The 30th BookForum International Festival announces program of events with participation of Anne Applebaum, Slavenka Drakulić and Peter Pomerantsev

Lviv BookForum 2023 has published its program. This was reported on the website of NGO “Publishers’ Forum”, initiator and organizer of the festival.

Events of the festival will take place at the Gunpowder Tower, the old element of the defensive system of the city, built in the 16th century. Focus topic of the festival is “Writing the Future”.

The festival’s discussion platform includes more than 20 topics. Among them are:

• “Remembering the Way to the Future”: Georgi Gospodinov, Ostap Slyvynskyi, Uilleam Blacker, Katherine Younger.
• “War as the collapse of civilization: Can there be happiness after war?”: Vakhtang Kebuladze, Anne Applebaum, Tetyana Oharkova, Slavenka Drakulić, Maksym Yakovlyev.
• “Planning a Marshall Plan for Ukraine: Why Ukraine’s victory will benefit everyone”: Sevgil Musayeva, Oleksandra Matviichuk, Kristina Berdynskykh, Timothy Garton Ash, Bernard-Henri Lévy.
• “Freedom of thoughts vs Indoctrination”: Jaroslava Barbieri, Janine di Giovanni, Peter Pomeranzev, Ian Garner.
• “Existential resilience: How global historical changes affect who we are”: Kateryna Kalytko, Iryna Tsilyk, David Toscana, Taras Prokhasko, Sasha Dovzhuk.
• “Fighting for or with words? The challenges of speaking about war”: Luke Harding, David Rieff, Yaryna Chornohuz, Svitlana Povalyaieva, Tetyana Oharkova.
• “Modern Mythologies: Do we still need heroes in the 21st century?”: Emma Antoniuk, Vakhtang Kebuladze, Peter Pomeranzev, Olena Huseynova.

Four literary talks will also take place:

• Conversation between Andrii Kurkov and Jonathan Franzen
• Conversation between Art Spiegelman and Oleksandr Mykhed
• Conversation between Volodymyr Arenev and Jonathan Stroud
• Conversation between Kateryna Kalytko and Ozren Kebo.

RELATED: The dates of the literary and translation festival TRANSLATORIUM have been announced

The program also includes partner discussions:

• “And in the great new family, the family of the free… How do we create closeness in the  conditions of war?” in partnership with Radio Culture: Iryna Tsilyk, Yurko Prokhasko, Janine di Giovanni, Olena Huseynova
• “How the Maidan changed us. A conversation about 10 years of struggle” in partnership with Espresso TV Channel: Antin Borkovskyi, Kateryna Kalytko, Vitalii Portnykov
• “How does the Russian assault on Ukraine change our view of colonialism and decolonization?” in partnership with Ukrainska Pravda media:  Mishra Pankaj, Volodymyr Yermolenko, Sevgil Musayeva, Nicola Careem
• Awarding ceremony of Ukrainian Jewish Encounter Prize “Encounter” winners in partnership with Canadian NGO “Ukrainian Jewish Encounter”: Olena Styazhkina, Olga Mukha, Nataliia Fedushchak, Oksana Forostyna
• “How do we speak? The language and its heroes” in partnership with Radio Culture: Olexander Mykhed, Volodymyr Yermolenko, Iryna Slavinska, Olesya Khromeychuk
• “The power of words”. Ben Okri, Rachel Clarke and Halyna Kruk in conversation supported by BOOK AID.

On Oct. 7, Night (evening) of poetry and music will take place, with Svitlana Povalyaieva, Yaryna Chornohuz, Pavlo Vyshebaba, Ostap Slyvynsky, Halyna Kruk, Olena Huseynova, Kateryna Mikhalitsyna, Pyrih i Batih band, the poetry group Landschaft with Hryhoriy Semenchuk, and German poet Ulrike Almut Sandig. Locations of the events are Lviv Puppet Theater. Lower hall.

In addition, there will be memoriam events dedicated to honoring the memory and work of Ukrainian writers Victoria Amelina and Volodymyr Vakulenko, who died during Russia’s war against Ukraine.

BookForum is the Lviv International Literary Festival and a book fair. Since 1994, it has been held every autumn in Lviv, and is organized by the NGO Publishers’ Forum.

Image: Lviv BookForum