Kapil Pandey’s May the Folk Be With You: A Tale of the Missing Barbers
By Kavya Arjun, Grade 12 It’s a tough task to simply capture the attention of one’s audience, but Kapil Pandey’s extraordinary performance had the audience absolutely enraptured. Starting out with a quick get-to-know-you session, the storyteller gave us a sneak-peek into the performance with a short vocal warm-up of ‘Lakdi Ki Kathi’, which transported the […]
Post-Pandemic Parenting
By Kavya Arjun, Grade 12 “You don’t know what is broken.” In a deeply vulnerable discussion between panellists Dr. Pramit Rastogi, Shabnam Minwalla, and Dr. Tanu Shree Singh, parents and educators in the audience gained an understanding of how children have been affected by the pandemic, and consequently, how they must adapt their parenting styles […]
No Holds Barred with Ashim Ahluwalia
By Jyothsana Narasimhan, Educator In the world of cinema, there are filmmakers who adhere to conventional storytelling and then there are those who push the boundaries – Ashim Ahluwalia belongs to the family of the latter wherein his films and series delve into the unconventional and the tabooed. Ahluwalia’s films challenge traditional narratives and take […]
Adaptation – Retelling, Rewriting, and Renewing
By Anya Shenoy, Grade 10 The excitement hung in the air on Day 2 of NLF. Some fresh faces appeared, while others returned for a fun-filled day. Of the numerous activities available, some of the most insightful were the masterclasses. Authors from far and wide gathered to talk about their stories. One of the masterclasses […]
Nidhi Sudhan on Living in the Age of AI
By Kabir Basu, Grade 10 Artificial intelligence, social media and technology have undoubtedly become a massive part of our lives, and an interactive session by Nidhi Sudhan, a responsible media advocate and co-founder of Citizen Digital Foundation (CDF) effectively captured the combination of wonder and fear that conflicts us when thinking about what the future […]
A Masterclass in Empathy
By Devyanshi Chakraborty, Grade 10 In a masterclass led by Neev Book Award winning author Nandita da Cunha, we embarked on a journey into the heart of storytelling through the lens of empathy. This transformative session opened our minds to the power of understanding and harnessing empathy as a vital component in the writer’s toolkit. […]
Takeaways from NLF 2023
By Anaaya Kanchan, Grade 8 The Neev Literature Festival was a 2-day event packed with performances, sessions, talks, masterclasses and readings. Authors and performers from around the world and the country came together to speak and perform to a large and diverse audience, leaving all of us with a vast wealth of knowledge and experiences. […]
Growing Historical Awareness – A Masterclass with Hannah Lalhlanpuii
By Sanjana Garg, Grade 10 Participants at the Neev Literature Festival 2023 conversed with author Hannah Lalhlanpuii, whose debut novel When Blackbirds Fly was shortlisted for the Neev Book Award 2023 in the Young Adult category. This book, set in the early years of Mizoram’s two-decade quest for independence, against the backdrop of the Aizawl […]
Jyoti Rajan Gopal on Straddling Cultures
Sunayana Surana, Grade 10 The interactive sessions for children were kicked off on Day 1 of the Neev Literature Festival 2023 by Jyoti Rajan Gopal, an author of many cultures. Jyoti talked about the formative years of her life—going from one country to another and learning to adjust and thrive everywhere—she lived in Thailand, shifted […]
Unveiling Layers: A Masterclass in Close Reading with Colin and Anuradha
By Vaishali Ghosh Basu, Educator On Saturday, the first day of the Neev Literature Festival, a masterclass on close reading led by the dynamic duo, Colin Kelman and Anuradha Ruhil Barua, left participants spellbound during a 45-minute session that transcended the ordinary. Both distinguished DP teachers in the IB curricula and members of the Neev […]