enhancing the attendee experience this time?
One of our chief focuses every year is how do we ensure that we have a program that sort of is accessible to everybody. As you know, 80 per cent of our audiences on ground is under the age of 25. And our effort always is that can we give them information which opens their mind and allows them to realize that they have a million questions to ask?
The other day I was at some conference where they were talking about lowest common denominator. We don't look at that. We are like, why lowest common denominator. If you educate people, irrespective caste, colour, creed, economic background information, you can open their mind. That's our effort. And I think this year's 550 odd writers, speakers, performers, etc, will be able to do that because you have such a spectrum. Everything from AI, space, health and philosophy to history, travel, migration and identity. And of course, fiction, poetry and theatre. And biography, environment, mental health, and climate.
Apart from the literary sessions, what other events or components would essentially make up the Jaipur Literature Festival this year and amp up the event from the experiential front?
Some years ago when we did a survey about the festival, we didn't realise that a lot of people looked at it as a food festival as well. So our whole effort always is, can we have great food curation? Can we have great crafts and design with a design intervention? And of course, can we get fantastic music to open the day and to close the day? So, the festival, while the basis of it is literature, but it has all of this other stuff that you don't necessarily get in a festival like this, but it's all about the written word, but it's in different ways. And it's pretty much part of this larger immersive experience.
What is the historical and global significance of the Jaipur Literature Festival, and how has it evolved over the past 17 years?
When we started the JLF, unlike the Harvard Business school teachers, that had a five year, a 10-year and a 15-year plan to become the biggest brand in the world, this is not what we started with. We started with the possibility that can we create value for built heritage? And can we bring about considered knowledge for young people? This was our two principal pillars around which we built the festival.
So if you look at the fact that we were in Diggy Fort, and Diggy Fort went from being very small to what it is today - a world famous hotel. Earlier they used to charge $10 a night. Today they charge, I think, an equivalent of $300.
So we've been able to realise that. But I think the most important contribution that the JLF has made is that 300 odd festivals from across the world, whether it's the Bay Area Berkeley Festival, to Calcutta, to Coimbatore, to Bangalore, to Chennai - they've all taken a sort of inspiration from the JLF and in many ways made literature sexy. And what has that done? It's allowed you to find platforms for new writing, for writing across different languages, for writing which is local.
And our hope, is that every city, every town has a festival like this. Not just that we need to do it, but people get inspired to do it.
What is the criteria that you have each year to get the speakers and performers for JLF since its inception in 2007, and what are some of the key features that make it a global literary phenomenon?
So as you know, William has his list, which is typically an international list of some of the brightest minds from across the world. Namita, has her list, which is both Indian but also global. I look at philosophy, some of the politics, AI science, etc. Collectively, we're able to put together a fabulous program, which really, in many ways we have the advantage because people come to Jaipur, irrespective. Those people come anyway. You have the Booker Prize, the Pulitzer and the Sahitya Akademi etc. We are able to do deep dive into academia, some amazing writing, which many festivals are not able to because they're worried that not one human being will show up in that session. We don't have that issue. So we can then explore issues that other festivals perhaps can't. And that's really our greatest strength, because they're limited in some way, but we're not because of the nature of the business.
What is the Jaipur Music Stage (JMS), and how does it complement the Jaipur Literature Festival?
Sometimes the Jaipur Music Stage has a completely different audience. And our whole thing is how do we get people to come in and accidentally flip over a new idea? So it's through music, it's through food, it's through craft, it's through everything. And the Jaipur Music Stage really looks at young people.
80 per cent of our audience is young people, but also get them a sense of does it necessarily only have to be popular? So our Jaipur Music Stage looks at, again, introducing new musicians, new ideas, new thoughts - internationally and Indian - to our audience.
How does the Jaipur Music Stage contribute to the overall experience of the Jaipur Literature Festival?
Pretty much. I mean, right from the very first day we were very clear that we needed morning music and evening music. Morning music, you get stuck in traffic coming in, calms you down. And that's really our classical tradition of Indian music. This year we have both Indian as well as international musicians for the morning music. Evening music is the energy, is the excitement, is really the discovery of so much that's different.
What is the significance of the Jaipur BookMark (JBM) in the context of the Jaipur Literature Festival, and the trends that JBM will cover in its 10th edition?
JBM is about the business of books. The business of books, like the business of music, has been changing fairly dramatically. Music, of course, the way you access music today has changed completely, as has the economics of music. So our whole effort in JBM is that can we look at and discuss what's the future. There are hundreds and thousands of writers today in different forms, etc. Everybody is looking for an audience, looking to sell their book, looking for an agent.
The private Festival Lounge for FOFs (Friends Of the Festival) would be to unwind and engage with festival speakers – what kind of experiences can attendees expect in this exclusive space?
There'll be podcasts, there'll be speakers. You can get your book signed and delivered to you in advance. It'll be a place where you can just rest. It will be a place where you can get a coffee when you're tired of these hundreds of sessions that you're having to dash between. It's really a downtime space.
