Humour as writing genre explained

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 23

Chandigarh Literati-2019 kicked off at the Lake Club here today.

The litfest, organised by the Chandigarh Literary Society, covered varied topics — from humour writing to poetry. The first session focused on ‘Oops and Downs of Humour Writing’ and how humour as a genre is fraught with dangers and challenges.

The next session, Translating Timeless Texts, had Dr Bibek Debroy talk about his journey and experience of translating timeless mythologies, especially in context of the Markandeya Purana. The economist and author, known for translations from Sanskrit to English, spoke about how a majority of ancient Indian scriptures, texts and books are yet to be reproduced in other languages. “95 per cent of the manuscripts haven’t been translated yet,” he said.

Another session, Passion through the Ages, had writers Nupur Sandhu, Mukul Kumar, Ruby Gupta and Simran Singh talk about their passion for writing and how it happened. A bureaucrat-turned-author, Mukul Dev, said: “Passion is what excites you and writing is what does that to me.”

Renowned poet Sudeep Sen, along with Sumita Mishra, talked about poetry. He said: “Poetry means different things to different people, but it’s a form of catharsis.” Sen pointed out how we need to dispel the notion that poetry is difficult.

Making their way in between the sessions were book launches and a session titled ‘Revival of Chann Pardesi’. The name itself immediately takes us to Raj Babbar, the actor who also starred in the National award-winning 1980 Punjabi film. While Raj Babbar could not make it to the event, rest of the team of Chann Pardesi — Subhash Sehgal, JS Cheema, Chitrartha Singh, Baldev Gill Manmohan Singh with Ravee Pandher — were present.

Other renowned people who made it to the litfest were author Vineet Bajpai, and Deep Haldar, reformist and educator Sonam Wangchuk, author Ankur Bisen and Mihir Dalal.