Jaipur Literature Festival 2026 Announces Final Speaker Line-Up, Showcasing a Global Constellation of Ideas

The Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF), globally celebrated as the “greatest literary show on earth,” has announced the final set of speakers for its 19th edition, scheduled to be held from January 15 to 19, 2026, at Hotel Clarks Amer, Jaipur. With this announcement, the Festival completes a thoughtfully curated and intellectually rich programme, bringing together an extraordinary assembly of authors, thinkers, artists, policymakers, and cultural trailblazers from India and across the world.

The final speaker list reflects the Festival’s hallmark diversity, featuring Nobel laureates, Booker Prize winners, Sahitya Akademi awardees, historians, scientists, poets, social commentators, philanthropists, and public intellectuals. Festival Co-Directors Namita Gokhale and William Dalrymple will join a stellar line-up that includes celebrated literary voices such as Amish, Anne Applebaum, Alice Oswald, Daisy Rockwell, Deepa Bhasthi, Esther Freud, Jeet Thayil, Kiran Desai, Marie Darrieussecq, Megha Majumdar, Neige Sinno, Richard Flanagan, Ruchir Joshi, Tamim Al-Barghouti, and Sonya Rhie Mace.

Adding depth to the programme are eminent economists and policymakers including Arvind Subramanian, Esther Duflo, Nicholas Stern, Radoslaw Sikorski, and Abhishek Singh. Historians, biographers, and chroniclers such as Alex von Tunzelmann, Fredrik Logevall, Janina Ramirez, Fara Dabhoiwala, Avi Shlaim, Ella Al-Shamahi, Jos Gommans, and Devesh Kapur further enrich the Festival’s global intellectual canvas.

The Festival also foregrounds voices from science, culture, journalism, and the arts. Participants include Timothy Berners-Lee, Rachel Clarke, Laura Spinney, Lucy Hughes-Hallett, Bhawana Somaaya, Andrew Graham-Dixon, Marcia Langton, Debra Diamond, Helen Molesworth, and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud. Popular culture, wellness, business, and sport are represented by figures such as Rujuta Diwekar, Pernia Qureshi, Viswanathan Anand, Vir Das, Stephen Fry, and H.H. Maharaja Gaj Singh II of Marwar-Jodhpur. Political leaders and commentators including Leo Varadkar, Karan Singh, Thant Myint-U, and Vandana Vasudevan add further contemporary relevance.

Speaking about the Festival, Namita Gokhale highlighted JLF 2026 as a celebration of human imagination across disciplines and cultures, while William Dalrymple described it as a vibrant crossroads of global thought. Sanjoy K. Roy, Managing Director of Teamwork Arts, reaffirmed the Festival’s role as a global platform for creativity, discourse, and cultural exchange.

Alongside literary sessions, JLF 2026 will also feature the Jaipur Music Stage, Heritage Evenings, and the 13th edition of Jaipur BookMark, continuing its commitment to inclusivity, accessibility, and meaningful dialogue across art, culture, and ideas.