The 13th annual edition of the Lahore Literary Festival concluded on Feb. 23, 2025. Staged at the Alhamra Arts Center, this three-day celebration of Pakistan’s intellectual capital welcomed festivalgoers in the thousands.
A vibrant celebration of literature, poetry, film, art, architecture, heritage, #LLF2025 brought together some of the most acclaimed, globally influential voices. This year’s distinguished speakers included:
- Diana Darke – Author of Stealing from the Saracens and The Merchant of Syria, she is a Middle East cultural historian specializing in Islamic architecture and heritage.
- Susan Stronge – Senior Curator at the Victoria & Albert Museum specializing in Mughal and Sikh courtly arts, she is the author of Painting for the Mughal Emperor.
- Maithree Wickramasinghe – Chair and Senior Professor of English at the University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, she is the author, most recently, of Unexpectedly.
- Peter Frankopan – Renowned historian and author of, among others, The Silk Roads: The Extraordinary History that Created Your World (2018) and The Earth Transformed: An Untold Story (2023). He serves as director of the Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research and is a fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society.
- Eduardo Manzano Moreno – Spanish historian specializing in Al-Andalus, he is a research professor at CSIC, Madrid, and author of Conquistadores, emires y califas.
- Mishal Husain – BBC journalist and author of The Skills: From First Job to Dream Job, she is one of the U.K.’s most prominent broadcasters.
- Azza El-Hassan – Palestinian filmmaker and media professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, she is the author of The Afterlife of Palestinian Images.
- Jessica Bruder – Journalist and author of Nomadland, which inspired the Oscar-winning film, and Snowden’s Box. She specializes in long-form narrative reporting.
- Fatimah Asghar – Poet and screenwriter for Ms. Marvel, she is also the author of If They Come for Us and co-creator of the Emmy-nominated web series Brown Girls.
- David Wagner – German author of Lives, which won the Leipzig Book Fair Prize, and Four Apples.
- Julia von Lucadou – Swiss-German author of The High-Rise Diver and Tick Tack, she explores dystopian themes in literature.
- Sunela Jayawardena – Sri Lankan environmental architect and author of A Line of Lanka, she examines myth, landscape, and cultural heritage.
- Luca M. Olivieri – Director of the Italian Archaeological Mission in Swat, Pakistan, he specializes in South Asian archaeology and cultural heritage preservation.
- Clemens Berger – Austrian writer, essayist, and playwright. His notable works include the novel Das Streichelinstitut and the play Gatsch.
- Haji Noor Deen Mi Guangjiang – Lecturer at the Islamic College in Zhengzhou and researcher at the Henan Academy of Sciences. A master of Islamic calligraphy, he specializes in the Sini style, rooted in the Chinese Muslim tradition.
- Sofka Zinovieff – British journalist and acclaimed author, among others, of Putney (2018), The Mad Boy, Lord Berners, My Grandmother and Me (2014), Red Princess: A Revolutionary Life (2007). She studied anthropology at Cambridge.
Event Program
The complete three-day program is available below and can be downloaded here. As always, LLF was free and open to all.
Legacy of Excellence
As South Asia’s premier literary festival, LLF has hosted Nobel laureates, Pulitzer and Booker Prize winners, and some of the world’s most thought-provoking minds. It has been internationally recognized in media such as The New York Times, BBC, The Guardian, Newsweek International, Al Jazeera, Indian Express, Gulf News, and The Wall Street Journal.
Past delegates have lauded the festival, including:
- Roger Cohen, The New York Times, who called LLF “a wonder of creativity, eclecticism, and ideas.”
- Michael Palin, celebrated author and Monty Python alumnus, who described it as “something special.”
- John Elliott of Newsweek International, who praised its unmatched energy, saying it “beat Jaipur [Literature Festival] for passion.”
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