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Lahore Literary Festival cancels Day One of programme, relocates festival to Avari Hotel

Lahore Literary Festival cancels Day One of programme, relocates festival to Avari Hotel

The three-day event has been condensed to take place on February 20 and 21
Updated 18 Feb, 2016

The Lahore Literary Festival (LLF) which was scheduled to begin on Friday will now commence on Saturday, February 20 and conclude on Sunday, February 21.

What was to be a three-day programme will now be condensed into two days.

"The change has been on the advice of the Punjab government," said an announcement on the LLF Facebook page.

The festival, which was originally being held at the Al Hamra, has now shifted to Avari Hotel, it was announced on Twitter:

The original programme featured a keynote address by veteran Bollywood actress Sharmila Tagore in conversation with Hameed Haroon. It was to be followed by a session, titled ‘The World of Intizar Hussain’, dedicated to the memory of the literary great who recently passed away.

Simultaneously, a discussion on ‘Multiculturalism in Flux: Refugees, Radicalism and Rightwing Parties’ with a mix of local and foreign delegates was to be held.

Also read: Women to take centre stage at LLF 2016

Other concurrent sessions included ‘Voices and Verse of Central Asia’, one with Chinese calligrapher Haji Noor Deen talking about his fusion of style and demonstrating Arabic calligraphy, and ‘State and the Sufis’ with Farzana Shaikh and Hasan Karrar.

In the second hour, sessions titled ‘Writing of Exile and the Exile of Writing’, ‘Preserving National Heritage in Stressed Societies’, ‘Anwar Jalal Shemza: Between Home and Diaspora’, ‘Zubaan aur Shanakht’ (language and identity), and ‘Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Fun aur Shakhsiyat’ were scheduled to be held.

Also on Day One's agenda were sessions like ‘From Quest and Astonishment to Nothingness: How the Painters saw the Sufis’, ‘Creativity, Capital and Chaos: Future of the Metropolis’, ‘Old Urdu Journals: A Disappearing Heritage’, ‘Emerging Trends in Urdu Fiction’, ‘Poetry in Translation’ and a dramatic presentation of A.R. Gurney's Love Letters directed by Hameed Haroon and starring Imran Aslam and Rehana Saigol.

Comments

Arif Feb 18, 2016 02:17pm
Advice of the Punjab Government? Why does the punjab government want a 2 day festival instead of 3? if this is security related, does the threat only relate to Friday, and will the government be able to neutralise it on the other 2 days? Weirdness abounds.
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Pasha Feb 18, 2016 03:05pm
i want to attend this festival where it is going to held and where from i can collect the pass. please guide me anyone
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Arifa Mukhtar Feb 19, 2016 03:07pm
How can I attend the festival?
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Fawzia Rashid Feb 20, 2016 04:56pm
Could you please tell me time of Zia Mohyuddin ' session
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