LAHORE: After a virtual session last year due to the coronavirus pandemic, the annual Lahore Literary Festival is back with a three-day in-person event at the Alhamra Art Centre from Friday.

Open to the public, the event takes place a month later than its usual February timeline owing to the uncertainty caused by the pandemic.

This year’s speakers include, among others, Marc Baer, the author of The Ottomans; Ahdaf Soueif (The Map of Love); Beth Gardiner (Choked); Nguyn Phan Qu Mai (The Mountains Sing); and Tariq Ali (Street Fighting Years).

The opening ceremony on Friday afternoon features short lectures by Mr Baer and MsSoueif, and an illustrated talk on Lahore by Mr FS Aijazuddin. This will be followed by the only other scheduled programme that day, a performance by musician Vanessa Muela.

Kicking off the first full-day event on Saturday will be a talk on ‘The State of Global Power Politics: Where’s the World Headed?’ with history professor Marc Baer and former editor/diplomat Maleeha Lodhi as speakers, followed by a session on exploring innovations in Urdu poetry. The day also features, among many others, a session with celebrated contemporary artist Imran Qureshi, and one on children’s fiction with authors Roopa Farooki – also a doctor, Saman Shamsie and Musharraf Ali Farooqi. Later, professor and author Ayesha Jalal talks to author and columnist Nadeem Farooq Paracha about 75 years of Pakistan.

The third and last day of the event begins with a session on ‘Rule by Fear’ with Ammar Ali Jan, Shahida Shah and Amar Sindhu. In another session, doctorRoopa Farooki, former JPMC Karachi executive director Seemi Jamali and author Saad Shafqat talk about doctors’ stories from the frontlines while dealing with the pandemic. A session, titled ‘Prison Diaries: Waning Freedoms for Writers and Activists?’ features Ahdaf Soueif, Hina Jilani and Daniel Hilton.

Global warming also features on the schedule with Beth Gardiner, Australian journalist Marian Wilkinson and Shazia Rafi discussing ‘Climate Crisis and the Framework for Sustainable Development’. In a session, titled ‘Streetfighting Years’, activist and writer Tariq Ali joins veteran journalist Najam Sethi for a live discussion from London. In what appears to be a refreshing discussion, Louvre Museum curator Jean-Baptiste Clais and journalist/digital storyteller Mariam Saeed Khan talk on ‘Video Games as a New Domain of Creation’.

Towards the end of the last day, a Punjabi play, ‘Chog Kasambe Di’, will also be staged, while the event will be capped off with artist Rasheed Araeen joining Conor Macklin (from Grosvenor Gallery, London), Kylie Gilchrist and Quddus Mirza for the launch of Islam and Modernism, followed by the unveiling of a permanent art installation by Mr Rasheed Araeen at the Bagh-i-Jinnah (Lawrence Gardens).

The festival also features launches of over a dozen books, some of which are The Go-Between by artist and storyteller Osman Yousefzada;Pakistan Here and Now,a collection ofessays on a range of topics edited by Harris Khalique and Irfan Ahmed Khan;Dasht-i-Imkanby Asghar Nadeem Syed; The Ottomans Khans, Caesars, and Caliphsby historian Marc Baer; The Key Manby former Wall Street Journal reporter Simon Clark; Diplomatic Footprints by former foreign secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry; Choked by journalist Beth Gardiner; Everything is True by Roopa Farooki; Vietnam: The Mountains Sing by novelist Nguyn Phan Qu Mai; Are You Enjoying? By Mira Sethi; Making a Muslimby S. Akbar Zaidi; and Woman splaining by Senator Sherry Rehman.

Published in Dawn, March 17th, 2022