The ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival, the world’s largest free literary festival, today announced the first line up of 77 authors set to participate in the 2015 event.

Taking place from 21-25 January 2015 at the historic Diggi Palace, Jaipur, the eighth edition of the ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival will see Nobel Laureate Sir. V. S. Naipaul, 2013 Man Book Prize Winner Eleanor Catton, acclaimed novelist Hanif Kureishi and celebrated American travel writer Paul Theroux take center-stage along with some of India’s leading authors, including prominent Hindi poet Kedarnath Singh, current Man Booker Prize nominee Neel Mukherjee, best-selling novelist Amish Tripathi and celebrated author and translator Arshia Sattar, as well as internationally loved German children’s author Cornelia Funke.

The 2015 Festival will have a number of themes running through the various sessions and panel discussions on all the five days. There will be a strong emphasis on poetry, as well as celebrating South Asia through all genres of writing and a particular strand of sessions which will showcase and celebrate the rich literature of the Seven Sister States of North-East India. Following on from the popular theme of Crime and Punishment at last year’s ZEE JLF, this January’s festival will look at writing associated with The Seven Deadly Sins, as well as continuing a second strand of the celebrated Women Uninterrupted series.

After its successful debut at the 2014 Festival, the Jaipur BookMark will return for a second edition, taking place at Narain Niwas on 21 and 22 January 2015. The b2b platform is a place for the global publishing community to come together and discuss issues and challenges faced by the industry, as well as India’s rapidly changing digital and print publishing landscape.

The Festival will once again champion Indian language literature with the great Hindi writer Vinod Kumar Shukla, Bangla writer Sangeeta Bandopadhyay, Marathi Dalit woman writer Urmila Pawar, and the towering figure of dramatist Girish Karnad all scheduled to attend. So far the programme includes Hindi, Urdu, Rajasthani, Marathi, Manipuri, Kannadiga, Telugu, Tamil, Sanskrit, Punjabi and Pali writers with more to be announced soon. The diversity of voices and breadth of Indian and international languages found at the Festival is unique amongst literary festivals in India and across the world.

Namita Gokhale, writer and co-Director of the ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival, said, “The Zee Jaipur Literature Festival has become one of the wonders of the thinking world. A platform for collective creativity and individual understanding, it emphasizes both global and local perspectives to make sense of our changing times. The 2015 edition will continue to nurture books, ideas and dialogue, and showcase the range and diversity of South Asian literature as well as the best in international writing.”

William Dalrymple, writer and co-Director of the ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival, said, “This may well be one of the strongest international lists we've ever fielded at Jaipur with several writers I've been chasing for almost a decade - for example Nicholson Baker, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Elizabeth Gilbert, Paul Theroux, Eleanor Catton, Kate Summerscale and Alberto Manguel - finally agreeing to come and star at Diggi. Major themes include the meltdown in the Middle East and Afpak, spies, historical fiction, alternative sexualities, memoir writing, cricket writing, as well as writing about politics, pirates, natural history and the life cycle of the humble honey bee! I can't wait- it’s going to be our best year yet.”

Sanjoy K. Roy, producer of the ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival, said, “Once again ZEE JLF will bring the best minds from across the globe to Jaipur for one of the greatest literary gatherings! The Festival has grown year on year and last year welcomed over 2.5 lakh booklovers to the Pink City.”