About JLF Colorado

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Sanjoy K. Roy

Managing Director - Teamwork Arts (Producer)

Literature builds equity, and engenders empathy. It exposes the cracks in fractured communities and reflects the daily pain and anguish of a society. Creating platforms for dialogue and enabling environs for writers to express themselves is vital for the very sustenance of progressive societies. It is literature and the arts that create a window to other worlds and allow us to appreciate and understand varied cultures, their histories, traditions, economies, and ways of life, pushing back against hatred and the fear of the unknown.

Even as the world learns to cope with the reality of climate change, polarization across political, economic, social, religious, and racial lines become more pronounced, the freedom to express has been challenged by hatred, violence, war, and authoritarian regimes

that are the dominant narratives of the day. Against this backdrop of hyper-nationalism and extremism, it is imperative that we continue to build equitable spaces and create an environment for writers and thinkers to articulate their worldview and foster creativity.

JLF, over the years, has spread its wings to include Adelaide, Belfast, Boulder, Doha, Houston, London, New York, Soneva Fushi in the Maldives, and Toronto. In 2023, we opened JLF Valladolid Spain – our first edition in the Spanish-speaking world, which was received with great enthusiasm with capacity crowds and multilingual simultaneous translations.

 As we look ahead to our 10th year in the United States, we renew our commitment to showcase the best literary works, address important issues such as empathy, climate crises, gender, economic upheaval, migration, and developments in the areas of science, technology, space, and health. We will nurture new writing, and hope to bring to the forefront a million ideas which can rise like fireflies into the night sky, illuminating us all!

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William Dalrymple

Writer, Historian & Festival Director

We are thrilled to bring our beloved festival back to the United States. The Jaipur Literature Festival is a unique celebration of writing that has grown into something bigger and more wonderful than anything we could ever have hoped for when we first conceived this festival more than a decade ago. We are as surprised as we are proud of this. This Fall, we present in Houston, New York, and Boulder a series of pocket-sized Jaipurs bringing the color and energy of the festival from the Aravallis to the bayous of Houston, the skyscrapers of New York, and the Rockies of Colorado. We can’t wait to once again share with the United States a little taste of the dynamism, energy, and literary brilliance that has made Jaipur the most happening literary festival in the world.

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Namita Gokhale

Writer, Publisher & Festival Director

We are delighted to return to Colorado to present the ninth edition of JLF at the inspirational Boulder Library. 

Our narratives define us. These narratives are changing, as are the voices and technology that platform them. Our weekend of ideation and literary conversation looks at the different perspectives of our shared stories. We look at how these stories travel, and transform, and renew themselves. 

Martín Puchner takes us on a journey through the cultural history of humankind in his latest book, Culture: The Story of us, from Cave Art to K-Pop.

Writer and tech journalist Vauhini Vara takes us through the many dimensions of her writing life and the fabric that holds it together. 

My co-director William Dalrymple speaks of Forgotten Masters: Indian Painting from the East India Company, and speaks to Caroline Elkins on the legacy of violence of the British Empire. 

Amitava Kumar, Andrew Altschul, and Erika T. Wurth explore different aspects of their fiction. 

Tibetan writer Tsering Tangzom Lama’s debut novel We Measure the Earth With Our Bodies is a meditation on displacement and ancestral memory. Dawa Lokyitsang and Natalie Avalos speak of chronicling the experience of exile.

Andrew Quintman and Holly Gayley speak of the wisdom of the Tibetan masters and mystics. 

Katie Hickman speaks of the women of the American west. 

Chika Unigwe discusses her latest novel, The Middle Daughter, a modern retelling of the myth of Hades and Persephone.

Angela Saini and Ruchira Gupta examine the intersectionality of gender, power, and social justice.

María Scunziano Singh on Mind, Body, and Spirit. Pariksith Singh on Ancient Mysteries and Modern Revolutionaries. Anjan Sundaram on Chronicles of War. A deep session on the political and cultural polarization of America. And so much more. 

We are each other’s stories.