Partition, poetry and personal history meet at Ethos Literary Festival 2025

Indian Express

5 days ago

At a time when public discourse is often loud and fleeting, the Ethos Literary Festival offered a day of sustained quietude, thoughtful conversation, and literary grace. Returning for its fourth edition on Saturday at Tango, Ambassador, the event brought together poets, academics, editors, and cultural commentators for what has become one of the more intimate gatherings on India's literary calendar.
Organised by Hawakal, the independent publishing house known for its poetry catalogues, the 2025 edition of Ethos remained true to its ethos: 'letters and lore, lifestyle and legacy.' This year, that sensibility found expression in a deeply curated mix of book launches, poetry readings, and nuanced discussions.
Among the day's defining moments was the felicitation of Professor Swati Pal, Principal of Janki Devi Memorial College, University of Delhi, and Mitali Chakravarty, editor of Borderless Journal, with the Ethos Literary Award 2025. The award not only recognised their literary contributions, but also their broader cultural commitments to inclusivity, critical thinking, and resistance through language.
Speaking to indianexpress.com after the event, Pal spoke of her debut collection, In Absentia (2020), which emerged from personal loss. 'It arose from loss—from the fact that a major tragedy occurred in my life,' she said. 'While some of my poems were funny or satirical, most dealt with sadness, sorrow, challenges, and problems. I really believe in that very Shelleyan concept: 'Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.''
Pal, who has been with her college for nearly 30 years, brings her interests in performance studies, cultural history, and creative writing into both her scholarship and poetry. She also writes on education policy, and has long been an advocate for disability rights, widowhood awareness, and elder care—causes she says are still underrepresented in Indian literary and academic circles.
Asked about her literary influences, she invoked Thomas Hardy, whose melancholic fatalism first moved her as a schoolgirl. 'Hardy has never left me,' she said. 'That line from The Mayor of Casterbridge—'Happiness is but an occasional episode in the general drama of pain'—has lingered all my life.'
While the festival unfolded over seven hours, it retained the feel of an extended salon. Several book launches stood out—not least The Lost Pendant: Bengali Partition Poems in English, selected and introduced by Professor Angshuman Kar, and Mitali Chakravarty's From Calcutta to Kolkata: A City of Dreams, a hybrid text that fuses memoir and cultural essay.
Later in the afternoon, the festival hosted the launch of Contours of Him, an anthology of poems curated by Professor Malachi Edwin Vethamani, with readers including Swati Pal and poet Sudeep Sen. In tone and texture, the collection echoed much of what Ethos seems intent on doing: holding complexity without judgement.
A singular presence at the festival was Amit Khanna, the lyricist behind Bollywood standards such as Chalte Chalte and Yeh Naina Yeh Kajal. His reading from Ananta Raag, a new poetry volume translated by Professor Manabendranath Saha, added a note of lyrical retrospection. Khanna, known for working with Laxmikant-Pyarelal and Bappi Lahiri, offered a glimpse of the poet behind the screenwriter. Sharing a stage with Pal after the award ceremony, his presence served as a subtle reminder of how art—be it poetry or song—often grows out of the same soil.
This year, Hawakal also partnered with Mrinalika Weaves, a textile and artisan initiative that works with rural craftspeople across India.