Deep in the madding crowd at the Jaipur Lit Fest
It was a startling introduction to Asia’s largest literature festival for best-selling writer J.M. Coetzee, as he clambered over hundreds of people squeezed next to speakers, crouched next to seats, or sat on folded newspapers on the churned-up grass. Coetzee, a notoriously reticent author who rarely appears in public, gingerly picked his way through the masses to reach the stage and address the Jaipur Literature Festival that has in seven years grown magnificently into a cultural must-visit, but requires careful cultivation to ensure its rapid rise can continue unabated.
For all the intellectual finger-pointing whipped up by a public spat between organizer William Dalrymple and India’s Open magazine over allegations of a perpetuation of colonial-era Western superiority the Open-sponsored banner welcoming guests to the festival appeared as something as a peace flag – it was anyway unlikely to sour an event that is famed as much for its infectious atmosphere as its literary relevance.
There was a undeniable energy to the event, hosted in the grounds of a former royal palace, garlanded with striking orange, yellow and green drapes, and blessed with uninterrupted Rajasthani sunshine.
The excitement as hundreds flocked from one location to the other, or the electric murmur that steadily rose in volume from the main tent as an anticipated session approached is impossible to ignore.
Choosing between events was the only stress of the day, as the guests, who had paid nothing to get in, mulled difficult session choices over their free lunch.
“What does he expect me to do?” said one exasperated reporter of her Delhi-based editor. “Split myself into four people and make sure I see everything?” she suggested, to laughs from the group of journalists huddled over their laptops near her.
Orhan Pamuk, who opened the festival on Friday morning, attracted more people to main lawn stage that it could accommodate each time he took to the microphone, while fellow Nobel Laureate Coetzee attracted the largest crowd of all for a absorbing 45-minute long reading on Sunday afternoon that left some Indian critics nonplussed, but only enhanced his reputation as “a writer who writes.”
