India '09: Through Fresh Eyes is British Council’s exciting new literature programme which highlighted the India Market Focus at London Book Fair 2009 through participation in a series of literature festivals, workshops and readings in India and the UK.
India was centre-stage at The London Book Fair in April 2009 as the British Council played host to a delegation of over 50 Indian writers, translators, critics, academics and industry professionals who took part in a varied programme of events around the themes of cultural and linguistic diversity designed to enable better understanding between India and the UK.
As well as a full and diverse programme of seminars and gatherings at the London Book Fair, there were events held at Foyles, The British Library, Shakespeare’s Globe as well as eight other cities around the UK.
Writers involved included Vikram Seth, Amit Chaudhuri, Girish Karnad, Tarun J Tejpal, K Satchidanandan, Chetan Bhagat, UR Ananthamurthy, Ramachandra Guha, Sankar, Nandan Nilekani and Sunil Gangopadhyay as well several UK authors with strong India connections such as Daljit Nagra, William Dalrymple, Martin Buckley, Michael Wood, Neel Mukherjee among others. Overall 15 Indian major languages were represented in 40 events spread across a week as part of India Through Fresh Eyes initiative, making it essentially the largest festival of Indian writing outside the subcontinent to date.
The launch: The launch of India ’09 was on 28 November 2008, with Mumbai still under siege by terrorists. Pavan K. Varma, Director General of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations, observed: “It is in times like this that we realize the power that literature has to heal.”
Publisher’s training: In November 2008, in partnership with The London Book Fair, we organised a training programme for 38 Indian publishers in who have taken up stalls at the Fair.
Book launches: In January 2009 we launched books in partnership with publishers. Tarun Tejpal’s The Story of My Assassins with Harper Collins India in Delhi and Neel Mukherjee’s Past Continuous with Picador India in Calcutta.
Writers’ Chain Literary Translation Workshop: Eight authors, working with over a dozen languages between them, were part of a Writers’ Chain translation workshop held at Neemrana in Rajasthan.
Jaipur Literature Festival: At the week-long Jaipur Literature Festival we held several programmes, including Writers' Chain: Found in Translation and Creative Entrepreneurs in Publishing.
Author engagements: Three UK authors, Hari Kunzru, Charles Nicholl and Nikita Lalwani, engaged with audiences in Delhi, Calcutta, Pune, Hyderabad, Chennai and Mumbai. We also offered ‘bursaries’ to six literature students who filed reports on their experience on the Jaipur Literature Festival website.
Scotland – Kolkata Connections: Scotland as Theme of Kolkata Book Fair 2009. This involved 52 events, a number involving writers and poets, led by Alexander McCall Smith, who inaugurated the world’s largest retail book fair.
Our partners in India and UK till date on India '09 include: Sahitya Akademi; Indian Council for Cultural Relations and Nehru Centre, London; CAPEXIL; Oxford Bookstore; Starmark Bookstores; Ethiraj College, Chennai; English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad; Jadavpur University, Calcutta; Calcutta University; Writers’ Chain, Wales Arts International, Siyahi; Neemrana; Foyles Bookshop, International PEN, Penguin, Harper Collins and the British Library.
USEFUL LINKS
THE LONDON BOOK FAIR
INDIA AT THE LONDON BOOK FAIR
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