First bi-lingual lit fest ends on a poetic note
On a cold winter morning in Dumdum, poets, professors, publishers and authors gathered for the first ever bilingual two-day-long literary fest – the Ethos Literary Festival (ELF) – in Kolkata. Organised by the Ethos Literary Journal (ELJ) and powered by Hawakal Publishers, the literary extravaganza was held from December 22-23. It aimed to rejoice both the English and Bangla literature, and to celebrate the independent presses.
The festival was inaugurated by Gautam Benegal, National-Award-winning film-maker and distinguished academic Prof. Sanjukta Dasgupta.
The first day of sessions opened with a panel discussion on the trends of English poetry in Calcutta, which concluded that the culture of poetry had arrived in Calcutta. The two days that unraveled proved the panelists right. Subsequent sessions explored the many facets of poetry, from their form to their role and the language of their voice.
"We speak the same tongue, yet when we travel and cross borders, we see that although we are united by our mother tongue yet there is something different with the way we speak," discussed a panel in Bangla on differences in our language.
Linda Ashok spoke how poets are astronomers, "exploring the space within, as astronomers do outside," subtly introducing us to poets who use scientific terms in a way that it doesn't really feel alien. She ended her speech with a tip for those who felt limited by their jobs, "As poets, we can also use words from our professions and give new expression to the poetry we write." Her insightful session was followed by a discussion on the role of interviewers in profiling authors, and a Bangla session on how a writer's political awareness influences their writing. Post a typical Bengali lunch comprising of rice, dal, vegetables and chana'r dalna, came Gopal Lahiri and Paresh Tiwari's much-awaited session on the Haiku and Haibun, a discussion on the rise of entertainment and the decline of mysticism in poetry, and on how poetry by writers from the North-East was different because of their experiences, shaped by a sense of alienation from the rest of the country. Later Gopal Lahiri launched Raja Chakraborty's poetry collection, 'The Soup Bowl and Other Poems'.
Two topics invited much audience interaction, on 'plagiarism in the age of the internet' and 'female aesthetics in poetry'. A Bangla session on the potential of translated Bengali poetry to reach wider audiences talked about "translating essence." Other discussions revolved around the effect English popular fiction has had on the Bangla short stories, on writing fiction based on real-life events. Beyond these, there were poetry readings and formal launch of a few collections of poetry. With over eighty participants on each day, the first edition of ELF was a grand success and brought back a focus on poetic discussion in Kolkata.
Among the speakers Nikita Parik, Munshi Md Younus, Anirban Basu, Avinandan Mukhopadhyay, Arnab Saha, Rimi Dey, Promita Bhowmik, Sebanti Ghosh, Sharmila Ray, Jhilam Chattaraj, Al Moohshina Muzzammil, Abhirup Dhar, Devika Basu, Amit Shankar Saha, Kushal Poddar, Vinita Agrawal, Ranu Uniyal, Gayatri Chawla, Arghya Dutta and Sanjoy Saha have been exemplary and fetched much attention. With ELF 2018, the organizers brought readers and authors together and gave readers access to books by independent presses.
ELJ is a bi-annual literary journal, published in both versions: online and print. The journal is headed by Kiriti Sengupta who is the chief editor. Hawakal Publishers is an independent press based in Calcutta, and founded by Bitan Chakraborty.
