Pico Iyer

Pico Iyer said of his visit: “I’ve been to so many literary festivals, from Shanghai to Bogota, and this one is definitely the least dry, the most carnival-like. Where else would you go from Shakespeare to contemporary politics to V.S. Naipaul and then Sufi music—each in such a full-bodied way? The music definitely had a cleansing, clarifying quality after that clash of ideas, like a sorbet in the middle of a rich meal”.