Several years ago, in 2014, I attended my first-ever Literature festival (‘Lit Fest’). It was the renowned Jaipur Literature Festival, and it was overwhelming and exhilarating. Thousands of people spread out across a massive garden venue, imbibing knowledge, networking, flirting, drinking, eating or furiously running to catch a session before it ends. It felt a bit like Lollapalooza for cool nerds. After two days of attending countless talks, I was hooked. I was exhausted. I was inspired.
On the long drive back to my home in Delhi from Jaipur, I imagined what it would be like to be one of the festival speakers. To get flown into Jaipur by the festival organisers. To chill in the speakers’ lounge drinking white wine and discussing all things life with some of the brightest minds and talented writers in the country and abroad. To sit on stage and speak about my book, my life, my passions in front of hundreds of people in attendance. To see queues of people lining up to buy my book and then queuing up again to get my personalised message on the book. Yes, I’ll admit, many aspects of this image had more to do with my ego than making a difference to others. But, hey, I am human.
Fast forward eight years. I published my first book, and the festival invites immediately arrived. TATA Lit Live in Mumbai. Orange City Lit Fest in Nagpur. Bangalore Literature Festival. I could not believe it. Within a month of getting published, I was already invited to be on the lit fest tour across India. As of writing this post, I have participated in three festivals and a few promotional events organised in bookstores. My overall experience has been almost as amazing as I had imagined while driving back home from the Jaipur Literature Festival in 2014.
I’ll share a few insights and learnings that I have taken away from my festival experience thus far:
- Most festivals organisers go out of their way to make you feel like a celebrity before, during and after the festival – this means booked flights, 5-star hotel stay, airport pick-up, fancy dinners for authors, private lounges with free booze, glowing introductions and large creatives of my book on stage. All of it made me feel super important and like an imposter several times throughout the experience.
- It goes without saying, but it makes a massive difference when you have a celebrity on your panel. In Bengaluru, Indian national football team captain Sunil Chhetri joined our panel, and this meant main stage panel placement, the best session timing and standing-room-only attendance – plus, we sold about 100 books to festival attendees that day. Oh, and my Instagram following jumped up a few rungs post the session.
- These festivals are the perfect platform to share messages with new audiences. Since I typically interact with people already working in the sports industry or sports management students, I welcomed the opportunity to talk about the past, present and future potential of Indian football with thousands of people who are either passionately supporting or flirting with the sport.
- I have found that networking at these festivals can be awkward. I am not looking to conduct business or collaborate with the other writers, so the best I can do is ask people what they have written and then ask them questions about their topic. This can feel exhausting, especially after speaking with hundreds of festival attendees about my book. Also, when I see an author whose book(s) I have read and enjoyed, I struggle to find an entry-line other than “Hello, I’m Neel. I loved reading _______,” which is something they would have already heard millions of times before. In addition, I am not sure what else I would want to talk to these writers about, so it is easier to avoid the awkward conversation altogether. Not great advice, but this has been my experience.
- While speaking at the festivals is incredible, nothing beats the high I felt while writing the book – this was a surprising realisation that was validated by many of the other authors I interacted with over the past few months.
Okay. That’s it. I pray that I get to participate in these high-quality literature festivals for many more years, as they are a blast and make me look somewhat important and cool in front of friends and family (at least I think they do). I am confident that one day I will be invited to the world-famous Jaipur Literature Festival and hope that an actual celebrity agrees to join me on stage, so people show up to the panel discussion and buy my book.
Sharing a few images from the festivals I’ve recently attended…
