Franschhoek Literary Festival: Star-studded line-up of local and international authors

The Franschhoek Literary Festival takes place this weekend from 13 to 15 May in the Cape Winelands town of Franschhoek. It is the first time the festival will take place in person again since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. With thought-provoking discussions and top local and international authors in the mix, this is a must for all book lovers.

“It has been quite a challenge to revive the festival and to get renewed sponsorship during COVID, especially in the book sector where we have such a small book-buying market,” said programme director Ingeborg Pelser. 

Fortunately, sponsorship has come from News24, Exclusive Books, Jonathan Ball Publishers and long-time supporter Porcupine Ridge. This has enabled the festival to include writers like Booker Prize winner Damon Galgut, Elif Shafak and Tsitsi Dangaremba.

FRANSCHHOEK LITERARY FESTIVAL: AUTHORS TO LOOK OUT FOR

If you’ve ever fallen in love with a classic work of South African literature, you’ll probably find the author on the programme. Here are some of the local writers on the programme:

• Qarnita Loxton, one of the authors of Chasing Marian. 
• Deon Meyer will be chatting about his latest work, The Dark Flood.
• Fred Khumalo, who wrote Two Tons O’ Fun.
• Dr Sindiwe Magona, author of When the Village Sleeps.
• Damon Galgut, who won the Booker Prize last year with The Promise.
• Zakes Mda will discuss his newest publication, Wayfarers’ Hymns.

There will also be several international authors making an appearance. 

“For the first time, we are doing a hybrid festival,” says Pelser. “Most authors will attend in person, but because of the challenge to get international authors to travel, we have five sessions where authors like Elif Shafak, Jeffrey Archer, Jonathan Dimbleby, Bill Browder and Charlie Mackesy will be interviewed virtually by an in-person interviewer in front of a live audience.”

The festival will, however, play host to in-person events featuring international authors such as Lionel Shriver and Jonny Duddle.

Pelser highlights the presence of Tsitsi Dangaremba, “the multi-award-winning Zimbabwean author whose book Nervous Conditions was named by the BBC as one of the top 100 books that shaped the world”.

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE FRANSCHHOEK LITERARY FESTIVAL PROGRAMME

With over 100 participants and 90 events, there is something for everyone on the schedule. Here are some of the sessions Pelser recommends:

• The Outside Story: Shaun de Waal asks Andrew Harding (Sunday Times/CNA Non-fiction Award winner for These Are Not Gentle People) about his foreign correspondent’s experience of South Africa. It’s all about what can outsiders see in our social fabric.

• Light & Shade: Finuala Dowling asks Karen Jennings (An Island) and Joanne Joseph (Children of Sugarcane) about the art of creating morally complex characters.

• Unpromised Land: Mark Gevisser talks to 2021 Booker Prize winner Damon Galgut about The Promise, its literary influences, and its reflections on post-apartheid South Africa.

• The Female Line:  Yewande Omotoso talks about women’s voices and the art of generational fiction with Tsitsi Dangarembga (This Mournable Body) & Sindiwe Magona (When The Village Sleeps).

• Putin and I: Tony Leon speaks to Bill Browder (Freezing Order), the businessman who played a long, bloodsoaked chess game against the Putin regime and lobbied for the Magnitsky Act, a key weapon against the Kremlin.

• The Zen of Zakes: Refilwe Moloto talks to master novelist Zakes Mda about Wayfarers’ Hymns, a bildungsroman set among the famous folk musicians of Lesotho. How does physical distance (Mda lives and writes in Athens, Ohio), shape his profoundly African storytelling voice?

• After the Plague: Lionel Shriver & Tom Eaton discuss the changing shape of our society and the lasting effects of the pandemic on our lives with John Maytham in the chair.

• Unbowed: Pippa Hudson speaks to Zimbabwean entrepreneur Rusty Labuschagne, who survived 10 years of maximum security imprisonment for a murder he didn’t commit. His inspirational memoir, Beating Chains, reveals what he learned.

The full programme can be found on the festival website, with tickets sold on Webtickets. There are discounted tickets available for students.