JLF 2026 returns with global icons, literary giants from January 15

New Delhi, Oct 13 (PTI) Nobel Laureate Olga Tokarczuk, Booker Prize winner Banu Mushtaq, Chess legend Vishwanathan Anand, British actor and author Stephen Fry and former diplomat-writer Gopal Krishna Gandhi are among the 350 speakers participating in the 19th edition of Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF), starting January 15, the organisers announced on Monday.

Dubbed as the “greatest literary show on Earth”, the festival, scheduled to run till January 19, will be held at Hotel Clarks Amer in Jaipur. It is presented by Vedanta and produced by Teamwork Arts.

The festival boasts an impressive lineup of 350 speakers and an expansive programme that spans a wide range of topics from fiction, poetry, and history to art, science, mathematics, medicine, and mental health.

It also delves into pressing global themes such as climate action, business, geopolitics and conflict, gender, translation, cinema, race, and identity -- all unified by the timeless power of storytelling.

“The JLF is a celebration of the written word & oral tradition, a testament to the power of stories & literature to inspire and connect. This year, as we gather once more in the Pink City, we look forward to welcoming an unmatched lineup of genius writers, thinkers, and dreamers from across the world. It is a carnival of literature that promises to ignite ideas of both writing & reading," historian and festival's co-director William Dalrymple said in a statement.

The initial lineup also features an impressive list of speakers, including celebrated Indian voices like novelist Shobhaa De, bestselling mythologist Anand Neelakantan, Sahitya Akademi Award-winner Anuradha Roy, veteran film critic Bhawana Somaaya, and celebrated authors Manu Joseph, Ruchir Joshi, and KR Meera.

Joining them are acclaimed international names such as British historian Eleanor Barraclough, bestselling author Hallie Rubenhold, renowned art curator Helen Molesworth, biographer Jon Lee Anderson, Chinese-British author Jung Chang, novelist Kate Mosse, and Lebanese journalist and author Kim Ghattas.

"The JLF 2026 promises to be a vintage edition. Our sessions and themes traverse cultures and continents while keeping a special focus on the rich diversity of Indian languages and literature. We examine the changing realities of our world, in geopolitical flashpoints, in emergent realities of AI, in the articulation of language and the fluidity of literary formats," said writer and festival's co-director Namita Gokhale.

Like before, the festival will also be parallelly hosting the 13th edition of Jaipur BookMark (JBM), the leading B2B platform for publishers, literary agents, translators and writers, driving industry collaboration and global exchange. PTI MG BK BK