The Hindu Lit for Life 2026 | Festival director Rachna Singh Davidar on this edition’s exciting line-up

Days ahead of the 2026 edition of The Hindu’s Lit for Life, a mounting anticipation grows to be part of a literary event — a celebration, if you may, that promises to illuminate the landscape of the written word. With a carefully curated line-up featuring acclaimed authors like Kiran Desai and Shashi Tharoor, the festival is set to explore not just the art of storytelling, but also the pressing themes shaping contemporary discourse, including the impact of Artificial Intelligence on literature. Ahead of this edition, festival director Rachna Singh Davidar goes into the details about what is to come.

As the festival director, when do you begin preparing for each edition of The Hindu’s Lit for Life? How do you and the team narrow down on the list of speakers. This is besides the obvious criterion of having published a book in the last calendar year.

I’ve been at LFL for over a decade now, and in all this time I don’t think a single day has gone by in which I haven’t been thinking about the festival. There’s always something brewing, always thoughts about what we can do better, how we can push the envelope, do things differently. Work begins almost as soon as the festival gives over. Picking the writers who make the final cut is hard. Thousands of new books are published every year, of which some are outstanding, and it’s those books and their creators we (and every other festival) would like to feature. But, in addition to the stars of the moment, we also pride ourselves on picking not so obvious writers of immense talent and sophistication so that’s the balance we try to maintain when we come up with a longlist of writers to invite. However, as we have room for less than a hundred writers, that list will need to be whittled down quite ruthlessly. In the end, what we hope to have is an array of writers whose talks and discussions are hugely insightful, provoke thought, and fully engage the thousands of people who attend the festival every day. And, miraculously, after endless deliberations, parleys, frayed nerves, and the consumption of kilometres (not yards) of degree coffee, the small team at LFL manages to put together a festival that we are proud of — year after year!

This year, a workshop focusses on working with Artificial Intelligence (AI). Shantanu Tungare, who’s going to run the session, speaks about ‘creating deep fakes deep faking yourself before deep fake deep fakes you’. What is AI’s involvement in a literature festival today? Do you work with it actively? Or does it not feature in the operations?

For now, the creative side of the literature festival isn’t involved with AI in any way. I’m not sure how I’d feel if AI were to intrude into that space. But as this whole business of AI is so dynamic and fast-moving who knows what things will be like tomorrow! What I am planning is a mega session on AI for 2027, it’s something I am excited about, but to talk about it now would be premature. I have no doubt that there will be an AI component in logistics and operations as we go forward and if it helps the festival I’m all for it.

Do you think it’s India’s time to shine in the translation space especially considering the kind of recognition that both Tomb of Sand and Heart Lamp have elicited in the recent years? What kind of conversation do you expect at LFL regarding this subject at the panels this edition?

Thanks to Tomb Of Sand and Heart Lamp, which deserve every single accolade that’s been heaped on them, translated works in (and from) India are certainly having a moment. However, translations have been around for several decades now. Just because there are more being published at the moment doesn’t necessarily translate into a wider readership. We should never forget that translations need to be quite brilliant in order to succeed and that isn’t always the case. If translations are to consolidate the gains that have been made, and secure a permanent space for themselves in the minds of readers, what needs to be focussed on is excellence — the books that are to be translated need to be outstanding and the translations need to be of a very high order. That’s something that we’ll be talking about.

What was the most thrilling conversation you had with an author in 2025? Are they going to be at the festival? If so, what must we look forward to in that session?

I met Kiran Desai for lunch early in 2025 when she was visiting India and was thrilled to hear that she had finally delivered to her publishers the manuscript of a novel that had been 20 years in the making. It was particularly thrilling as we’d been talking about this book for so many years. However, when I finally got my hands on The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny I must admit to feeling nervous — would it live up to the brilliance of The Inheritance of Loss which I absolutely loved? I needn’t have worried, the novel knocked me sideways, it was extraordinary. So, it will be special that she’ll be in Chennai to talk about her novel with Nirmala Lakshman.

Do you often find people requesting you to platform their favourite writers on the LFL stage? Have you developed a response to this question. If so, can I begin petitioning you to bring my favourite authors down to the festival too?

Yes, this happens all the time, mostly, its welcome. It’s easy to turn down some petitioners because their writers don’t fit LFL’s needs or are simply not good enough, but when it comes to others I’m torn because much as I’d like to feature the writers they represent we either don’t have room for them or some other consideration stands in the way. I’d like to think I never say no to writers of great distinction so if that’s who you are representing, then I’ll be happy to listen to your pitch.

What must one look forward to in LFL 2026?

We have a great line-up of writers and events this year. I’ll mention only a few in no particular order. Shashi Tharoor will present his newest book about Sree Narayana Guru. We’ll have International Booker winners Banu Mushtaq and Deepa Bhasthi, Booker winner Kiran Desai and Oprah pick Megha Mazumdar. We talk about all things India and Indian with Justice DY Chandrachud, Gopalkrishna Gandhi, and TM Krishna among others. If you attend AC Grayling’s session you might feel like you’ve earned a university degree. Laura Spinney will take us on a fascinating journey through the history of words. Weight loss drugs have been all the rage last year, so we have Ambrish Mithal decoding them for us, starting with who should take them, and, equally importantly, who shouldn’t. Satoshi Yagisawa brings his beloved Morisaki bookshop series to Chennai fans in his first-ever appearance at an international literature festival. Then there’s Shobhaa De on sex, romance and sensuality. We all want to listen to Shobhaa. We all want to listen to Rujuta too, who makes sense of our diet in an age obsessed with food and fad diets. This past year there has been loud chatter online and offline about the OTT series Adolescence. Mostly, parents seem terrified and helpless when it comes to dealing with their adolescent kids, so I was thrilled when Shelja Sen agreed to start a conversation about the problems young people have to deal with. And there is more, much more to delight and engage festival goers this year. Fabulous workshops on fitness, wealth management, play-writing and so on.

The schedule is up on the website, registration is open and the festival is free and open to all. Do come!

The Hindu Lit for Life is on January 17 and 18 at The Lady Andal School premises. To register, visit thehindu.com/lit-for-life

Published – January 13, 2026 11:57 am IST