Bringing together poets, readers

A view of the audience at the Dharwad Literary Festival held in 2019. Photos by B M Kedarnath

The lively discussions and cultural programmes featured at literary festivals draw a diverse crowd.

Sangam Poetry Festival

Gathering people from various corners of the world, Ballari’s international poetry festival will be the first-of-its-kind event in Karnataka. The festival, titled ‘Sangam - Confluence of World Poets’ will be held at Ballari from October 21 to 24. It will bring together 50 poets from around the world. Of these, 20 are from India. There is considerable representation from Latin American countries including Chile, Venezuela and Colombia.

“Until now, Indian poets have largely interacted with other English-speaking poets from Europe and other Commonwealth countries. We wanted to introduce our writers to non-anglocentric poetry,” says renowned poet and academic H S Shivaprakash. He is the curator behind the line-up.

In fact, Latin America and India share the experience of having been under colonial rule, albeit under different empires. The organisers hope the festival can open up a conversation between the two postcolonial geographies.

Young poets

“Our intention is to let all the languages of the world reverberate in the land of Kannada,” says poet Arif Raja, the convenor of the festival. Each session will feature a poet from a different country, a poet from a different state in India, and one from Karnataka. The poets from abroad will be reading their works in the original language. This will be followed by the reading of a Kannada translation by local poets. The English translation of the work will be projected on a screen.

A group of 27 translators have painstakingly translated the poems. As a result, after the festival, an anthology will be released, containing all poems read during the event, edited by poet and translator Kamalakar Bhat, along with Arif Raja and Shivalingappa Handyal. The anthology will contain one poem per poet, translated into English.

The poems featured come from a variety of authors, from different backgrounds.

All Kannada poets chosen are under 45 years old. The festival particularly aims to appeal to the younger generation.

“Senior poets rarely give opportunities to the younger lot. If the new generation is to grow, we need more opportunities like these,” says publisher and poet Rajendra Prasad.

Though every year, many young poets enter the Kannada literary world, there is hardly any engagement with new writing. Prasad adds, “When talking about Kannada poetry, everyone seems to stop at the 1970s. There are hundreds of writers that have come after (Gopalakrishna) Adiga and Lankesh. But, they are not referenced, critiqued or discussed. This is why no one cares for today’s young poets.”

Zero-budget festival

The talk of hosting a poetry festival in Ballari first came up at the release of Ajay Banakar’s poetry collection, Bhoomi Hidida Hoo in 2021. At this time, Arivu Trust’s Dr Aravind Patel took it upon himself to organise the festival.

A general surgeon by vocation, Dr Patel is also a poet and a translator. He had previous experience, as an active participant and organiser in the cultural and literary scene of Ballari. His agreement was contingent upon H S Shivaprakash curating the festival.

“Of all the poets I invited, only 50% agreed to come, since this is a zero-budget festival, and the poets will have to finance their own travel,” says Shivaprakash. Following their arrival at Bengaluru International Airport, they will be escorted to Ballari by the Arivu Trust.

Due to the goodwill cultivated by the trust in the district, food and accommodation for the delegates will be sponsored by members of the community. For attendees, a delegate pass costs Rs 2,200, which covers food and accommodation for all three days.

Karnataka could make the best of such an opportunity to stay true to its tagline of ‘one state, many worlds’. It can use the opportunity of world poets converging to promote tourism in the district, as well as in the state.

If the Sangam poetry festival manages to enthral the crowds and contribute to the literary tradition of Kannada, it may very well become a permanent fixture in Ballari’s cultural calendar. Now, more than ever, we are in need of more such literary festivals that operate under Kuvempu’s Vishwamanava ideal.