The 5 day event which will be held in the Southern town of Galle is expected to see the largest participation in its 5 year history.
Festival’s Events Director Kishani de Silva has told info.gov.lk that the enthusiasm to attend this year’s festival is at a higher level.
She has said that Hotel rooms in Galle are already booked for the event.
According to the organizers 65 acclaimed authors will take part in the upcoming Literary Festival covering all continents.
Among the expected writers are Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Mohsin Hamid, Jung Chang, Andrey Kurkov, Damon Galgut, William Fiennes, Charles Allen, P
ankajMishra, Tash Aw, Jill Dawson and also Pauline Melville.
Karen Roberts, Randy Boyagoda, Liyanage Amarakeerthi, Prashani Rambukwella, Roshi Fernando and Ranjini Obeyesekere are among the Sri Lankan writers who will take part in the event.
Poets will include Daljit Nagra, Roger McGough, Omar Musa, Vivimarie VanderPoorten and Tishani Doshi.
Jancis Robinson, England’s leading authority on wine, will head a strong gourmet participation which will also include Malaysian celebrity chef TripatNarayanan and fine wine from Sandalford in Western Australia.
Meanwhile several writers have called for boycotting the event in protest of the alleged human rights violations taken place in Sri Lanka during the war.
The Founder of the Galle Literary Festival Geoffrey Dobbs commenting on this has said, “it is unfortunate and ridiculous”.
Orhan Pamuk, who is a 2006 Nobel prize winning writer and Kiran Desai who won the 2006 Man Booker Prize also have withdrawn from the event.
The organizers said the two authors are unable to make it owing to ‘Visa issues’.
Related Info :
• SriLankan Air Taxis Fly to Galle Literary Festival, January 26th to 30th 2011
It's a shame that some people are striving to turn this purely literary event into a political circus, and that too over some issues that pale into insignificance as one considers events in international arena.
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