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Big names like Margaret Atwood and Margaret MacMillan, along with Montreal photographer Velibor Božović, will join a roster of more than 200 authors from India and overseas at the upcoming ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival, which runs from 21–25 January 2016 at the Diggi Palace in Jaipur.

Visitors can look forward to sessions such as the keynote address from Tara Gandhi Bhattacharjee and Margaret Atwood, incredible women of stories, conscience and creativity.

Major prize winners will also be attending the world's largest free literary festival, including Marlon James who won the Man Booker Prize in 2015 for his epic and visceral novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings, Cyprian Broodbank who’s The Making of the Middle Sea won the Wolfson History Prize and photographer Steve McCurry who won the Robert Capa Gold Medal for Photographic Reporting, to name a few.

Incredible personal stories will inspire and entertain with appearances from a wide range of people from British comedian, actor, writer and presenter Stephen Fry, war correspondent Christina Lamb, beloved Indian author Ruskin Bond and the Dalit activist and campaigner Bant Singh. Audiences can expect to be moved by their intimate insights and stories of determination and inspiration.

A daily headline in the news around the world, the evolving modern issue of privacy is the focus of a range of sessions — The Fiction of Privacy: Drawing the Line looks at the daily dilemma of journalists and non-fiction writers grappling with issues of privacy, both philosophical and legal with Avirook Sen, Samanth Subramanian and Pragya Tiwari.

Founded in 2006, the free event attracts, on average, 250,000 patrons each year. Past attendees have included Jonathan Franzen, Oprah Winfrey, Abdul Kalam and the Dalai Lama.

Total Recall: The End of Privacy brings together Pratap Bhanu Mehta and Dayanita Singh with Homi Bhabha to explore whether privacy is dead forever; the concept of personal privacy as a collective philosophical value and right which sometimes overlaps and conflicts with issues of security and secrecy.

The event will not shy away from tackling vast and dark subjects. War, conflict, genocide and particularly the history and modern issues of the Middle East are a strong presence this coming January. Sessions explore the violent challenges, arrangements, unities and divisions of the region bringing together great minds and writers including authority on the Arab history Eugene Rogan, acclaimed historian Margaret Macmillan, political scientist and historian Ronald Suny, and biographer and travel writer Anthony Sattin in The Peace to End All Peace.

Five of the world’s most acclaimed war correspondents, Dexter Filkins, Christina Lamb, Don McCullin, David Grossman and Samanth Subramanian form The Frontline Club, a delve into the reality versus Hollywood glamour of life as a war correspondent.

Some of the most brutal and widespread ethnic cleansing in modern history erupted in the creation of a new border, searing a divide between India and Pakistan that remains a root cause of many contemporary evils. A superb line up of authors, researchers and thinkers on this period of history come together to discuss The Partition: Nisid Hajari, author of The Great Divide, a recent bestselling narrative history of Partition discusses his research with Yasmin Khan, author of The Great Partition, Venkat Dhulipala, author of Creating a New Medina: State Power, Islam, and the Quest for Pakistan in Late Colonial North India and Urvashi Butalia, author of The Other Side of Silence.

Modern India is explored and discussed in many sessions including Parivaar, Parampara aur Parivartan looking at family and societal structures; Mahatma Gandhi said “if the village perishes, India will perish too”, Mera Gaon, Mera Desh explores a modernity where rural idyll’s give way to dysfunctional urbanities with Sanchaita Raju, Uday Prakash, Desraj Kali, Anu Singh Choudhary and Suman Sahai gather to discuss disturbing realities of this lure.

Navigating Modernity explores the ambiguous and conflicted politics of change and the journey towards modernity with Ravi Kant, Pratap Bhanu Mehta, Shobhaa De and Christophe Jaffrelot.

From Hindi mystic and poet Meera Bai to Kaavad oral traditions and the wonderful regional cuisine, many rich jewels of Rajasthani culture will be showcased as well.

And writers will take us around the world from Tibet to Kolkata, Jamaica to Canada and through the eyes of Margaret Atwood, Ireland’s greatest living writer Colm Toibin, Bosnian-born American fiction writer Aleksandar Hemon, gifted young storyteller Sulaiman Addonia and Sunjeev Sahota among many others.

From Hindi mystic and poet Meera Bai to Kaavad oral traditions and the wonderful regional cuisine, many rich jewels of Rajasthani culture will be showcased as well.

Winners of the Ojas Award 2016 Master Artist Santosh Kumar Das, a Mithila artist best known for his Krishna Series, and protégé artists Mahalaxmi and Shantanu Das will have their work displayed; This year’s award celebrates excellence in Madhubani/Mithila Art.

Sanjoy K. Roy, Director of Teamwork Arts which produces JLF said, “The ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival has established itself as one of the greatest literary gatherings in the world and I know that this is one of the best line-ups of authors we’ve ever had.”

Founded in 2006, the free event attracts, on average, 250,000 patrons each year. Past attendees have included Jonathan Franzen, Oprah Winfrey, Abdul Kalam, Salman Rushdie and the Dalai Lama.

The highly anticipated program for festival is now live on www.jaipurliteraturefestival.org.