Speaking of the City w/ Lavanya Sankaran

Bangalore’s World-Famous Semi-Deluxe Writing Program sponsors a monthly curated talk called Speaking of the City, at Shoonya (Lalbagh Road). Writers, artists, journalists, scholars, architects, scientists, entrepreneurs, historians, geographers, activists or anyone who has worked in Bangalore will be invited to speak in this city that we all inhabit.

The first talk in our lecture series, in July 2017, was with Ramachandra Guha and was followed by a session with Vivek Shanbhag, both of which pulled in big crowds. Sugata Srinivasaraju thrilled us in October with his thoughts on growing up in the city and how it has affected his views on writing – and his work as an editor, translator, and top journalist.

Now it is time for the fourth talk in the ‘Speaking of the City’ talk show series that we’re proud to host at Shoonya and we’re glad to be able to invite Lavanya Sankaran to share her thoughts with us in an exclusive event.

|| Speaker – Lavanya Sankaran ||

Nine US publishers competed in a three day auction for the rights to Lavanya Sankaran’s first two books: The Red Carpet (2005), a celebrated short-story collection, and her debut novel, The Hope Factory (2013).

Lavanya’s writing has spent over two years on bestselling lists, including the number 1 spot on Amazon India. She has been translated into French, German, Italian, Russian, and Polish and is currently published in over 15 countries. Critically acclaimed by the Washington Post, Publisher’s Weekly and Kirkus, and compared to Charles Dickens by the British press, her writing has won several awards, including Barnes and Noble Discover New Writers, and Poets and Writers’ Best First Fiction award. Her opinion pieces and fiction appear in The New York Times, The Guardian, and The Atlantic, among others.

Lavanya graduated from Bryn Mawr College, USA. She sponsors two literary fellowships at the Sangam Writers Residency as part of her arts philanthropy.